Anti-settlement group Peace Now says seizure of 180 hectares including site of Sebastia would become Israel’s largest theft of archaeologically significant land.
Israel plans to seize parts of a key occupied West Bank historical site, according to a government document, as settlers put up a new outpost there overnight in the latest instance of Israeli theft of Palestinian land.
Thursday’s development comes as Israel faces international pressure to crack down on rampant settler violence being carried out with impunity, and often with the military’s backing, in the Palestinian territory.
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Israel’s Civil Administration announced its intention to expropriate large swaths of Sebastia, a major Roman-era archaeological site in the occupied West Bank.
Peace Now, an anti-settlement watchdog, said the site is about 1,800 dunams (180 hectares or 450 acres) – and would become Israel’s largest seizure of archaeologically significant land.
The Israeli order released on November 12 lists parcels of land it intends to seize in the Sebastia area, according to the group.
Israel’s Haaretz newspaper reported that the intention is to confiscate the privately owned lands in the north of the occupied region with the aim of developing the archaeological site in Sebastia.
Palestinian residents were given only 14 days to file their objections to the decision, the newspaper added.
The capital of the ancient kingdom of Samaria is thought to be beneath the ruins of Sebastia, and Christians and Muslims believe it is where John the Baptist was buried.
Israel announced plans to develop the site into a tourist attraction in 2023. Excavations have already begun, and the government has allocated more than 30 million shekels ($9.24m) to develop the site, according to Peace Now and another rights group.
The largest parcel of historical land previously seized by Israel was 286 dunams (70 acres) in Susya, a village in the south of the West Bank, Peace Now said.
Settler attacks unrelenting
The move comes as Israeli settlers celebrated the creation of a new, illegal settlement near Bethlehem as they continue their rampaging attacks on Palestinian civilians and their property, unchecked, in the occupied West Bank.
Settlers carried out a series of attacks across the territory on Friday, torching property and assaulting Palestinians before Israeli forces moved in to make arrests.
In Huwara, south of Nablus, dozens of settlers from a nearby illegal settlement set fire to a vehicle scrapyard after storming the northern part of the town, local sources told the Wafa news agency.
Meanwhile, west of Ramallah, settlers accompanied by Israeli soldiers beat four Palestinians as they tried to remove a soil barrier that settlers had placed in front of their farm near the village of Kafr Nima.
The four Palestinian men were then arrested by Israeli forces.
Separately, Israeli forces killed two Palestinian teenagers in the occupied East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Kafr Aqab during a raid on Friday, according to the Wafa news agency.
The report said Palestinian Red Crescent Society crews treated two teenagers aged 16 and 18 for serious injuries from live ammunition during the forces’ raid on Kafr Aqab, and the wounded were transferred to hospital, where they were pronounced dead.
Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch said Israel may have committed war crimes when it forcibly expelled 32,000 Palestinians from three West Bank refugee camps this year.
