Israel has deployed tanks into the occupied West Bank and ordered its military to prepare for an “extended stay” to fight Palestinian armed groups in the area’s refugee camps.
Sunday’s move comes among an expansion of military operations that have expelled an estimated 40,000 people from their homes in the Israeli-occupied West Bank over the past month, since a ceasefire paused fighting in Gaza.
Increasingly strident calls by Israeli hardliners for full annexation of Palestinian territories and a proposal by United States President Donald Trump to expel everyone who lives in Gaza have stoked fears of a new Nakba.
Here’s everything you need to know about the recent escalation in the West Bank and what it means:
Israel deployed three tanks into the Jenin refugee camp, the first such deployment in the occupied West Bank since 2002, when Israel launched a bloody crackdown on a Palestinian uprising known as the second Intifada, which lasted until 2005.
Israel began its attack on January 21 and has moved beyond Jenin and its camp southwards to Qabatiya and westwards to Burqin, and eastwards out of Tulkarem to Nur Shams refugee camp.
It has also raided further south in the West Bank, hitting Kobar and Silwad north of Ramallah, the Beitunia neighbourhood of Ramallah, and Hebron.
As it conducts its raids, the Israeli army is also expelling people, destroying roads, imposing curfews for days on end, blocking access points to towns, arresting people and commandeering homes for military use.
No, it is not legal.
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