12 Jan 2023; MEMO: Palestinian sources said that Israel has begun placing cement blocks west of the town of Qaffin, north of Tulkarm, in the northern occupied West Bank, separating Palestinians from thousands of acres of agricultural land.
The new concrete wall extends from the village of Salem to the city of Tulkarm. It is nine metres in height and 45 kilometres in length, in addition to fortifications and electronic devices.
Farmer Muhammad Saeed told Sputnik: "Farmers from the town of Qaffin alone will be denied access to 5,000 dunums (1,236 acres) of their agricultural land, along with tens of thousands of dunums in neighbouring villages."
"In the past, we used to enter for 3 days, and they often prevented us under security pretexts, but with the construction of this wall, we will be prevented from entering completely, as there is an intention to harass us and seize our agricultural lands."
For his part, Tayseer Amarneh, the mayor of Akaba, in the Tulkarm district, said: "These are Palestinian lands, and with the construction of the wall, we will not be able to access them under a security pretext. Our lands will be robbed under these weak pretexts."
"They implemented the fence and said it was a security fence, and today they are building a concrete wall for the same reason. It is the Palestinians who are losing their land that they are cultivating."
Last November, former Israeli Defence Minister Benny Gantz approved the construction of an illegal new concrete wall in the northern West Bank, that is 100 kilometres long.
Israel began building a wall in the occupied West Bank in 2002, with the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs saying it is 712 kilometres long and 85 per cent of it lies within the territory of the occupied West Bank and not along the Green Line (1967 borders).
Two years later, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel's wall in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem was illegal.
