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West Bethlehem in Final Stages of Ghettoization
Latest News, Palestinian Grassroots Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign, May 22nd, 2006

In West Bethlehem, between al-Khader and the villages to be isolated in a ghetto on the west side of the Wall, the Occupation has begun building a tunnel under the settler-only road. This construction and the associated land devastation will finalize the isolation of the villages in an unbearable ghetto.

Previously, on November 21, 2005, Occupation forces confiscated 85 dunum from Battir, Beit Jala and al-Khader villages to build a tunnel under Road 60, which links the settlements in Jerusalem to those in Hebron district. Located close to al-Khader, the settlers-only road is an integral part of the Wall path and completes it.

Once the tunnel is completed, all other passages can be closed and people channelled, controlled and humiliated under the Jewish-only bypass. 18,000 people in the villages of West Bethlehem will soon be completely isolated. Al-Khader, on the other side of the Wall, will be isolated from lands cultivated with vegetables, grapes and almonds that remain within the boundaries of the West Bethlehem ghetto. Not only will Nahallin, Battir, al-Walaje, Husan and Wadi Fuqin be completely imprisoned, but the Occupation has recently approved the expansion of Betar Illit settlement, which will confiscate much of the villages’ remaining lands. The latest plans will expropriate 400 dunum from the Palestinian villages for the sake of Zionist settlers.

Above: Preparing Al-Khader’s confiscated land to build a tunnel under the settler-only road.