The Land Research Center of the Arab Studies Association revealed that the Israeli occupation forces have implemented a new settlement plan with the aim of expanding the Migdal Oz settlement, which is built on citizens’ lands, north of Hebron.

In a report, the Center stated that, on May 14, 2023, the Israeli occupation authorities announced a new colonial plan to expand the Migdal Oz settlement, which is built on lands confiscated from the town of Beit Ummar, north of Hebron Governorate, noting that the Settlement Secondary Committee of the Planning Council The highest in the so-called Civil Administration is a detailed organizational chart bearing the number (1/3/407), accompanied by an announcement stating that the plan has been submitted for filing (for objection) within 60 days from the date of its publication.

The land area covered by the plan is (290 dunums) from the lands of the northern town of Beit Ummar, located in Natural Basin No. 2, in the locations of (Jabal Abu Souda, Khirbet Barikot).

The announcement stated that the plan aims to transform land use from agricultural lands, a forest area, antiquities and a tourist area according to the previous plan (RJ-5), to open areas, engineering facilities, public institutions, buildings and recreation areas.

The Land Research Center indicated that the works to change the use capacity target the plot of land located at the western end of the settlement, along the bypass road (Road No. 60), and it comes on an area planted with forest trees.

In their declaration, the occupation authorities claimed that the owner of the lands subject to planning is responsible for the governmental and abandoned property in the occupation authorities, knowing that these lands belong to the citizens of the town of Beit Ummar, but the occupation authorities - according to what the landowners reported - had prevented them from using and benefiting from them for security reasons. , under the pretext of its proximity to the colony, and then confiscated it and expropriated it from its original owners without legal procedures, and without relying on inherited land laws in the occupied West Bank, but rather based on military orders issued in the Palestinian territories, which aimed at confiscating the lands and transferring them to the treasury of the occupying state to be used as a reserve settlement stock. Expand it whenever you want.

The occupation authorities had previously targeted the Barikot and Jabal Abu Souda areas, by preventing construction in these areas, demolishing agricultural facilities and uprooting fruit trees from them with the aim of limiting urban expansion and agricultural spread in them, under the pretext of preventing friction with the colonists, and today the process of legitimizing its seizure and annexation to the colony and its expansion is taking place. .

The Land Research Center believes that the occupation's manipulation of the laws and customs of Palestinian land use that prevailed since the Ottoman era, passing through British colonialism and the Jordanian era, confirms the illegality of all occupation measures aimed at stripping the rights of land possession and granting them to the colonizers who are not originally permitted to settle in it according to the Fourth Geneva Convention, and according to The Hague Treaty, and United Nations resolutions have considered that the transfer of citizens of the occupying state (Israel) to the occupied Palestinian territories is an illegal and unacceptable procedure for the international community. This also includes the illegality of annexing eastern Jerusalem and declaring it the capital of the occupying state, and moving the embassy American to it.

In addition, the spatial plan (RJ-5) may not be modified except with a new spatial plan carried out by the authority authorized to do so within the Palestinian territories occupied in 1967, which is the State of Palestine, and this will only be done by removing and dismantling the occupying settlements, removing the effects of the occupation and recognizing the sovereignty of the State of Palestine over the entirety of it. Its soil according to United Nations resolutions and international legitimacy.