Thwarted tree-planting underscores daily torments for embattled Palestinian hamlet

Villagers in West Bank’s Umm al-Khair say security forces quick to stymie Tu Bishvat coexistence event or new soccer pitch, but take their time when it comes to stopping settler harassment

UMM AL-KHAIR, West Bank – The ramshackle Palestinian hamlet of Umm al-Khair, located in the South Hebron Hills region of the West Bank, is no stranger to hardship and adversity.

Since October, the village has had demolition orders hanging over more than a dozen of its structures. In July, peace activist Awdah Hathaleen, one of the village’s most prominent residents, was shot dead, allegedly by an extremist Jewish settler from the area.

On Monday, the hamlet was once again the scene of strife as the army and police thwarted a planned tree-planting event there organized by Israeli coexistence activists, illustrating what villagers say are ever-growing challenges imposed by their settler neighbors and Israel’s security services that threaten their daily existence beyond the tragedies and large-scale tribulations that usually grab headlines.

These day-to-day difficulties include perpetual harassment and intimidation inside the hardscrabble village, struggles to maintain their agricultural livelihood, and even efforts aimed at stopping them from giving their children a place to play soccer.

“We are upset all the time here,” Khalil Hathaleen, the brother of the slain activist, told The Times of Israel on Monday, complaining of persistent harassment by settlers and security services whenever he takes his sheep and goats out to graze. “They don’t give the kids one minute to be happy. They make life very difficult for everyone.”

The tree-planting activity was organized by Rabbis for Human Rights to mark the Jewish holiday of Tu Bishvat, which celebrates the new year for trees and is a day on which tree-planting ceremonies are traditionally conducted in Israel.

READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE HERE.

An IDF officer comes to inform coexistence activists that they have to leave the Palestinian hamlet of Umm al-Khair in the West Bank where they went to plant olive trees on February 2, 2026 (Jeremy Sharon/Times of Israel)

"This is probably the most important Hebrew Tweet I've ever seen". Jan 29, '26

This is probably the most important Hebrew Tweet I've ever seen. Moshe Ya'alon is a former chief of staff and defense minister. The absolute cream of the Israeli defense establishment. In this text he admits that the Israeli government and settlers have become Judeo-Nazis and their policy is based on Jewish supremacy. 

Here is a full translation: "On the last Tuesday evening, I attended an event marking the International Holocaust Remembrance Day. When I got home, I received a message about Jewish pogromists attacking Palestinians in the south of Hebron, stealing their livestock, and burning their property. “We can't compare!…” After ambulances, which tried to reach the scene, were delayed by the Jewish terrorists, three Palestinians were evacuated to the hospital, one of them with skull fractures. “No event can ever compare to the Holocaust, which we endured!” … 

 I turned, of course, immediately to the security authorities in the area, and I was assured that the incident was being handled by the IDF. To this day not a single Jewish terrorist has been stopped (as in many other cases), because … the Israel Police is controlled by a convicted criminal, a fascist racist Nazi, the Shin Bet is controlled by a representative of “Jewish supremacy” from the schools of the rabbis Tao, Lior, Ginzburg, and Zini (Dodo), the defense minister prevents administrative detentions of Jewish terrorists, and the other minister in the Ministry of Defense encourages illegal outposts and equips them with off-road vehicles, to torment the lives of Palestinians, to evict them from their land, and to settle the land with Jews (you’ll ask again why I blamed the government for “ethnic cleansing”!?). 

The ideology of “Jewish supremacy,” which has become dominant in the Israeli government, resembles Nazi racial theory, “but we must not compare!” … When I commanded the Jerusalem and Samaria Division, the Central Command, and the IDF, I was acquainted with the warnings of Professor Yeshayahu Leibowitz, regarding the process of dehumanization to the point of turning us into “Judeo-Nazis” (as he put it), under our control of another people. I did my best, even as defense minister, “so that we may know how to defeat terrorism and remain human.” 

