Holiday resort guest houses under construction in a Judean Desert nature reserve under Palestinian Authority control, Aug. 21, 2024. Photo: Josh Hasten.
Israeli government officials, local municipalities and NGOs are waiting to see whether Israel’s Civil Administration will implement a recent cabinet decision calling for Israel to reclaim responsibility from the Palestinian Authority for a nature reserve just east of Gush Etzion in the Judean Desert.
MKs Yuli Edelstein (left) and Danny Danon (second from left) study a map during a fact-finding visit to the illegal Bedouin encampment of Khan al-Ahmar near Jerusalem, Jan 23, 2023. Photo by Josh Hasten.
Knesset member Danny Danon (Likud) on Monday morning led a fact-finding visit to a hilltop overlooking the illegal Bedouin encampment of Khan al-Ahmar, located on Highway 1 between Jerusalem and the Dead Sea.
View of the E1 corridor. Photo by Josh Hasten.
The Israeli government seems to be starting to fall in line with a request by Washington not to take any “provocative measures” in Judea and Samaria ahead of the July 13 visit by U.S. President Joe Biden to the Jewish state.
View of the Bedouin city of Rahat in southern Israel, on April 8, 2019. Photo by Moshe Shai/Flash90
Israel’s Sovereignty Movement, headed by Nadia Matar and Yehudit Katzover, organized a tour of the Negev Desert on Dec. 28 for journalists, think-tank professionals and influencers to get a glimpse into the lives of the 300,000 Bedouin who live in that region.
Bedouins in the Negev Desert near Arad in southern Israel on Feb. 20, 2020. Photo by Anat Hermony/Flash90.
An Israeli Bedouin resident of the Negev desert was sentenced to seven months in prison this past week by the Beersheva Magistrates Court for practicing polygamy. The sentencing was welcomed by the Israeli NGO Regavim, whose mission is to preserve Israel’s resources, and which has been studying and monitoring the practice of polygamy in the Bedouin sector for years.
This isn’t the first time that garbage has been an issue. Here, dumping outside the Palestinian village of Rammun, Dec. 8, 2014. Photo by Hadas Parush/Flash90.
“We find it implausible that the Palestinian Authority managed to hide thousands of trucks dumping garbage over the side of a cliff along a major highway for weeks on end,” said Regavim, which is pressing for cleanup and a resolution to the situation.
After nearly a decade, the saga of the illegal Bedouin village of Khan Al-Amar continues. Over the weekend Prime Minister Netanyahu delayed the evacuation of the illegal squatters’ colony adjacent to Highway One between Jerusalem and the Dead Sea. He promised that one day it will be taken down, but now as a result of his capitulation to foreign remonstrators, when that will happen nobody knows. Joining Josh Hasten on this week’s Israel Uncensored, is Naomi Kahn the director of the international division of the Regavim Organization, a group committed to safeguarding Israel’s State Lands, to discuss this latest development on Khan Al-Amar.