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HEBRON (Ma'an) -- Israeli forces on Sunday handed confiscation orders to Palestinians in the al-Kaabna area of Um al-Daraj south of Hebron, officials told Ma'an.

Soldiers told residents that large tracts of their land would be appropriated for an Israeli military base, said Hassan al-Basaita, mayor of the local village council.

Al-Basaita said that Israel wanted to confiscate the lands and destroy the barns and pastures in order to restrict local people's lives and eventually to displace them.

He added that the Israeli forces had tried more than once to forcibly displace the people there, and that at that time they demolished houses, agricultural properties, and barns.

They also demolished water wells in order to force people to leave the area by cutting off access to water, he said.

He added that Palestinians who live in this area would not leave their houses and lands, even if they were exposed to aggressive violations and practices even worse than these.

Israel has destroyed more than 558 Palestinian properties in the West Bank and East Jerusalem since the beginning of this year, displacing 919 people, according to UNOCHA.

Israel rarely grants Palestinians permits to build in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. It has demolished at least 27,000 Palestinian homes and structures since occupying the West Bank in 1967, according to the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions.

The internationally recognized Palestinian territories of which the West Bank and East Jerusalem form a part have been occupied by the Israeli military since 1967.