In the year since the Hamas-led attacks on Israel, the occupied West Bank has seen an increase in Israeli military raids and attacks by Israeli settlers. More than 600 Palestinians have been killed.
Suliman Mleihat, 32, and his nine-year-old son Obeida stand in front of Obeida's classroom, where he sheltered from settlers who attacked the school in the Mu’arrajat Bedouin community in mid-September.
Obeida’s dad, Suliman Mleihat, is the head of this rural Palestinian Bedouin community, tucked into the rolling hills of the Jordan Valley. He rushed to the school when he heard the attack was happening — both his young children were there. He says the Israeli military showed up and blocked him and other parents from entering, but also didn’t stop the settlers. “My children are my soul, so it was incredibly difficult to not be able to get to them, to not know if they were okay,” Mleihat says.
“Settler violence isn’t just about a group of young guys on a hilltop anymore,” she says, invoking a common stereotype. “Once the Palestinians are chased out of these areas, the settlements move in and make it much harder to give back the land to the Palestinians,” says Pacheco.: “To prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.
As schoolchildren carrying backpacks try to navigate the piles of rubble and debris in the streets, community leader Farha Abu Hejah observes that the violence has been especially difficult for them.Scenes of destruction of homes, storefronts and infrastructure after Israeli military raids, incursions, and bombings in a refugee camp in Jenin, in the occupied West Bank.
“These last few months have essentially brought in tremendous fears that the destruction in Gaza is going to happen in the West Bank as well,” Shikaki says. “There is a significant rise in the perception of West Bankers that Gaza is coming to them.”Near the center of the Jenin refugee camp, through a small courtyard off a ripped-up street, is the Abu Ali family home — where 26 family members, including eight children, once lived spread over three floors.
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