KHAN AL-AHMAR, West Bank: For the anxious Palestinian residents of Khan Al-Ahmar, there’s little left to do but wait.
After the West Bank hamlet lost its last legal protection against demolition late last week, Israeli forces could swoop in any day now to tear down the desert community’s few dozen shacks and an Italian-funded schoolhouse made from recycled tires.
Some hold out hope that Israel might be deterred by an inevitable international outcry over razing the community. Major European countries have warned that flattening Khan Al-Ahmar poses a grave threat to the already fading prospects of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The seemingly outsized international attention being paid to the tiny community is linked to its strategic location in the center of the West Bank. It’s an area deemed essential for setting up a viable Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, areas Israel captured in 1967.
Israel has portrayed the battle over Khan Al-Ahmar as a mere zoning dispute. Critics of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies say the village has become a symbol for what they describe as an ongoing displacement of Palestinians to make room for Israeli settlements.
With demolition now looming, dozens of activists, including foreigners, have been spending nights in Khan Al-Ahmar to show support. They sleep on mattresses spread out under green tarp covering the front yard of the Italian-funded school.
“We cannot prevent demolition,” said activist Mohammed Abu Hilweh, 30, from Jerusalem, as he stretched out on a mattress on a recent evening, settling in for the night.
“But we can resist, delay and when it happens, we can rebuild,” he said.
Khan Al-Ahmar is located a few dozen meters from a four-lane highway that runs east-west, effectively slicing the West Bank in half at a narrow waist and linking Jerusalem with the Jordan Valley.
The highway is also flanked by several Israeli settlements, including Maaleh Adumim, the West Bank’s third largest. A new settlement across the highway from Maaleh Adumim, called E1 by Israeli planners, would effectively block the remaining land link between West Bank Palestinians and east Jerusalem, their hoped-for capital. Khan Al-Ahmar sits just outside the area mapped for E1, which until now had largely been frozen under US pressure.
Hanan Ashrawi, a senior Palestinian official, called the planned demolition a “blatant attempt” by Israel to separate the Palestinians from Jerusalem. “It is absolutely imperative that the international community intervene,” she said.
For the past 25 years, the international community has favored the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel as the best hope for peace. But those hopes are quickly fading.
In a departure from predecessors, President Donald Trump, who has promised a new peace plan, has refused to endorse the two-state solution while recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, over Palestinian opposition.
The US State Department has said little about the looming demolition, referring reporters to the Israeli government for details.
By contrast, European governments have been outspoken.
“The demolition of this small Palestinian village would not only affect a local community,” EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini recently told the European Parliament. “It would also be a blow against the viability of the state of Palestine and against the very possibility of a two-state solution.”
Separately, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom warned in a rare joint statement that demolition would have “very serious” consequences.
For now, Israel appears to be moving ahead. After a decade-long legal battle, Israel’s Supreme Court rejected a final appeal earlier this month. Late last week, a moratorium on demolition expired.
Israel has not announced a date for the demolition, but earlier this week dismantled five corrugated metal shacks near Khan Al-Ahmar that had been set up by villagers a few days earlier in a show of defiance. On Friday, troops returned with heavy equipment, removing earthen mounds set up to slow demolition. Two Palestinians and an American-French law professor were detained.
The 180 residents of Khan Al-Ahmar are members of the Jahalin Bedouin tribe that has lived in the area since being expelled from the southern Negev Desert after Israel’s establishment in 1948. The United Nations granted them refugee status.
Shani Sasson, a spokeswoman for COGAT, the Israeli defense body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, said Israel has offered to relocate the villagers.
She said the tribe squats on land that is not safe for living, and that the Israeli government has prepared an alternative site just a few kilometers (miles) away with sewage treatment and access to water and electricity. She said Israel has invested over $2 million in the relocation project.
“We are doing them a service,” she said. “This is not against them, this is for them.”
Residents acknowledge that life in their village is tough. But they say there is no place they would rather live. They say Israel is trying to move them to a site that will be too crowded for their livestock and that sits near a sewage facility and a garbage dump.
“We Bedouin people like the desert life,” said Yousef Abu Dahouq, a Khan Al-Ahmar resident, sitting on a wooden bench near the school, sipping tea and smoking a waterpipe. “We live next to each other, support each other.”
The Palestinians and Europeans see a deeper Israeli agenda.
