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Photos:

First three are scenes published by Maan News

A Bedouin woman attempts to block a bulldozer during a march in the unrecognized village of Al-Araqib, Negev Desert, July 24, 2016. (photo: Oren Ziv/Activestills.org)

Israeli police detain a Bedouin woman during a march in the unrecognized Bedouin village of Al-Araqib, Negev Desert, July 24, 2016. (photo: Oren Ziv/Activestills.org)

Israeli police detain Bedouin women during a march in the unrecognized village of Al-Araqib, Negev Desert, July 24, 2016. (photo: Oren Ziv/Activestills.org)

Israeli police detain an activist during a march in the unrecognized Bedouin village of Al-Araqib, Negev Desert, July 24, 2016. (photo: Oren Ziv/Activestills.org)
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NEGEV (Ma’an) -- Israeli police detained several Bedouin residents of the village of al-Araqib in the Negev on Sunday, after locals tried to prevent bulldozers from leveling lands in the village, a local activist told Ma’an.

Aziz Sayyah al-Turi said that Israeli police escorted bulldozers which raided the village in the morning “to take control of about 1,300 dunum (325 acres) of the village’s land, which they failed to take in 2011 after angry Arab crowds rushed to defend al-Araqib.”

Al-Turi added that Israeli police [detained] his wife and son, as well as at least two other al-Araqib residents he identified at Talal Abu Mudeghem and Ashraf Salim Abu Mudeghem.

Al-Turi added that he himself, along with his father Sheikh Sayyah al-Turi, were also temporarily detained.

Al-Turi said that three young women were also injured during the raid when they were “brutally” attacked by police forces.

Al-Turi and his father had also been detained on Thursday during one of a number of raids Israeli police have carried out in the village in past weeks.

Al-Araqib has been demolished at least 100 times by Israeli forces, as the village was designated as an “unrecognized” village by Israeli authorities, alongside 34 other Bedouin villages scattered across the Negev desert.

According to the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), more than half of the approximately 160,000 Negev Bedouins reside in unrecognized villages.

Israel can refuse residents of unrecognized villages access to the national water and electricity grids, health and educational services, and basic infrastructure.

Though Bedouins are citizens of Israel, the villages unrecognized by the government have faced relentless efforts by the Israeli authorities to expel them from their lands in order to make room for Jewish Israeli homes.
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Nine Bedouin and Jewish activists arrested for trying to prevent JNF bulldozers from turning Al-Araqib’s land into a forest.

Text and photos by Oren Ziv / Activestills.org for 972Mag.com

sraeli authorities arrested nine Bedouin and Jewish activists in the unrecognized village of Al-Araqib Sunday morning as they attempted to block bulldozers from working to turn village land into a Jewish National Fund (JNF) forest.

Like every other morning over the past week, JNF tractors began working the land, which has been destroyed by Israeli authorities 100 times over the past six years, in order to plant a forest in its place.

The women of Al-Araqib, joined by a number of teenagers and local activists, marched toward the tractors, which were guarded by approximately 30 police officers.

After marching, the women took a break for lunch before marching once again toward the tractors, this time attempting to block them with their bodies. The police violently arrested two of the women, one of whom fainted. Three Jewish activists who attempted to assist her were detained and taken to a local police station.

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Two teenagers and two men from the village were also arrested.

Last week the police arrested Sayekh, Al-Araqib’s sheikh, and his son Aziz, but was resigned to release them without any conditions after they were kept for hours at the police station in the Bedouin township of Rahat.

One of the village women, whose 20-year-old daughter was arrested, told +972: “The goal of the arrest was to pressure people to agree to restraining orders keeping them away from Al-Araqib. I hope the fact that the police chose to arrest women will cause people in Rahat and other places to wake up and come support us.” Over the past week the police refrained from arresting women, and focused on men in the hopes of quashing the protests.

The land in question is currently in the process of ownership registration and has yet to be legally resolved. In 2012 an Israeli court ruled that no irreversible changes should be made on these plots of land, which the Bedouin families claim as their own. Despite promises made by JNF chairman Efi Stenzler to halt any work until the issue is cleared legally, tractors began plowing this week.

It is one of 35 “unrecognized” Bedouin villages in the Negev desert in southern Israel, which means Israel refuses to provide residents with connections to the national water and electricity grids, provide them with health and educational services, or any basic infrastructure.