Hebron homes raided and emptied, CPT team stays with community

Source: Community Peacemaker Teams, International

Community Peacemaker Teams (CPT) condemns the Israeli Occupation Forces' operation now underway in Hebron/al-Khalil in the Occupied West Bank. Soldiers are raiding homes and ordering families out of entire neighbourhoods. Three members of CPT's Palestine team are currently sheltering in place. They've chosen to stay with their families and neighbours. CPT honours that choice and stands with them and the wider community.

"Families should never have to live in fear of being forced out of their homes or separated from the places where they have built their lives," said a member of CPT's Palestine team. "Our presence here is about standing with our families and communities, and affirming that every Palestinian has the right to live safely and with dignity in their own home."

Since early Saturday, Israeli forces have sealed Hebron/al-Khalil behind checkpoints, searched and occupied homes, and used loudspeakers to order residents of neighbourhoods including al-Jalada and Ein Deir Baha to leave. More than 2,670 Palestinians have already been displaced, and the Hebron Municipality has opened an emergency shelter for them.

A friend of the CPT team who was awake on her family's rooftop throughout the night described the fear: "Everyone is expecting evacuations to continue. As I'm writing this, the soldiers are only 200 metres away from my house. Inshallah it's only a bad dream that will end soon."

The operation follows Friday's shooting attack near Hebron in which two Israeli soldiers were killed. Our commitment to nonviolence means we cannot be silent when a whole city is punished for the actions of a few. Forcing families from their homes, raiding them at night and sealing off neighbourhoods is collective punishment, and international humanitarian law forbids it.

CPT calls on:

- Israeli authorities to end the raids and the forced evacuations, and to let displaced families return home;

- The international community and diplomatic missions to act now to protect civilians in Hebron;

- People of faith and conscience to contact their elected representatives and call for action to protect Palestinian civilians, and to follow and share updates from CPT.

LINK

CPT: https://cpt.org/