 I never deceived myself into thinking that only through concessions would we achieve “peace now,” and I also understood the danger of “Jewish supremacy” over our future and our existence. Therefore I advocated separation according to the proto-programmatic speech of Yitzhak Rabin of October 5, 1995, and therefore I named my book is “A Long Short Way.” As of now, Professor Yeshayahu Leibowitz was right and I was wrong. The task of the next Israeli government is to prove that Professor Leibowitz was wrong, and not to bring ruin upon our state. The government of “Jewish Supremacy” — the government of lies and betrayal — the government of messianism, the traitors and the corrupt — must be replaced before ruin." Israelis of conscience see that it is adopting the policies of Judeo-Nazism and Jewish supremacy. They have known it for a long time. But most do not have the courage to say so. This is an earthquake.

Quote

משה 'בּוֹגִי' יעלון

@bogie_yaalon

ביום שלישי האחרון בערב השתתפתי בארוע לציון יום השואה הבינלאומי. כאשר הגעתי הביתה, קבלתי הודעה על פוגרומיסטים יהודים שתוקפים פלסטינים בדרום הר חברון, גונבים את צאנם ושורפים את רכושם. ״אי אפשר להשוות!״… לאחר שאמבולנסים, שניסו להגיע למקום, עוכבו על-ידי הטרוריסטים היהודים, שלושהShow more

Bi-Weekly Brief. Jan 2, 2026

Palestinians have no say and no rights while perpetrators of genocide determine their future 

The logo for the new Board of Peace, launched on Jan. 22 at the World Economic Forum in Davis,  speaks volumes about the world according to Trump.  It mimics the UN logo: both feature olive branches surrounding a land mass.  In the Trump version the world map depicted in the UN logo has been reduced to North America and instead of the UN’s blue, it is a gleaming gold.  

An “alternative to the UN?”

So far, 26 countries out of the 60 or so that received invitations have either signed up or said they would be doing so.  Among them are Israel (whose prime minister skipped the Davos Forum out of fear of arrest), Türkiye and Qatar which Israel tried to exclude and many autocratic regimes.  To date, Hungary is the sole European country to accept Trump’s invitation.   Canada, whose prime minister, Mark Carney,  spoke bluntly at Davos about the “rupture” in the world order without directly mentioning the rapacious hegemon threatening to take over Greenland, has the distinction of being the only country whose invitation Trump has rescinded. 

Did the countries that signed on have a clear idea about Board of Peace operations and goals or did they just want to be on Trump’s team?  Its charter bears scant resemblance to the mandate of Trump’s ‘peace plan’ endorsed  by the UN Security Council on Nov. 17, 2025 (resolution 2803).  It makes no mention of Gaza, Israel or Hamas.  Rather than lasting for three years as originally conceived, it shall “dissolve at such time as the Chairman considers necessary or appropriate.” Member states can serve a term of three years free of charge, or stay indefinitely if they “contribute more than USD $1,000,000,000 in cash funds to the Board of Peace within the first year of the Charter’s entry into force.”  That’s $1 billion from each country, which is reportedly not for reconstruction and which the Chairman will oversee.   In addition to all the other powers given him by the Charter, Trump as Chairman (possibly for life) “is the final authority regarding the meaning, interpretation, and application of this Charter.”   

With a military onslaught on Iran appearing imminent, Trump may breathe new life into George Orwell’s 1984 slogan, ‘War is peace.’  On Jan. 30 he dispatched to Israel a further $6.5 billionin military aid without Congressional approval. 

“A parody of a colonial body”

The first draft resolution of the Board of Peace, dated Jan. 22, 2026, outlines the hierarchical structure and the members of the committees which will be imposed on Gaza in order “to create a deradicalized terror-free Gaza that poses no threat to its neighbors.”  White House chief of staff Susie Wiles has been added to both the Executive Board and Gaza Executive Board described in the last Brief.   Martin Edelman, an international real estate attorney who is an advisor to the UAE (which invested over $200 million in Jared Kushner’s private equity firm), now appears on the Executive Board.   Pro-settler Aryeh Lightstone and former investment banker Joshua Gruenbaum have been added as ‘senior advisors’ in charge of day-to-day strategy and operations.  Lightstone had been involved in the creation of the murderous Gaza Humanitarian Foundation which cost thousands of Palestinians their lives.

At the very bottom of the hierarchy outlined in the resolution is the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG), the technocratic committee of Palestinians headed by Dr. Ali Sha’ath.   It had no input in planning for Gaza’s future and its only role is to carry out directives from above. To date, Israel has blocked it from entering the Gaza Strip.  