Khan Al-Ahmar is in the 60 percent of the West Bank that is known as Area C and remains under full Israeli control, according to interim peace deals from the 1990s that are seemingly locked in place because of diplomatic paralysis. The remainder of the territory is administered by a Palestinian autonomy government.
Area C is home to about 400,000 Israeli settlers and an estimated 150,000 to 200,000 Palestinians. Israel places severe restrictions on Palestinian development while supporting and promoting dozens of settlements in the area.
The EU has attempted to build numerous structures for Palestinians in Area C, only to see them demolished or rejected because of a lack of hard-to-get permits. Khan Al-Ahmar’s Italian-funded school was built from car tires because a construction permit could not be obtained.
“This is the situation on the ground: New settlements for Israelis are built, while Palestinian homes in the same area are demolished,” said Mogherini. “This will only further entrench a one-state reality, with unequal rights for the two peoples, perpetual occupation and conflict.”
The village chief, Eid Khamis, promised to put up a fight.
“They want to kick us out and build settlements and we will not let that happen,” he said. “It’s our land.”
Doomed Palestinian village turns to Europe as last hope
Doomed Palestinian village turns to Europe as last hope
- Major European countries have warned that flattening Khan Al-Ahmar poses a grave threat to the already fading prospects of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- Critics of PM Netanyahu’s policies say the village has become a symbol for the ongoing displacement of Palestinians to make room for Israeli settlements
Hamas says it ‘positively’ views Gaza Biden ceasefire proposal; EU chief also finds it to be ‘realistic'
- Hamas’ position signals a change in attitude from the group, which in recent months had accused the US obstructing attempts for a ceasefire
- Rifts between Biden and Netanyahu over red lines in Gaza has set up a potential showdown between the two leaders
GAZA: Hamas on Friday said it had a positive view of the contents of a three-phase ceasefire proposal announced by US President Joe Biden for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
“Hamas confirms its readiness to deal positively and in a constructive manner with any proposal that is based on the permanent ceasefire and the full withdrawal (of Israeli forces) from the Gaza Strip, the reconstruction (of Gaza), and the return of the displaced to their places, along with the fulfillment of a genuine prisoner swap deal if the occupation clearly announces commitment to such deal,” the group said in a statement.
Hamas’ position signals a change in attitude from the group, which in recent months had accused the US of siding with Israel and obstructing attempts for a ceasefire.
“Hamas sees Biden’s position now more focused on pressuring Israel to return to negotiations with a different attitude, or they (Israel) could risk clashing with the Americans,” a Palestinian official close to the mediation efforts told Reuters.
Rifts between Biden and Netanyahu over red lines in Gaza has set up a potential showdown between the two leaders, raising questions about whether the US might restrict military aid if Israel continues its offensive in the now-devastated enclave.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said that Israel had authorized negotiators to present a Gaza truce deal after Biden revealed details of the ceasefire plan.
Palestinian health authorities estimate more than 36,280 people have been killed in Gaza since Israel attacked the enclave in response to an Oct. 7 Hamas assault in southern Israel. The Hamas attack killed around 1,200 people, according to Israeli tallies.
EU chimes in
European Union chief Ursula von der Leyen also welcomed the Israeli roadmap toward a ceasefire in Gaza announced by US President Joe Biden as a “significant opportunity” to bring the war to an end.
“I wholeheartedly agree with Biden that the latest proposal is a significant opportunity to move toward an end to war and civilian suffering in Gaza. This three-step approach is balanced and realistic. It now needs support from all parties,” the European Commission president said on social media.
UN demands full aid access in Sudan
- Aid workers continue to face systematic obstructions and deliberate denials of access, committee says
GENEVA: UN agency chiefs have demanded unimpeded humanitarian access to deliver aid throughout war-torn Sudan, saying time was running out to prevent widespread famine.
In a joint statement, the heads of multiple UN agencies urged all parties in the conflict to immediately stop denying and obstructing humanitarian actions.
“Let us be clear: If we are prevented from providing aid rapidly and at scale, more people will die,” the statement from the UN Inter-Agency Standing Committee said.
“Without an immediate and major step change, we will face a nightmare scenario: A famine will take hold in large parts of the country. More people will flee to neighboring countries in search of sustenance and safety. More children will succumb to disease and malnutrition.”
