Amnesty International has accused Israel of carrying out a campaign of "ethnic cleansing" of Palestinian Bedouin communities from the occupied West Bank, with the intention of annexing the territory. The human rights organization's new 150-page report alleges that the forced displacement of these communities is a result of concerted state policy, not solely the actions of settlers.
The report found that Israeli authorities were committing the crime against humanity of forcible transfer through a "state-driven campaign of ethnic cleansing targeting Palestinian Bedouin and herding communities in Area C of the occupied West Bank." Area C makes up around 60 percent of the total area of the West Bank and is under the military and civil control of Israeli authorities.
According to Amnesty’s report, the Israeli government has expanded gun licenses and the number of armed settlers in the area, increased funding for illegal settlements, and accelerated the construction of settlements and the legalization of outposts. Outposts are settlements built in contravention of Israeli law, which are increasingly being legalized by the authorities, though all Israeli settlements in the West Bank are illegal under international law.
Agnes Callamard, the head of Amnesty International, stated that "Over the past three and a half years Israeli authorities have accelerated a state-sponsored campaign of ethnic cleansing in the West Bank, uprooting, dispossessing and forcibly transferring Palestinian communities." She emphasized that "This is not the work of rogue actors or what the international community has repeatedly labelled as extremist settlers, organisations or one or two ministers." Callamard added, "What we are witnessing is deliberate, state-led annexation, in complete violation of international law unfolding before the eyes of the entire world."
