On Sunday (October 19, 2025), residents of the Palestinian village of Um al-Kheir submitted an affidavit detailing multiple violations of a temporary court injunction prohibiting the inhabitation of caravans and construction work at the illegal outpost adjacent to the village. The injunction was issued by the Beersheba District Court a week earlier, on Sunday, October 12, 2025.
Tomorrow (October 20), the State Attorney’s Office is expected to respond to a petition by Peace Now and Umm al-Kheir residents demanding to know why the court’s order has not been enforced.
According to the affidavit, the latest breach occurred on Monday, October 13, the day Israeli hostages were released. On that day, settlers entered the outpost, occupied the caravans, and continued development work that has persisted since. The head of the Har-Hebron Regional Council, Eliram Azulai, was reportedly seen visiting the site. Attorney Michael Sfard, legal counsel for Peace Now, immediately alerted the legal advisor for the West Bank, the Defense Ministry’s legal counsel, the Hebron police, the IDF, and the Civil Administration. Villagers also filed complaints and sent video evidence to several authorities. Yet, no enforcement officials arrived at the scene, and settlers have since continued refurbishing the caravans, connecting them to electricity, and moving in equipment.
The court injunction was part of a broader petition filed by Peace Now and Um al-Kheir residents, represented by attorneys Michael Sfard, Shnir Klein, and Anat Halpern, demanding the removal of the newly installed caravans and the prevention of a new road being carved near the village homes, intended to link the settlement of Carmel with the new outpost. The petition also calls for the dismantling of a fence built by settlers on privately owned Palestinian land.
תיראו מופתעים
יום למחרת הוצאת הצו תועדו מתנחלים ובינהם ראש המועצה מפרים את צו בית המשפט שאוסר עליהם לאכלס ולעבוד במאחז.
בלתי נתפס שבזמן שעם ישראל כולו צפה והתרגש עם שובם של החטופים, מתנחלים עבריינים עסקו בצפצוף על בית המשפט – ואף גורם לא הגיע לבצע אכיפה. https://t.co/xyOs08qjq5 pic.twitter.com/rFRXEfmaE3
— שלום עכשיו (@PeaceNowIL) October 15, 2025
Peace Now: “For months, all enforcement authorities have been fully aware of the massive and blatantly illegal construction project taking place on Um al-Kheir’s lands. Not only have they failed to act, but even after a clear court order, the criminal activity and land theft continue unchecked. It is outrageous and inexcusable that while Israelis were united in joy over the hostages’ return, lawbreaking settlers are openly defying the court, and not a single authority has stepped in to enforce the law.”
Background
Um al-Kheir is a Palestinian village of about 200 Bedouin residents. Their families originated in the Negev and were forced to leave their lands after 1948. They later migrated to the South Hebron Hills, where they purchased land and settled in Masafer Yatta during the Jordanian administration of the West Bank. Israel does not recognize the village as legal. The state refuses to issue building permits and considers all structures in the village “illegal.” According to OCHA, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Israel has demolished 56 structures in the village over the past 15 years.
In the early 1980s, Israel declared c. 4,000 dunams in the area as state land and allocated them to the Settlement Division for the establishment of the Carmel and Ma’on settlements. The Carmel settlement was built adjacent to the lands of Um al-Kheir. In 2005, the Higher Planning Council approved Plan 507/1 for Carmel, which expanded the settlement’s planned area to include about 2,200 dunams of surrounding open land. Around seven of those dunams lie within the village of Um al-Kheir itself, and on these 7 dunams the caravans were established. Under the plan, the area where the outpost was built is zoned for agricultural use, not for housing.
Settler Harassment of the Residents of Um al-Kheir
Residents of Um al-Kheir, like many Palestinian villages across Area C, have come under repeated attack by settlers from nearby settlements and newly established shepherd outposts. These assaults include physical violence against residents and damage to their property. The Israeli police and security forces have not acted to prevent the violence, which has already driven dozens of Palestinian communities from their homes.
In the past year, the Magistrate’s Court issued a restraining order against Shimon Attiya, a settler from the Havat Shoreshim outpost, following a petition submitted by the residents together with Peace Now. Attiya had been harassing and threatening families in their homes without any provocation on their part.
As mentioned, the peak of violence in Um al-Kheir occurred with the killing of Odeh al-Hathalin by a settler. In addition, settlers have several times destroyed the village’s water and electricity pipes, leaving the residents during the peak heat of August without water and for several days without electricity at all. Repairing the infrastructure took several days and required the intervention of the authorities, since settlers prevented the Civil Administration or the residents themselves from fixing the pipes they had deliberately broken.
