New demolition order for West Bank camp is ‘more devastating news’

This article is published in association with United Nations.

Israel has issued new demolition orders for the Nur Shams camp in the north of the occupied West Bank effective this week, which a senior official with the UN Palestine refugee agency (UNRWA) labelled as “more devastating news” for the region.  

Some 25 buildings face imminent demolition starting on 18 December, impacting hundreds of forcibly displaced Palestinians, the Director of UNRWA Affairs for the occupied West Bank, Roland Friedrich, said on Tuesday in a statement posted on social media.

Furthermore, satellite imagery shows that nearly half of all buildings in the camp, 48 per cent, had already been damaged or destroyed before this latest order.

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Goal to control

“This new demolition order fits the pattern we have seen too often this year, with Israeli forces destroying homes to enable their long-term control over the camps in the northern West Bank, permanently altering their topography,” said Mr. Friedrich.

“Justified through ‘military necessity’, these demolitions make no one safer,” he added.

In January, the Israeli military launched a large-scale operation in the northern West Bank that has displaced thousands of Palestinian refugees.

‘Operation Iron Wall’ initially targeted the Jenin refugee camp but expanded to the Tulkarm, Nur Shams, and El Far’a camps.

Distant hope of return

“The forced displacement of the more than 32,000 Palestine refugees in the northern West Bank must not become permanent,” Mr. Friedrich said.

“Residents have anxiously waited for 11 months to return home. With each blow of the bulldozers, this hope becomes ever more distant.”

Supporting Palestine refugees

UNRWA assists nearly six million Palestine refugees in five locations across the Middle East, including at 19 camps in the occupied West Bank.

Some 13,739 people were registered at Nur Shams camp in 2023, where two UNRWA schools – one each for boys and girls – serve roughly 1,571 students.  

Residents also access primary healthcare including reproductive health, infant and childcare, immunisations, screening and medical check-ups, at the camp’s sole health centre.

Fatalities, displacement and destruction

Escalating violence and tensions in the West Bank are cause for alarm, the UN Deputy Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process said on Wednesday in the Security Council in New York.

Ramiz Alakbarov delivered his quarterly briefing on Council resolution 2334 (2016), which calls for Israel to cease settlement activity in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

He told ambassadors that Israeli security operations in the north had caused high fatalities, population displacement, and large-scale destruction, especially in refugee camps. 

“Continued Israeli security presence in camps contravenes obligations to end the unlawful occupation,” he said via videoconference.

Record expansion

Mr. Alakbarov also condemned “relentless Israeli settlement expansion” which “fuels tensions, impedes Palestinian land access, and threatens the viability of a contiguous and sovereign Palestinian State.”

It coincides with rising settler attacks, thus further entrenching occupation, violating international law and undermining Palestinian self-determination.

He said that settlement advancement reached its highest point this year since the UN began tracking nearly a decade ago.

“I urge Israel to abide by its obligations under international law, recalling the International Court of Justice advisory opinion of 19 July 2024, which obliges Israel to cease all new settlement activities, evacuate settlers, and end its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory promptly,” he said.

Rising settler violence

The senior official further condemned rising settler violence across the West Bank, which intensified during the olive harvest. 

Palestinian farmers have faced assaults, harassment, and obstruction from their lands; while olive trees have been uprooted or burned, and entire harvests destroyed.