Demolition of Jewish home (archives)
Demolition of Jewish home (archives)Israel news photo

Border Police forcibly expelled families from two Jewish homes south of Hevron Monday morning and destroyed their homes, saying they were built without permits. Asaf Fried, one of the residents of the Negohot community, told Arutz 7 that “less than a half mile from here, there are Arab homes that were left alone - despite 10-year-old demolition orders.”

 

The administrator of Negohot, which connects the Hevron Hills with the Lachish area northeast of Be’er Sheva, said the families resisted expulsion, but that no one was injured as of this report.

 

“A large police forces and soldiers arrived at the southern neighborhood of Negohot, named Beit HaKerem [literally, House of  the Vineyard] and began to destroy the homes, where small children have lived with their parents for more than 18 months,” Fried said.

 

He noted that until Monday morning’s destruction and expulsion, the Civil Lands Administration had decided not to destroy homes in which people reside.

 

The move represents a marked escalation in Israel government policies, which have focused on outpost communities, many of them with only temporary shacks.

 

Tzviki Bar-Chai, chairman of the Southern Hevron Hills Regional Council, charged that Defense Minister Ehud Barak “has again taken selective action to strangle Jewish settlement, while not carrying out demolition orders against Arab homes.”

 

The High Court recently ordered the government to explain why it is destroying Jewish homes while not carrying out long-standing orders to destroy illegal built Arab buildings.