A village under fire.

Israel escalates on the West Bank.

Hebron, 26 NOVEMBER—The village of al–Mughayyir, 60 km north from here, was under continual occupation by the Israeli army for three days, beginning last Friday. The I.O.F. launched its raid at midnight, according to Amin Abu Aliya, head of the village council who spoke with local media over the weekend. It wasn’t until Tuesday morning that Occupation forces finally retreated.

Early in the raid, soldiers seized the home of another council member, Marzouq Abu Naim, turning it into a military barracks and interrogation center. I.O.F. soldiers draped the house, which is located on a hilltop, in Israeli flags. From this strategic post they kept watch over the terrified community, firing randomly into the village. This is the Israelis’ procedure, I have found again and again: Seize high ground and terrorize the community below.

During their occupation of the village, soldiers conducted “field investigations,” as reported by Abu Aliya. They arrested, detained, and physically abused many of the village’s men. “People are frightened and hiding,” I was told by a local source on Monday evening. “Al–Mughayyir is like a ghost town.”

Numerous homes were stormed and ransacked and the people living there assaulted. Abdhullah Abu Aliya—age 55 and closely related to councilman Abu Aliya—was brutally beaten in front of his family and several of his ribs were broken.

Last night a text arrived from a friend, time stamped 8:53pm: “This is al–Mughayyir right now!!” Attached was a video. The village was dark with some areas illuminated by what appears to be military spotlights. The loud and terrifying sound of gunfire can be heard.

When I showed the video to the translator with whom I’ve been traveling in the West Bank for the past five weeks, a young woman from the town of Dura, she displayed almost no emotion. “I hope no one gets hurt,” was all she said. Dura has been raided almost weekly since 7 October of last year. Some seventeen residents—men, women, children, and at least one elderly person—have been killed. This is sometimes with a sniper shot to the head, as happened to a 22–year-old mother who left behind a seven-month old daughter—a daughter she had had dreams of seeing attend medical school.

Many people are numb and despairing. After more than a year of watching the genocide in Gaza and seeing the violence escalating here, the mood in the West Bank is greatly altered even from what it was in May, when I first visited.

What occurred in al–Mughayyir over the past three days is happening throughout the West Bank. Each city, town, village, and refugee camp has been intentionally and strategically isolated by the Zionist regime—by the apartheid wall and by the placement of settlements, checkpoints, and roads open only to Israelis. When each community in its turn comes under attack, the Palestinians who live there are on their own with no possibility of help or defense. This, by design, facilitates the ethnic cleansing of the West Bank which is well under way.

Note: Al–Mughayyir is the village where we have been working to build a new playground for the local kindergarten and provide badly needed repairs to the roof and existing bathroom. Many readers have made donations to this project. Work will continue now that the Occupation forces have withdrawn.

You can follow Cara on Instagram: WinterWheat98

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