Bethlehem and al-Makhrour, occupied West Bank – For Alice Kisiya, a Palestinian Christian activist from Beit Jala in the occupied West Bank, this Christmas season is special.

On Tuesday, Kisiya was able, for the first time since 2019, to set foot on her family’s land in the Christian village of al-Makhrour after an Israeli court ruling in June eventually forced Israeli settlers to leave the land and dismantle an illegal outpost.

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“This victory, which forced the settlers to dismantle their outpost in preparation for leaving for good, confirms to me that one must never tire of continuing the struggle, despite all the methods they used to pressure me and my family into leaving the land,” Kisiya told Al Jazeera.

“They left our family’s land after four months and moved on to build an outpost on land belonging to our relatives. Yet, I have prevailed once again, because every time I saw them on my land, it strengthened my commitment to pursue my legal struggle,” she said.

The Kisiya family’s legal battle was prolonged and hard-fought after an Israeli settler organisation claimed to have bought the land from “other owners” and provided ownership documents. After years of legal proceedings, an Israeli court recently rejected the settlers’ allegation and ruled that the documents presented were fabricated. The court stated that the Kisiya family was the legal owner of the 5 dunams (0.005sq km) piece of land in al-Makhrour and had the right to return to it.

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“The Israeli court ruling is very important, because it affirms my rights and ownership of the land and exposes the falsity of the occupation and settlers’ manipulation of property documents in an illegal manner, as they were forged for political and personal purposes,” Kisiya, who was arrested in 2024 for protesting settler land grabs, said.

But despite her legal victory, Kisiya still does not stay on her land, fearing settler attacks and violence, which are commonplace in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

“The court ruling granted my family and me the right to return to the land, the house and the restaurant that were demolished by the occupation, but we are now avoiding a permanent presence because of settler violence, backed by the right-wing government and its ministers, Smotrich and Ben-Gvir,” she said, referring to Israeli Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich and Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir.

Kisiya, whose family home Israeli forces also demolished when she was a child, has become a symbol of resistance in her Christian community and among other Palestinians after years of leading a civil, legal and popular campaign to confront Israeli occupation policies and illegal settlement expansions.

Push for illegal settlements

Kisiya’s success offers renewed hope. But Israel’s settlement expansion, aimed at linking illegal East Jerusalem settlements with the Gush Etzion bloc south of the occupied West Bank, is continuing as part of the so-called “Greater Jerusalem” plan.

Israel’s far-right government, led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, is pushing to confiscate Palestinian land and build more settlements.

In a social media post, Smotrich, who is a settler himself, said: “We continue to write history in settlement building and in the State of Israel… We have legalised 69 settlements in three years. We are preventing the establishment of a Palestinian state on the ground. We continue development, construction and settlement in the land of our ancestors, with faith in the justice of our cause.”

The number of settlements and outposts in the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem has risen by nearly 50 percent – from 141 in 2022 to 210 now – under the current Israeli government.

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An outpost is built without government authorisation, while a settlement is authorised by the Israeli government. Both are illegal under international law, as they are built on occupied land.

Nearly 10 percent of Israel’s Jewish population of 7.7 million people live in these settlements.

Israeli authorities are expected to advance plans to build 9,000 new housing units in a settlement on the site of the abandoned Qalandiya airport in occupied East Jerusalem, in another attempt to cut off Palestinian lands from each other and block any possibility of a contiguous Palestinian state emerging.

The so-called Atarot neighbourhood in northern East Jerusalem, reminiscent of the E1 plan to undermine Palestinian statehood, is to be discussed and have its outlines approved on Wednesday by the District Planning and Building Committee, according to Israeli group Peace Now.

Palestinian farmers a form of resistance

Palestinians are not standing idle and are finding their own means, albeit small, to block the Israeli land grab.

Farmer Bashir al-Sous, who is 60 years old, has never stopped cultivating and rehabilitating his land in al-Makhrour, despite Israeli plans to confiscate some 2,800 dunams (2.8sq km) of agricultural land.

He explained to Al Jazeera that his village was first targeted in the 1990s with the construction of settlement Road 60, which split the land in two, and is now facing renewed confiscation plans. Palestinian farmers repeatedly say that Israeli authorities reject their requests to establish electricity and water pipelines, and to issue building permits.

Al-Sous wants to challenge the Israeli narrative that there are no Palestinians on the land.

“I believe we can protect our land by keeping our presence 24 hours a day, and by planting it with grapes and olives,” al-Sous told Al Jazeera.

“Keeping our presence visible will brush aside the claims that these lands have no owners,” he said, adding that farmers rely on historical wells and old agrarian structures that enable them to cultivate the land.

“We will not leave our land,” he said.

Fears over legal evasion

Palestinian legal experts have warned against celebrating legal victories, because Israeli officials and settler leaders could evade court rulings.

“The escalation in settler expansion in the West Bank is clear. What is happening is part of an Israeli policy aimed at eliminating the concept of a Palestinian state,” said Hassan Breijieh, head of the international law department at the Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission.

“Israeli actions circumvent laws and court orders, especially in strategic areas that are central to the plan to connect Jerusalem with Gush Etzion settlements within the so-called Greater Jerusalem,” he said.

Breijieh added that the Israeli government seeks to continue its grand settlement plan with the backing of the United States.

A message to the Christian world

Those concerns are very real for Kisiya, but she still believes that her legal victory represents a glimmer of hope, and one that has come at an important time of the year for Christians.

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For Kisiya and her family, this Christmas brings strength and steadfastness.

“I pray that God strengthens our faith and keeps us rooted in our land,” she told Al Jazeera. “Palestinian Christians are an integral part of the national struggle, facing systematic displacement aimed at portraying the conflict as purely religious.”

“I want the world to know that we, as Christians, are not separate from the Palestinian cause,” she added. “We are a fundamental part of it, alongside our Muslim brothers and sisters. We are subjected to systematic persecution aimed at emptying the Holy Land of Christians and forcing them into displacement, so that Israel can portray the conflict as one between itself and Muslims.”

Kisiya said she is looking towards Christian world leaders, in particular, the leaders of the world’s churches, to stand by the ancient Christian population of Palestine.

“I hope that His Holiness the Pope, along with all church leaders and clergy, will intervene more broadly to protect the Christian presence in the city of Bethlehem and throughout Palestine,” she said.

“We are part of the struggle and the building of the Palestinian state.”