By Kaamil Ahmed
JERUSALEM (AA): Israeli forces destroyed 13 structures — including a school — in a village in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday, according to Palestine’s official WAFA news agency.
The structures in the Bedouin village of Khirbet Tana east of the city Nablus were deemed illegal by the Israeli authorities since they are located in “Area C” of the West Bank — the 60 percent of the territory that remains under full Israeli control.
“Sad start to 2017,” UN Assistant Secretary-General Robert Piper tweeted. “The village of Khirbet Tana already had 4 rounds of demolitions by Israeli security forces in 2016.”
According to WAFA, 250 Palestinians live in the village, where 150 structures were destroyed last year by the Israeli authorities.
Earlier on Monday morning, Israeli forces invaded Khan al-Ahmar, east of Jerusalem, and destroyed the homes of 87 Palestinian Bedouins, most of whom are women and children.
Adal Jahaleen, one of the residents of the Bedouin village, told the Palestinian Wafa news agency that the Israeli military arrived with several Caterpillar D9 armored bulldozers in the morning and forced his family and other families out of their homes.
The Israeli military then proceeded with the destruction of eleven dwellings, home to 87 people.
The demolition took place in the middle of winter, and Jahaleen said that he is extremely worried for his family and the other families that were forced into the cold today when the military destroyed their homes.
Nearly 7000 Palestinians have been rendered homeless this year by Israeli home demolitions.
Additional reports from Imemc.org
[Archive photo: Family sitting among debris of their house demolished by Israeli froces in Musafir Jenbach region of Hebron on 2 February 2016. Photographer: Wisam Hashlamoun/AA]