Tel Aviv Tribune Net correspondents
Hebron- With the start of the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip on October 7, the occupation tightened restrictions on the people of the Old City of Hebron. southern West Bank, A complete curfew was imposed on the population, which is approaching its 100th day.
Since the Al-Aqsa Intifada, which began in 2000, the Israeli occupation has imposed measures that greatly restrict the freedom of the Palestinian population in the same area and elsewhere.
During the past two decades, the Al-Muhtasib family was forced to use the window of their house to enter and exit, and they placed a ladder for this purpose, given that they were prevented from using the door of their house, which was closed by the occupation, by setting up a checkpoint in front of it on the road leading to the Ibrahimi Mosque.
The young man, Saher Al-Muhtaseb, tells Al-Jazeera Net that his family has become accustomed to the new door, through which they enter their belongings and needs, and also receive their guests, and transport their patients.
Exceptional situation
For his part, Imad Hamdan, head of the Hebron Reconstruction Committee, a government committee, says that the situation in the Old City of Hebron is “exceptional because of the presence of a settlement enclave in the heart of the city, and this makes the heart of the city live in a catastrophic situation since before the Gaza War, which lasted about 100 years.” day”.
He added in an interview with Tel Aviv Tribune Net, “There are about 750 families subject to the imposition of a curfew since October 7, 2023, on an area estimated at three-quarters of the Old City of Hebron.”
He continued, “This makes this area more like a disaster area, where the citizen cannot stand on the balcony of his house to look out.”
He stated that the Old City is surrounded by about 18 checkpoints and military points, “while the total number of obstacles between a military point and a checkpoint or control point is 101 in an area of one square kilometer.”
He said that the Old City is subject to “collective punishment, and if there is an escalation in Nablus or Jenin and even in Gaza, a curfew will be imposed on the Old City, and today the aggression against Gaza is being carried out and a curfew is imposed on the heart of Hebron.”
Imad appealed to the international community “to look at the Old City of Hebron with humanitarian eyes, after the war in Gaza stops.”
Most of the buildings in the old town are old-fashioned and date back to the Mamluk (1250-1517) and Ottoman (1517-1924) eras. In 2017, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) declared the town a “protected area” as a site “of exceptional universal value.”
It is noteworthy that the Hebron Agreement between the Palestine Liberation Organization and Israel in 1997 divided the city into two parts: District 1, which constitutes about 80% of the city, and was attached to the Palestinian Authority at the time, and District 2, which remained under Israeli control and is where the Ibrahimi Mosque is located, and settlement outposts are spread.