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The residents of Khan al-Ahmar are living on borrowed time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On Monday, Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu<\/a> told Knesset members from his ruling Likud<\/a> faction that the West Bank Bedouin encampment, home to 28 families, will be razed \u201cvery soon\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI will not tell you when, but we are preparing for it,\u201d he promised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After a protracted legal battle, the high court of justice ruled in May that the state is legally permitted to demolish the Bedouin community, which was built without Israeli permits in the Judean desert on the road which descends from Jerusalem<\/a> to the ancient biblical town of Jericho<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There has been widespread international condemnation of the Israeli plans to demolish the village. Ireland, along with other European states, has lobbied against the move, saying such a development would further undermine the viability of the two-state solution and prospects for a lasting peace. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe feel like a tsunami is coming. There is a demolition order hanging over the whole village,\u201d explained Eid Jahalin, Khan al-Ahmar\u2019s Mukthar village head. \u201cNo one has even consulted with us about a plan to relocate to an alternative location. We feel like we are between a rock and a hard place \u2013 caught in the struggle between Israel<\/a> and the Palestinian Authority<\/a>. \u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Located close to the settlement of Kfar Adumim, the encampment is home to some 180 Bedouin who were expelled by Israel from the Negev desert in southern Israel in the early 1950s. The West Bank\u2019s Arab Bedouin are a small, impoverished minority among the broader Palestinian population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Similar to other Bedouin encampments, residents of Khan al-Ahmar live in corrugated shacks or tents, often without electricity or running water, and raise livestock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The smell of goats pervades the whole village as children run barefoot between the ramshackle structures, happily playing and seemingly unaware of the looming demolition of their homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When the Jahalin tribe moved here more than 60 years ago the West Bank was under Jordanian control and the Judean desert was an empty expanse. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Since Israel occupied the area in 1967, more and more land has been expropriated by the army for bases and firing zones, and for nature reserves and the constantly expanding Jewish settlements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Khan al-Ahmar is located close to the area known as E1, between Jerusalem and the large settlement city of Ma\u2019ale Adumim. Israel hopes to expand Ma\u2019ale Adumim by building in E1 but so far the plans have been thwarted, partly due to strong opposition from the Palestinian Authority (PA), backed by the international community, who argue that such a move would essentially split the West Bank into two.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Critically, Khan al-Ahmar lies about 35 metres from the strategically-important Jerusalem-Jericho highway and Israel wants to move the Bedouin away from the highway and from proximity to nearby settlements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Khan al-Ahmar residents rejected Israeli proposals to relocate them either closer to Jerusalem or to Jericho. Recently, negotiations took place over a site close to the existing encampment, but no agreement was reached and the Palestinian Authority lawyer representing the villagers stepped down. <\/p>\n\n\n\n ‘There may be some people who want to look out of their window in the morning and see only Jews, but this is not the reality’ <\/p>\n\n\n\n One villager, speaking on condition of anonymity, speculated that the PA would actually like to see Israel demolish the encampment because such a step would be a colossal PR disaster for Israel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"http:\/\/www.jahalin.org\/archive\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Image-3-1.png\")
Stuck in the middle<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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