Land Authority says it won’t serve demolition notice for rescued hostage’s home
Some 70% of residents in Farhan al-Qadi’s village of Khirbet Karkour have received notices amid action against the unrecognized communities where about a third of Bedouins live
The Israel Land Authority said Thursday that it would not serve a demolition notice to rescued hostage Farhan al-Qadi, though the state has earmarked much of his village to be razed.
Al-Qadi, who was rescued on Tuesday by IDF troops from an underground Hamas tunnel in Gaza after over 10 months in captivity, hails from the unrecognized Bedouin village of Khirbet Karkur, near Rahat. Since November, about 70 percent of Khirbet Karkur residents have been told the government plans to raze their homes because they were built without permits in a “protected forest” not zoned for housing, according to a lawyer representing them.
A spokesperson for the Israel Land Authority said that “in light of the situation,” it would not serve a demolition notice to the al-Qadi family. But it would not comment on the plight of his neighbors or their lawyers’ efforts to save their homes.
For decades, Israel has been trying to convince scattered, off-the-grid Bedouin villagers that it is in their interest to move into government-designated Bedouin townships, where the government can provide them with water, electricity and schools. Bedouin leaders have rejected many proposals, saying they would destroy their lifestyle or send them to less desirable areas. About a third of Bedouins in Israel live in unrecognized villages in the southern Negev desert.
The High Court has previously deemed many of the unrecognized Bedouin villages illegal, and the government has said they are trying to bring order to a lawless area and give a better quality of life to the impoverished minority.
There have been 2,007 Bedouin structures demolished in the first six months of 2024, according to the Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality, a left-wing group that tracks demolitions in the Bedouin community.
That’s a 51% increase over the same period in 2022, under the previous government. The then-ruling coalition — a motley crew of factions opposed to current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — included the late Bedouin lawmaker Said al-Harumi, who abstained from the vote to confirm that government in protest of the planned demolitions.
The increase in demolitions has coincided with the ascendance of Netanyahu’s hardline coalition. National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir and other members of his far-right Otzma Yehudit party have consistently championed the demolition of illegal Bedouin construction in the Negev desert and the West Bank.
Ben Gvir last year traveled to witness a demolition himself, expressing “kudos” and calling the destruction “sacred work.”
