Israeli settlers take over Palestinian pastureland as part of state policy to drive out communities

In February and March 2024, B’Tselem documented some 20 incidents in which Israeli settlers and soldiers drove Palestinian shepherds out of pastureland in the South Hebron Hills, using various means. These incidents are part of a deliberate pattern of settler actions meant to promote Israel’s policy of expulsion, crucially affecting the survival of these communities. The State of Israel is working to drive Palestinian pastoral communities out of their homes in the West Bank in order to take over their areas of habitation, including farmland and pastureland, and use them for its own purposes. To that end, it combines official practices, implemented by branches of the state such as the Civil Administration and the military, with an unofficial arm of organized settler violence and harassment. This combination is used, among other things, to limit the communities’ ability to set their flocks to graze, which damages their income – making them more vulnerable and easier to drive out. In the last decade, dozens of “farms” have been established by settlers in the West Bank, supported by the state but not officially authorized, in order to take over pastureland in Palestinian rural areas. Since the Hamas attack and beginning of the war in Gaza on 7 October 2023, many settlers involved in these violent acts have been deployed in the military “territorial defense“ unit or in emergency squads and given military weapons. This makes it impossible to distinguish when they are operating under military orders and when they are acting independently while in uniform. The harassment is focused on preventing the communities from taking their flocks out to graze in broader and broader areas. Sometimes, the settlers drive the shepherds out themselves with threats and violence, while the authorities turn a blind eye. At other times, they summon soldiers and Border Police officers who cite various pretexts to force the shepherds to leave. Some pretexts supposedly relate to security, such as being too close to roads serving settlers, for example on private Palestinian land. Others relate to the status of the land, such as claiming that the shepherds are in state land allocated to settlers, a firing zone or a nature reserve, generally designated to exclude Palestinians, or a general assertion that the land is not private Palestinian land. Under the pressure of violence and threats, and with no other options, Palestinian communities are abandoning or scaling back traditional economic activities such as shepherding and growing seasonal crops, which supported them comfortably for generations. They are moving away from pastureland and water sources they used to utilize, and are reducing the cultivation of farmland. Meanwhile, the authorities allow settlers to graze sheep freely on Israeli-declared state land, in firing zones, and even on private Palestinian land. The settlers, who often set their sheep to graze close to Palestinian homes, harass the residents and shepherds, assault them, and damage their crops and other property. State violence – both official and unofficial – is integral to the Israeli apartheid regime, which seeks to Judaize the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. This regime views land as a resource meant to serve the Jewish public, and therefore uses it almost exclusively to develop and expand existing Jewish settlements and establish new ones. At the same time, the regime fragments Palestinian space, dispossesses Palestinians of their land, and pushes them into small, crowded enclaves. Read more: #full