bipmistry

Today (Thursday), 8 January, after persistent attempts, organized settler groups operating in coordination with, and backed by, the Israeli military and the police, succeeded in forcibly transferring 26 families numbering 124 people, including 59 minors from their homes in the community of Ras ‘Ein al-‘Auja.​ The community of Ras ‘Ein al-‘Auja, located about 10 kilometers north of Jericho, is the largest remaining shepherding community in the West Bank and the last surviving in the southern Jordan Valley, after the area has been “cleansed” of Palestinians. It is still home to about 100 families numbering roughly 600 people. The community has long suffered severe and daily violence carried out by Israeli youths, some of them minors, as well as armed settlers supported by military and police forces. This violence includes repeated incursions into its territory with herds of camels and sheep, physical attacks on residents, destruction and theft of property, and livestock theft. In one incident, in March 2025, approximately 1,500 head of sheep were stolen. On Wednesday, 31 December 2025, another outpost was established some 200 meters from residents’ homes, where, with the approval of the Israeli authorities, herds of sheep and camels were brought for an extended stay. On the morning of Thursday, 8 January 2026, Palestinian families in the houses near which the outpost was established packed their belongings and left their homes of decades. This marks the first wave of departures from the community, whose residents have faced escalating violence since October 2023. Although journalists report on events in the West Bank, diplomats visit and witness them with their own eyes, and local and international human rights organizations document and publicize the rampant violence, world leaders see, know, and yet choose to do nothing to stop the ethnic cleansing in the West Bank.​ The international community, which has failed, and continues to fail, to stop the ongoing genocide in the Gaza Strip, is still standing idly by in the face of the Israeli regime’s crimes in the West Bank, granting de facto immunity to the State itself and the individuals responsible for these crimes.