West Bank: Jewish settlers vandalise Palestinian school threatened with demolition

Palestinian students sit with their teacher inside a classroom at the Ras al-Tenneen school in eastern Ramallah city which an Israeli court ruled that it was built without the necessary construction permit and rejected an appeal against its imminent demolition, on 8 October 2020. [ABBAS MOMANI/AFP via Getty Images]

Jewish settlers stormed a Palestinian school in the central occupied West Bank on Sunday, breaking windows and vandalising fixtures and fittings, Wafa has reported. Ras Al-Tin School to the east of Ramallah is threatened with demolition by the Israeli occupation army.

The school is located in a Palestinian Bedouin community on land belonging to the villages of Kafr Malik, Khirbet Abu Falah and Al-Mughayer. It was built in 2020, and is part of the Palestinian Tahaddi School Group.

According to Wafa, in October 2020 the Israeli authorities decided to demolish the school, on the pretext that it is located in an area under full Israeli control, and construction is prohibited for any reason, even for education purposes.

Jewish settlers also stormed the Tahaddi school in the Wadi Al-Siq Bedouin community on Sunday. They too smashed its windows and vandalised its contents.

There are currently 18 Tahaddi schools in the occupied West Bank built by the Palestinian Colonisation and Wall Resistance Commission with international support. They are in so-called Area C, in which Israel prevents construction on the pretext of a lack of building permits, which are almost impossible to obtain.

The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the settler attacks on the two schools. It described them as part of the “serious escalation of settler attacks and their targeting of Palestinian educational institutions, especially those located in areas classified as ‘C’ that are threatened with seizure. These attacks fall within the framework of the occupation state’s attempts to isolate, Judaise and annex the West Bank, and to fight all forms of the Palestinian national and humanitarian presence in those areas targeted by settlement.”

The ministry said that it holds the Israeli government fully responsible for the results of the settler attacks. “We call upon the US administration, the international community and the relevant UN organisations, particularly UNESCO, to shoulder their responsibilities in providing protection for educational institutions.”

READ: Israel settlers protest building Palestinian homes in West Bank

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