While the resolution asserts that the Board will redevelop the Strip “for the benefit of the people of Gaza,” only people and NGOs with no association with Hamas “or other terror groups” can “participate in governance, reconstruction, economic development, or humanitarian assistance activities in Gaza.”  Individuals who fail to be approved by the Executive Board and High Representative Nicolay Mladenov will be barred from accessing “humanitarian zones and controlled civilian-protection corridors.”  

In the words of Mahmoud Shehada, the Board of Peace system “does not pave the way for a Palestinian state.  It opens the door to dismantling it through administrative solutions: Gaza as an internationally managed unit, the West Bank on a parallel path of fragmentation, while Israel retains the right to intervene or obstruct whenever it chooses – without bearing the costs of occupation.”  And, it should be added, without being subjected to any accountability for its genocidal actions and war crimes.  

Planning for “catastrophic success”

This is how Jared Kushner described the plan for ‘New Gaza’ which he presented to the Davos forum.  The plan features ‘New Rafah’ with 100,000 housing units (mainly for workers),  75+ medical facilities, a transportation hub for trains, a port and airport, a coastal strip of Gulf-like futuristic towers and tourist facilities, an industrial complex, data centers, and off-shore natural gas platforms, all to be built within three years.   

In the words of Hani Almadhoun, a Palestinian-American who played a key role in funding Gaza’s soup kitchens, “To see AI-generated renderings of luxury high-rises and ‘coastal tourism zones’ atop the literal ruins of our lives is not a vision of peace.  It is a blueprint for erasure…This plan is designed to replace our indigenous people and society with a capitalist dystopia where we are merely a cheap labor force behind militarized walls.”  

The UAE is reportedly planning to fund the first reconstructed community in the Rafah area, which will subject residents to biometric data collection and other intrusive surveillance measures.   

Israel digs in to stay

While Kushner was pitching the investment opportunities in ‘New Gaza’ to the world leaders and CEOs gathered at Davis, Israel was moving ahead with its own project: establishing a permanent military presence in the 58% of Gaza that it now controls.  The western part of the Gaza Strip – where Kushner hopes a coastal strip of glitzy towers will one day rise – is being cut off from the eastern portion by earth mounds along the existing location of the flexible ‘yellow line’ (explained here) and a ditch many meters deep.   During the ‘ceasefire,’ Israel has built 13 military outposts within the eastern zone, bringing the total by Dec. 20, 2025 to 48, as well as several roads attaching the territory to Israel.  Using satellite evidence, Forensic Architecture  reported that Israel has cleared and compacted the land in the Rafah area and surrounded it by a military infrastructure.  It may be where those given security clearance, including members of militias backed by Israel, will be housed.  

On Jan. 26, the remains of the last hostage, Ran Gvili, were returned to Israel, removing the obstacle that  Netanyahu had been invoking to delay opening the Rafah Crossing and moving to phase two of the Trump ‘peace plan’ when Israel would be required to hand over territory it currently controls to the yet-to-be-formed International Stabilization Force.  The prime minister immediately told the Knesset that “the next stage is not reconstruction, it is the disarmament of Hamas and the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip.”  Just two days later Haaretz reported that the government would allow the construction of so-called New Rafah “after receiving a commitment from Hamas to disarm within 100 days.”  But according to this penetrating analysis by Muhammad Shehada, Netanyahu is  bent on sabotaging phase two and cementing “perpetual occupation.” 

Bloodbath ongoing during the sham ceasefire

“We maintained the cease-fire, delivered record levels of humanitarian aid – great aid,” Trump declared at Davos.  “You used to hear all the people who were starving; it was terrible.  You don’t hear it anymore.”

What are the actual facts?  The toll of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces during the ‘ceasefire’ now is at least 520 (over 100 of them children), with nearly 1,400 people wounded.   In 27 months, Israel has exterminated over 2,700 extended Palestinian families, while 6,000 familieshave just one surviving member.  By Jan. 28, the total death toll was 71,667, not including thousands of bodies still buried under rubble.  On that day the Israeli military accepted Gaza Health Ministry numbers, after long denying their accuracy.  

In Gaza the number keeps steadily rising.  Three journalists and two 13-year-olds were among the 11 Palestinians killed on Jan. 21.  On Jan. 24, three Palestinians were murdered by drones, including two teens collecting firewood, while five were killed on Jan. 29 and a further seven on Jan 30.  The following day, multiple airstrikes killed at least 30 more people, many of them children.  See a video of the attacks here.

