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Gaza water as weapon
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said Israeli authorities are using access to water as a "weapon" against the Gaza population, depriving it of the essential resource as part of a "collective punitive campaign," in a report published on Tuesday.
“The Israeli occupation army and settlers escalated their attacks and raids against Palestinians in various areas of the West Bank, resulting in injuries, the detention of dozens, and the demolition of homes and facilities”
MSF’s press release accompanying its report titled 'Water as a Weapon: Destruction and Deprivation of Water and Sanitation by Israel in Gaza' states that "the deliberate deprivation of water inflicted on Palestinians is an integral part of the genocide being carried out by Israel," and it links the water deprivation to "the direct killings of civilians" and "the destruction of health facilities".
MSF said the report relies on MSF data and testimony gathered by its staff between 2024 and 2025, and it argues that 'the repeated instrumentalization of water' reflects 'a recurring, systematic, and cumulative pattern.'
MSF’s head of emergencies, Claire San Filippo, said in the press release that "Israeli authorities know that without water, life stops," while it also cited that ninety percent of Gaza's water and sanitation infrastructure has been destroyed.
The Israeli Defense Ministry agency COGAT, which oversees civil affairs in the occupied Palestinian territories, "categorically" rejected MSF’s allegations, saying the water supply "consistently exceeds humanitarian thresholds" thanks to dozens of local wells and "more than 70,000 cubic meters of water distributed each day."
West Bank raids and arrests
In the occupied West Bank, Sana reported that an Israeli incursion into several areas left a Palestinian man wounded and led to dozens of arrests, after Israeli occupation forces opened fire on a young man near the separation wall in the town of Tarqumiya, west of Hebron.
Sana said Israeli soldiers invaded the towns of A‘lar and Sida, north of Tulkarem, conducting raids that targeted dozens of homes and led to the detention of 40 Palestinians, and it added that five Palestinians were arrested during raids into Qalandiya Camp in East Jerusalem and in towns including Halhoul and Beit Ummar in Hebron.
The same Sana account said Israeli forces demolished shops and facilities around Qalandiya Camp and agricultural shelters in the village of Al-Minya near Bethlehem.
Anadolu Ajansı reported that Israeli forces demolished another home in the village of al-Dirat in Hebron Governorate, and it quoted Majdi Al-Adra, head of the Khla al-Mai council in Hebron, saying Israeli forces stormed the village with dozens of soldiers and assaulted residents, resulting in injuries to three women, before demolishing a home belonging to Osama Musa‘af.
Anadolu Ajansı also quoted Al-Adra saying the village had become a "disaster area" after Israeli forces demolished more than 10 homes there in the past forty days and issued more than 50 demolition notices in the last three months.
Demolitions, displacement, and escalation
Middle East Monitor said Israeli forces demolished a Palestinian family’s home in the village of Ad-Deirat, near Yatta east of Hebron, on Tuesday, citing the lack of a building permit, and it said members of the family and other Palestinians rushed to remove as many belongings as possible from the house owned by Osama Issa Musaif.
The same report said Israel continues to demolish Palestinian homes and structures in the occupied West Bank, claiming they were built without permits, and it described how Palestinian and Israeli rights groups say Israeli authorities impose strict restrictions that prevent Palestinians from obtaining building permits, especially in areas classified as Area C.
Middle East Monitor stated that under the Oslo II Accord signed in 1995, Area C falls under full Israeli control and makes up about 60% of the West Bank, and it said UN data shows demolitions last year alone displaced more than 1,700 Palestinians.
Al-Jazeera Net said Israeli occupation army and settlers escalated attacks and raids across the West Bank, including demolition of homes and facilities, and it reported that WAFA said occupation bulldozers demolished a factory and agricultural sheds in the town of Beit Ola, destroying components including equipment, machines, sheds, goods, offices and other facilities.
Al-Jazeera Net also said that since the start of the war of annihilation in Gaza in October 2023, the Israeli escalation in the West Bank has led to the martyrdom of 1,181 Palestinians, injuries to about 13,000 others, and the arrest of around 24,000 people, according to the Palestinian Government Communications Office in Ramallah.
