Holy Land: Tensions grow at Khan al Ahmar as bulldozers arrive

Khan al-Ahmar school, built in 2009 with mud and old tyres, serves over 150 students, aged 6-15, from five villages who have no other access to education.

Source: Facebook/Twitter/Combatants for Peace

Bulldozers arrived yesterday at Khan Al-Ahmar, preparing to raze the Bedouin village - near the site of the Inn of the Good Samaritan - with its homes, school and clinic, to the ground. Palestinian, Israeli and foreign supporters have been trying to form a human wall to stop the army from reaching the houses. Yesterday at least seven people were injured and four were briefly detained. Today one group tweeted that they had managed to bring food in for the villagers - the army had previously stopped people from bringing in any supplies.

A United Nations team with OCHA, is at the village. They wrote on their Facebook page today:

"In this house… I gave birth to all my children… and in this house I celebrated their marriage. Now, they want to uproot us..." This is what a 70-year-old #Palestinian from #KhanAlAhmar - Abu al Helu, who asked not to be identified by name, told us recently, referring to the imminent destruction of all the community's structures.

"We can no longer sleep," she said, "and we are always thinking: maybe the army would come from this or that hilltop."

All residents of this community - 191 people, over half of them children - may be displaced any time now. The community was already displaced from southern Israel in the 1950s.

"We adults get scared when the army shows up here, so you can imagine what happens to the children."

For nine years, the residents fought a legal battle to prevent the destruction of their community. Now, legal remedies have been exhausted.

"The constant anxiety and fear from what may happen are consuming us," she said. "You cannot imagine what we are going through."

Khan al Ahmar - Abu al Helu is one of dozens of herding communities in Area C of the #WestBank that the United Nations views as being at risk of forcible transfer due to a coercive environment generated by Israeli practices and policies.

The Israeli authorities plan to relocate the villagers either to a piece of derelict land beside a sewage treatment facility or 12 12 km away near to a landfill site.

The removal of this village would enable the Israeli government to expand two illegal settlements, Maale Adumim and Kfar Adumim - effectively cutting the occupied West Bank in half.