Israel continues to bar foreign journalists from entering the Gaza Strip and on Jan. 25, the transmission tower of the first Gaza radio station to be opened since Oct. 2023 was blown up by quadcopter drones.  Under US pressure to move onto phase two of the ‘peace plan’ Israel announced on Jan 30 that the Rafah Crossing would open on Feb. 2 for “limited movement only” of 150-200 people.  Some residents could leave for medical treatment and those who left during the war could return if they had prior security authorization from Israel.  

Meanwhile, living conditions endured by the nearly 40% of Gaza’s residents confined to flimsy tents in flood zones remain horrendous.  On Jan. 27, an eleventh child  - a 12-day-old baby - froze to death.   Dreadful conditions have contributed to a recent outbreak of bacterial meningitis.  And despite being squeezed into less than half of the western part of the Gaza Strip, at any moment residents can be ordered to move as Israel changes the location of its lethal ‘yellow line.’  As for food, the UN has reported that  “the food security situation has improved and famine has been reversed,” with most families “eating at least once a day.”  However, “100,000 children remain acutely malnourished and require long term care.”  

Meanwhile, there are reports of huge profits being made by war profiteers, including Israeli soldiers who are smuggling goods into Gaza from Israel. Trucks carrying ‘dual use’ items such as solar panels, phones, and generators that are generally barred from Gaza have been permitted entry without being searched as ‘coordination fees’ amounting to millions of dollars per truck are reportedly paid to the military.  Given their vastly inflated prices when they appear in Gaza’s markets, it is unclear who can purchase these goods.  

“The Final Expulsion of Palestinians is Underway – and your Indifference Enables It”

This is the headline of an article by Israeli journalist Amira Hass who excoriated the Israeli opposition for its silence as “the official armies of God and their subcontractors are engaged in expulsion and erasure, in emulating the achievements in Gaza.”   The changes in the West Bank, she wrote, “are tectonic and occur at lightning speed.”

Some examples: on Jan. 20, the Israel Land Authority demolished UNRWA’s East Jerusalem headquarters, an action condemned by the UK, France and nine other countries.   Some 1,400 settler housing units are planned for the 11 acre site near Sheikh Jarrah.  “I promised that we would kick the Nazi enemy out of Jerusalem,” said Aryeh King, the deputy mayor of Jerusalem.  

After a legal struggle lasting decades, Israel’s Supreme Court ruled that 40 families in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Batn al-Hawa in Silwan could be forced from their homes that have been claimed by the settler group Ateret Cohanim.  Residents are now being served with expulsion orders.  

On Jan. 25, the last family was forcibly displaced from Ras Ein al-Auja after enduring 15 years of settler harassment.   According to B’Tselem, this is the 46th shepherding community to be ethnically cleansed since Oct. 7, 2023.

On Jan. 26, settlers again attacked the Ein Samia wells, stopping water from reaching 19 communities east of Ramallah.  Meanwhile, across the West Bank the military and settlers have escalated their raids.   In the single week of Jan. 20 – 27, there reportedly were 330 army attacks and scenes like this are regular occurrences.   Settlers and soldiers conducted simultaneous “devastating pogroms” on three Masafer Yatta villages on the evening of Jan. 27. Over 1,110 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since October 2023, 230 of them children. 

The struggle for control of prominent religious sites is also intensifying.  On Jan. 19, after the administration of Hebron’s Ibrahimi Mosque was turned over to the settlement of Kiryat Arba, the director and custodian of the Mosque were barred entry for 15 days.  On Jan. 21, long-standing rules between Israel and the Jerusalem Waqf barring non Muslims from praying in the Al Aqsa Compound were changed to permit Jews to visit what they call the Temple Mount with prayer sheets, as national security minister  Itamar Ben-Gvir has long demanded.  Netanyahu, needing the support of Ben-Gvir’s far-right Otzma Yehudit party if he is to win this year’s elections, has backed the move. 