The joint statement was penned by the UN aid chief Martin Griffiths, along with the heads of the UN agencies for food, health, human rights, refugees, migration, agriculture and children, among others.
The committee is the highest-level humanitarian coordination forum in the UN system, bringing together the heads of 19 organizations, some of which are from outside the UN.
Fighting in Sudan broke out in April last year between the regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. The conflict has killed thousands and sparked a humanitarian disaster.
The statement said 18 million people were acutely hungry, 3.6 million children were acutely malnourished and famine was closing in on millions of people.
Nearly 2 million people have escaped to neighboring countries while millions more are displaced within Sudan.
FASTFACT
The joint statement was penned by the UN aid chief Martin Griffiths, along with the heads of the UN agencies for food, health, human rights, refugees, migration, agriculture and children, among others.
“Despite the tremendous needs, aid workers continue to face systematic obstructions and deliberate denials of access by parties to the conflict,” said the statement from the UN Inter-Agency Standing Committee.
“Aid workers are being killed, injured and harassed, and humanitarian supplies are being looted.”
The statement said movement across conflict lines to parts of Khartoum, Darfur, Al-Jazira and Kordofan had been all but cut off since mid-December.
The UN agency chiefs made a series of demands, including an immediate ceasefire, protection for civilians and an end to human rights violations.
“Facilitate unimpeded humanitarian access through all possible crossline and cross-border routes to allow civilians to receive humanitarian aid. Immediately cease all acts denying, obstructing and interfering with, or politicizing, humanitarian action,” they said.
“Simplify and expedite administrative and bureaucratic procedures related to the delivery of humanitarian aid.”
Jens Laerke, spokesman for the UN humanitarian agency OCHA, told a media briefing in Geneva that the conditions for aid delivery were “very, very poor, and it’s very, very dangerous.”
“We want these generals to find a way to solve their differences not by violence that kills, maims, rapes hundreds of thousands of people,” he said.
The UN also said it was concerned by limited donor support, having received only 16 percent of the $2.7 billion it needs for Sudan.
In conflict-torn Libya, artist’s family turns home into museum
TRIPOLI: A seemingly ordinary villa in the heart of Tripoli holds a lifetime of works by the late Libyan artist Ali Gana, whose family has turned his house into a unique museum.
In the North African country still grappling with divisions and conflict after the fall of Muammar Qaddafi in 2011, “art comes last,” said Hadia Gana, the youngest of the artist’s four children.
A decade in the making and with the help of volunteers, she had transformed the classic-style Tripolitan villa her father had built, before passing in 2006 at age 70, into “the first and only museum of modern art in Libya,” Gana said.
Bayt Ali Gana — “Ali Gana’s House” in Arabic — finally opened this year, and seeks to offer both retrospection and hope in a country constantly threatened by violence and where arts and culture stand largely neglected.
“It is seen as something superfluous,” Gana said, adding that galleries in the country often focus solely on selling pieces rather than making art more accessible.
Once past a lush garden, visitors reach the museum’s permanent exhibition of paintings, sculptures and sketches by the masterful Ali Gana.
Other rooms include temporary exhibitions, and offer space for seminars and themed workshops.
Set on a wall, an old shipping container houses an artist residency for “curators and museologists” whose skills are scarce in Libya, said Hadia Gana.
Libyan artists had long been subject to censorship and self-censorship under Qaddafi’s four-decade rule, and “we could not express ourselves on politics,” recalled Gana, 50, a ceramic artist.
Art “must not have barriers,” she said, proudly standing in the family-owned space for artistic freedom.
Bayt Ali Gana appears timeless, though the villa bears some signs of the unrest that followed the overthrow and death of Qaddafi.
A road sign riddled with bullets hangs from the gate that separates the museum from the private residence.
Mortar shells turned upside down sit among flowers in the garden, where visitors are offered cold drinks or Italian espressos in a setting that replicates Cafe Said, once owned by Ali Gana’s father in the old medina of Tripoli.
During the unrest that began in 2011, Hadia Gana said she feared “losing everything if a rocket hit the house.”
Then came the idea of creating a museum in the hopes of conserving her father’s precious works and archives.
Sporadic fighting, water or electricity cuts, and forced isolation due to the Covid pandemic have piled challenges on the family’s mission, while the Ganas steered clear of state funding or investors to maintain the independence of their nascent institution.
