The Gaza Strip is often described as the world’s largest open-air prison. Although Israel evacuated its settlements and military bases (which were all illegal) inside Gaza in 2005, the territory remains occupied under international law because Israel maintains strict control of its borders, air space and territorial waters, apart from the rarely open Rafah Crossing into Egypt, over which it coordinates with the Egyptian dictatorship.
However, there are other open-air prisons controlled by Israel inside the occupied West Bank. The village of Nabi Samwil is one example.
A small village near Jerusalem, Nabi Samwil is described by residents, in interviews with Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq, as the village where everything is forbidden. There are so many restrictions on movement, building and even visitors to the village, that Al-Haq describes the Israeli regime there as an act of “indirect forcible transfer” of Palestinians; in other words, ethnic cleansing.
While Palestinians are banned from building new homes or expanding their old ones, the Israelis who live in the nearby colonial settlements (illegal under international law) are free to move and expand them as they see fit.
In the video, and in a new report, Al-Haq documents the Israeli occupation regime in Nabi Samwil in detail. There are certain unique aspects to it, although many of the restrictions are of a type which Israel imposes on Palestinians across the West Bank.
Originally a village of some 1,000 Palestinians, it was occupied by Israel during its 1967 invasion of the West Bank. During the Six Day War, all but around 200 of the the villagers were compelled to flee to Jordan. Although the village is not far from Jerusalem, Israel did not declare it to be part of the subsequently expanded municipal borders of “Greater Jerusalem”. The Israeli regime thus imposes the green West Bank ID card, on its residents, rather than the blue Jerusalem ID.
In 1971, Israel demolished the homes of the remaining Palestinians, transferring them forcibly to the empty homes of the other villagers who had been forced to flee in 1967.'
Read more: The Palestinian village where apartheid Israel forbids everything
