Palestinians fear further evictions in the West Bank under Trump
Palestinians fear further evictions in the West Bank under Trump
The reality of compulsory evacuation
The sixty-year-old farmer Khalid Sawafta, whose head is wrapped in a traditional red-white Keffiyeh, has tears in his eyes. The Israeli orders ask him to leave the country at 9:00 a.m. - only 16 days until the deadline - or to lose everything. According to the United Nations, such evacuations are widespread in the West Bank.
increase in the compulsory evacuation
According to the activist group Peace Now , 227 Palestinian families were sold out of the area last year alone, while the Israeli government has approved more than 8600 new residential units for Israelis in the western bank and increased the financing for settler project was.
political developments
Since the brutal attacks of Hamas on Israel on October 7 of the last year, in which 1200 Israelis were killed and more than 250 others were taken as hostages, the settler leaders in the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are increasingly setting up for the Annexion of the entire western bank. A new concern for the Palestinians is that Donald Trumps is designed for the US ambassador in Israel, Mike huckabee , who has many supporters among Israeli settlers, could accelerate their land losses.
influence of Huckabee
During a visit to Israel in 2017, the former governor of Arkansa's journalist explained something like the West Bank. It is Judea and Samaria, "used the Israeli term for the country. "There are no settlements. These are municipalities, neighborhoods, cities. There is no crew."
insight into the political strategies
The Israeli settler leader and activist Yishai Fleisher, who met Huckabee during several visits to Israel, noticed: "Mike recognizes our request, (he is) no anti-Arab, but he recognizes the Jewish right to this country." Fleisher believes that Huckabee, an evangelical Christian, could even have a greater influence than Trump's last ambassador in Israel, David Friedman, who helped convince the president at the time, Jerusalem to declare the capital of Israel , which was very popular in Israel.
The geopolitical challenges
alon Pinkas, an Israeli diplomat and former advisor of Shimon Peres Prime Minister, who took significant steps towards peace with the Palestinians, is of the opinion that the settlers are misguided and Trump will not be willing to sacrifice his interests in the further region.
The outlook for West Bank
"If Israel is unilaterally large parts of the West Bank, it will not be well received in the Arab world." Pinkas believes that Trump will try to secure what bids could not achieve: the normalization of Israel's relationships with Arab countries, the holy graal of Middle East Diplomacy.
The perspective of a peace agreement
"He is put under pressure by the Saudis, the Katari and the Emiratis to conclude a larger agreement," said Pinkas, referring to the Abraham-Agreement , which normalized the relationships of Israel to the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco. Nevertheless, the war of Israel in Gaza and the many dead among the Palestinians increased the price for this large -scale agreement. Trump's friend, the mighty Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, explained that normalization is only possible if Israel gets involved with a Palestinian state.
The role of the Arab states
The former Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority, Mohammad Shayyeh, is convinced that MBS will hold on to this position. "Maybe there is an opportunity for us with Saudi Arabia, and that's why we coordinate closely with them," he said.
The influence on Israeli politics
In the end, it is Trump's friends and not Huckabee who will probably have an influence on the Israeli government, believes Shtayyeh. "This man will not be the one who dictates the decisions." The Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich in turn expressed hope that the West Bank will soon be part of his country. "The year 2025 will be the year of sovereignty in Judea and Samaria," he said in November.The situation in Bardala
in Bardala claims Israeli civil servants that a recent security threat has triggered the construction of a new barrier that almost completely enclosed Bardala and two other villages with a total of around 4,000 inhabitants, which effectively cuts off their agricultural livelihood. "The goal is to suppress the residents from this region," said local council chairman Ibrahim Sawafta to CNN.
The challenges of the village population
He shows documents that, in his opinion, show the Palestinian possession of the Wadi Salman, the small ground floor, which offers refuge for Khalid's sheep stalls, and that this has been the case for 100 years. Ibrahim reported that they had contacted Israeli officials to postpone the barrier, "but they have completely rejected and claimed that the street had already been planned."
The memory of past compulsory evacuation
Around Bardala is the annexation an overly familiar reality. Khalid, who has just received his evacuation notice, remembered that he was driven out seven years ago. "They came and destroyed everything, didn't leave me behind with anything," he said. The hard reality in Bardala shows that the Palestinian state, even before Trump's impending take office, has become a distant dream.
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