Opinion | In the West Bank, a boy dreams of being martyred

“Little Gaza” is the nickname that the inhabitants used for an area marked by the battle here where the buildings are destroyed and the roads torn, where families have been hunted, where the alleys pile up with loss, sorrow and fear of elite shooters. But it is not at all Gaza, it is a refugee camp in Tulkarm in the West Bank.

Without attracting a lot of notice or protest, Israel is increasingly using familiar war tools in Gaza – tanks, air strikes and massive destruction and travel – here in the West Bank. Human rights groups like B’tselem call this the “gazer” of the West Bank.

A centerpiece of this gauze is a wave of Israeli military assaults that started in January in the West Bank refugee camps, forcing some 40,000 people at home. Historians say that it is the largest number of civilians in the territory since Israel has grasped it in 1967.

In the short term, Israeli military actions seem to have succeeded in repressing Palestinian activists in the camps, but at an immense cost in life and suffering. Sondos Shalabi, a 23 -year -old woman who was eight months pregnant with her first child.

In the longer term, destruction can simply sow seeds of violence. At the edge of a forbidden area, where groups of Palestinians watched their house but did not dare to enter out of fear of Israeli elite shooters, I spoke to a 12 -year -old boy, Mohammed Abdul Jalil. He said that his house had been demolished and that his school lessons have canceled in the past two months due to the military occupation of the camp.