Gradually, the house morphed into a cultural center celebrating Ali Gana’s calling to “teach and educate through art,” said his daughter.
It “is not a mausoleum,” but a hub of creativity and education, she said.
Gana’s archives also document traditional crafts and trades, some of which have completely disappeared by now.
After taking power in a 1969 coup, Qaddafi had imposed a ban on all private enterprise, and “for 40 years, crafts became an outlawed activity,” said the late artist’s oldest son Mehdi, who now lives in the Netherlands.
He said that in his lifetime, Ali Gana took on a mission to “build archives in order to link Libya’s past to a possible future.”
It is “the nature of the family” to preserve and share knowledge, said matriarch Janine Rabiau-Gana, 84.
Hadia Gana lamented that while museums should be educational spaces, “here in Libya, we don’t have that notion yet.”
She said she wanted to avoid “making it a museum where everything is transfixed.”
Instead, “I wanted something lively, almost playful, and above all a place that arouses curiosity in all its beauty.”
Iran denies using Swedish gangs to target Israel
STOCKHOLM: Iran’s Embassy in Stockholm has denied accusations it was recruiting criminal gang members, some of them children, as proxies to commit “acts of violence” against Israeli interests in Sweden.
“Paying attention to the source of this information clearly shows that it is false,” the embassy said in a statement on its website, adding that media coverage based on documents from Israel’s secret services was “false and baseless.”
Tensions have flared between Israel and Iran since the start of the war in Gaza on Oct. 7, and the two states have fought a shadow war of killings and sabotage attacks for years.
On Thursday, Sweden’s intelligence agency said Iran was “using criminal networks in Sweden to carry out acts of violence against other states, groups or people in Sweden that it considers a threat.”
The service, commonly known as Sapo, said these were particularly aimed at “Israeli and Jewish interests, targets and operations in Sweden.”
Several hours before Sapo’s announcement, Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter or DN cited documents from Israel’s intelligence agency Mossad as saying that the heads of two Swedish gangs had both been recruited by the Iranian regime.
“Unfortunately, some Swedish media have quoted the false and baseless claims of media and institutions affiliated with this brutal regime (Israel) and published false and fabricated reports against Iran,” the Iranian Embassy’s statement added.
The embassy said it “expects the Swedish media not to trust the claims and reports published by the Israeli regime” and to work for “an end to the crimes of the Zionist regime in Palestine.”
The diplomatic spat comes two weeks after night-time gunfire was reported outside Israel’s embassy in Stockholm, and three months after police found a live grenade lying on the grounds of the Israeli compound.
UNRWA chief says Israel ‘must stop its campaign’ against agency
- Philippe Lazzarini highlights ‘outrageous attacks on employees, facilities and operations’
JERUSALEM: UN Palestinian refugee agency chief Philippe Lazzarini said on Friday that Israel “must stop its campaign against UNRWA” in an opinion article published by the New York Times.
“The war in Gaza has produced a blatant disregard for the mission of the UN, including outrageous attacks on (UNRWA) employees, facilities and operations,” agency chief Lazzarini said.
“These attacks must stop and the world must act to hold the perpetrators accountable.”
UNRWA, which coordinates nearly all aid to Gaza, has been in crisis since January, when Israel accused about a dozen of its 13,000 Gaza employees of being involved in the Oct. 7 attack.
That prompted many governments, including top donor the US, to abruptly suspend funding to the agency, threatening its efforts to deliver aid in Gaza, although several have since resumed payments.
An independent review of UNRWA, led by French former Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna, found some “neutrality-related issues” but said Israel had yet to provide evidence for its leading allegations.
“Israeli officials are not only threatening the work of our staff and mission, they are also delegitimizing UNRWA by effectively characterizing it as a terrorist organization that fosters extremism and labelling UN leaders as terrorists who collude with Hamas,” Lazzarini said.
He said the “assault on UNRWA has spread to (Israeli-annexed) East Jerusalem”, where demonstrations outside the agency’s compound have become common in recent months, and “increasingly dangerous, with at least two arson attacks.”
UNRWA last week suspended food distribution in southern Gaza, including Rafah, after Israel launched an offensive in the city and seized the Rafah border crossing with Egypt.
The war was sparked by Hamas’s attack on southern Israel.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 36,284 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s Health Ministry.
