Palestinian families in Hebron have been forcibly displaced and their homes seized by Israeli occupation forces, with the municipality reporting that nearly 2,000 people were driven from the Ein Deir Baha neighborhood as the Israeli regime imposed sweeping restrictions across the occupied West Bank ahead of Tuesday’s Israeli election.
The mass displacement followed a gun attack on an Israeli military checkpoint on Friday that killed two Israeli soldiers, prompting Netanyahu and finance minister Bezalel Smotrich to visit the area and threaten sweeping retaliation.
Netanyahu warned of imminent military operations on a scale the occupied West Bank had not experienced in nearly 60 years of occupation, as his ruling coalition campaigned amid a closely contested election.
Within hours of the attack, Israeli forces sealed off Hebron, a city of approximately 250,000 people, while the neighborhood of Farsh al-Hawa was flattened.
By Sunday morning, the area had been reduced to rubble, destroying an industrial district that housed car workshops, a major ceramics plant and other businesses.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces began systematically emptying Ein Deir Baha, another neighborhood several kilometers away, after alleging that at least one of the attackers had lived there.
Residents said they were ordered to leave their homes in the middle of the night, with military vehicles broadcasting evacuation instructions and troops threatening those who refused to comply.
Fahed Ahmaro, the local mosque’s imam, said he was awakened around midnight by loudspeakers ordering residents to leave immediately.
Ahmaro had 30 members of his family living in his house.
He rushed his frail mother and several grandchildren to his daughter’s home elsewhere in Hebron before attempting to return to collect his belongings.
However, a neighbor called to warn him that Israeli forces had blown up the house’s gates.
“He told me not to come back, and the army had blown up the gates to the house. I don’t know what they have done to it by now. I heard they destroyed the furniture,” Ahmaro said.
“You don’t know what you have until you lose it. Now I realise how devastating it is to lose your home.”
By Sunday afternoon, Ahmaro was searching a Hebron market for replacement clothes for his grandchildren, with no indication of when his family might return home.
He had heard that Israeli soldiers were using his house as a military base and could see lights inside the building perched on a steep hillside.
The Hebron municipality said 370 families, comprising nearly 2,000 people, had been displaced during the Israeli military operation in Ein Deir Baha.
The Israeli military, however, claimed that residents had left voluntarily, stating that “civilians who wished to evacuate were permitted to temporarily leave the area”.
Ahmaro rejected the military’s account, insisting that residents had been given no meaningful choice.
“Never, never, never. Why should I leave my house?” he asked.
Abdul Halim al-Tamimi, 77, said Israeli forces arrived at his home at approximately 1:30 a.m. and gave his family just 10 minutes to leave.
“An intelligence officer told me if we didn’t go, they would displace us the same way they have done it in Gaza,” he said.
“We stood there in front of the house, and we refused to leave until we were faced by three military vehicles and they forced us out.”
The Tamimi family finally left at 3 a.m. on Saturday.
By Sunday morning, their substantial villa had been surrounded by military vehicles and covered with large Israeli flags, as occupation forces converted the property into a military headquarters.
The Israeli military also claimed that approximately 2,000 residents belonged to the Jaba’a clan, which it alleged had ties to the attackers and was “associated with Hamas”.
Residents of Ein Deir Baha disputed the claim, saying the Jaba’a clan numbered no more than 150 people.
“We are from a completely different family. We are innocent people. We have nothing to do with the whole thing,” Tamimi said.
“I don’t know what they are using it for, other than maybe election publicity.”
The displacement has unfolded as Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank remain excluded from Tuesday’s Israeli elections, despite facing the direct consequences of decisions made by the incoming government.
By Sunday evening, roads leading into and out of Hebron remained closed to vehicles, with heavy steel barriers blocking access.
Pedestrians were left to navigate the restrictions, while taxi drivers competed for passengers amid the disruption.
Wasam Sadi, a delivery truck driver, arrived at a checkpoint with a shattered windshield and glass fragments in his eyes, saying Israeli settlers had attacked him at a nearby junction.
Hebron Mayor Yousef al-Jabari condemned the displacement and restrictions as collective punishment, accusing Israeli authorities of preventing journalists from documenting the operation.
“It’s collective punishment,” al-Jabari said.
“They have dragged people from their houses, and they have prevented the media from getting into the district in order to cover up what is happening.
“Netanyahu and his gang are using Palestinian land to displace Palestinian people, closing the city, closing the mosque, in order to achieve their political goals.”