Torture as a tool of occupation

The systematic use of torture against Palestinian detainees is as old as the occupation, as a 1970 report by Amnesty International and a June 19, 1977 article in the Sunday Times of London attest.  Its use now appears to have achieved social acceptance.   Living Hell: The Israeli Prison System as a Network of Torture Camps was released by the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem on Jan. 20 as a follow up to its chilling July 2024 report Welcome to Hell.  Living Hell details the cruelty and ferocity with which torture and rape are routinely deployed in Israel’s prisons and detention camps, where between 9,000 and 10,000 ‘security prisoners’ are still being held after the ‘ceasefire’ releases of detainees.  More than a third are held indefinitely without charges or trial and 350 are minors.  The majority are from the West Bank.  At least 84 Palestinians have died in Israel’s ‘torture camps’ since Oct. 2023.  In addition to torture and daily dehumanization, prisoners have suffered from deliberate starvation and the withholding of medical treatment. 

In a Jan. 21 Guardian piece in which a former prisoner describes the sexual violence to which he was subjected, B’Tselem head Yuli Novak comments on the lack of effective international intervention, saying that “the international community continues to grant this regime full immunity.”

By giving a free pass to Israel to carry out genocide and torture powerful world leaders have reinforced its lack of a moral compass.  As  B’tselem writes about torture:  “Far from being carried out in the shadows, this systemic abuse is put on public display, with no attempt to conceal or obscure it. In fact, the persons in charge boast about it openly, and the entire Israeli regime is complicit….Torture of Palestinian prisoners, all of whom are labeled ‘terrorists’ by the Israeli media, has become an accepted norm.”

Nancy Murray, Alliance for Water Justice in Palestine
 

Note: Go here to read previous briefs.

How Netanyahu is sabotaging phase two of the Gaza ceasefire

By undermining a new Palestinian technocratic body, Israel is trying to make Gaza appear ungovernable — and prove the need for its sustained military rule.

By Muhammad Shehada January 29, 2026

When U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff announced the start of phase two of President Donald Trump’s Gaza ceasefire plan in mid-January, it marked the inauguration of the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG) — a 15-member Palestinian technocratic body tasked with providing services and managing reconstruction in the ravaged enclave, supervised by Trump’s Board of Peace and Gaza Executive Board.

Within hours of the announcement, all major Palestinian factions, including Fatah and Hamas, had welcomed the formation of the NCAG. Many of the committee’s members are well-known and respected figures who quickly garnered popular support. Chairman Ali Shaath himself lost his father during Israel’s genocide in Gaza and demands Israel be “held accountable,” while having been openly critical of Trump’s “Gaza Riviera” plan. The committee’s health commissioner, Dr. Aed Yaghi, is a longtime civil society activist who headed the Palestinian Medical Relief Society in Gaza. Ayed Abu Ramadan, the trade and industry commissioner, was chair of Gaza’s Chamber of Commerce and has been a vehement opponent of Israel’s policy of backing criminal gangs in the Strip.

The public in Gaza also breathed a sigh of relief when the committee’s first decision was to waive all taxes or fees on individuals and businesses imposed by Hamas’ government (both before October 7 and since the ceasefire), and when Shaath promised the reopening of the Rafah Crossing in his first televised appearance at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

But since its formation two weeks ago, Israel has yet to allow the NCAG to even enter Gaza, let alone rebuild it.

Even though Benjamin Netanyahu agreed to join the Board of Peace at Trump’s invitation, the Israeli prime minister publicly rebuked the president and criticized the Gaza Executive Board as running “contrary to Israeli policy.” Shortly after, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich declared“Gaza is ours” and called the Trump plan “bad for Israel.” Smotrich demanded that the plan be shelved in place of resuming “a full-force assault on Gaza” and rebuilding “permanent Israeli settlements” in the enclave.

The Israeli newspaper Maariv even reported that Israel is currently “preparing for the collapse of the Trump plan” and has already made preparations for resuming its assault on Gaza “without restrictions,” seeking this time to directly occupy the entire Strip. Israel’s Channel 14 further highlighted that the army’s chief of staff has approved plans for a large-scale attack on the enclave, including the invasion of areas that Israeli forces didn’t enter during two years of fighting.

In other words, Israel has made no secret of its intention to keep Gaza deadlocked indefinitely. The Israeli government is proactively taking steps to ensure that phase two of Trump’s plan will not proceed as planned — and at most, as Netanyahu remarked dismissively, remain a “symbolic” spectacle — in order to convince the Americans that Gaza is ungovernable, and thus prove the need for sustained Israeli military rule.

Read the entire ariticle from +972 here.