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Israeli forces have forced around 1,500 Palestinians from 250 families to flee their homes in Hebron, in the southern occupied West Bank, since Friday and plan to displace another 2,500 in the coming hours, the municipality said Saturday, according to Anadolu Agency.
The displaced families lived in the Deir Bahha and al-Jilda neighborhoods, which together are home to 500 families, the municipality said in a statement. Israeli forces marked evacuated homes and delivered notices ordering the remaining families to leave without their vehicles, it added.
The Palestinian Foreign Ministry warned Saturday against inflammatory Israeli statements threatening expanded forced displacement and the evacuation and destruction of neighborhoods in Hebron.
The ministry described the threats as attempts to repeat the “Nakba” and carry out ethnic cleansing. It instructed Palestinian embassies and diplomatic missions to take urgent international action and press governments to adopt firm positions against Israeli practices.
Netanyahu says army is preparing a large-scale offensive
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday, during an incursion into Hebron, that the army was preparing a large-scale military offensive in the occupied West Bank that would involve displacing Palestinians from their neighborhoods and raiding their homes.
“We will do here what we have not done before. We will apply the successful offensive model we implemented in the refugee camps,” he said, referring to military offensives in the northern West Bank.
Hebron under siege for a second day
The Israeli army continued its siege of Hebron for a second consecutive day on Saturday as part of an offensive launched Friday, forcing Palestinians to evacuate their homes.
The army closed the city on Friday after two Palestinians opened fire at an Israeli checkpoint. Both attackers and two Israeli soldiers were killed, while three other soldiers were wounded, according to Israeli figures.
The closure was accompanied by a larger deployment of Israeli military vehicles and bulldozers, the blocking of main entrances and roads linking Hebron to surrounding areas, and raids and searches of homes.
The occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, has seen escalating Israeli military attacks and violence by settlers since Israel launched its war on Gaza in October 2023, which Anadolu Agency described as genocidal.
The attacks have included the killing and detention of Palestinians, demolition of homes and other structures, the burning of mosques and vehicles, bulldozing farmland, preventing farmers from accessing their fields, and displacing Palestinian communities, alongside the expansion of illegal settlements.
Palestinians warn that these measures pave the way for Israel’s formal annexation of the West Bank, undermining prospects for establishing a Palestinian state in accordance with relevant UN resolutions.
