As the siege enters its second week, 15 Palestinians, including two children, remain besieged inside three homes in the Ras al-Ain area of Qusra, south of Nablus. Surrounded by armed Israeli settlers and military battalions and convoys, the families are cut off from food, water, and electricity. The United Nations reported that the residents are “trapped inside their homes in a state of terror, unable to attend to their basic needs and without access to water or electricity”.

Stripped of humanity

The humanitarian crisis remained acute on Sunday when the Israeli army intercepted a UNICEF convoy attempting to deliver aid to the trapped families. While the entry of two vehicles provided temporary relief regarding food, military forces blocked and expelled a water tanker from the vicinity of the homes, sustaining the severe deprivation of basic resources. The day prior, settlers attacked municipal workers and a bulldozer attempting to repair utility lines. Qusra Mayor Abdel Azim Wadi told Al Jazeera, “We were unable to restore electricity and water to the three besieged homes in the town.”

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Wadi emphasized the severity of the situation, stating, “Humanely, we have often heard about human rights, about children’s rights, and about women’s rights, but today what our families in Jabal Ras al-Ain are experiencing is truly stripped of humanity.”

Al Jazeera’s Laith Jaar, reporting from Qusra, witnessed the military’s direct involvement in enforcing the blockade. “The Israeli army is the one providing this support to these settlers, and the Israeli army is moving in the area with the participation of settlers who are trying to distance Palestinians and expel them from their homes,” Jaar reported. Describing the military and settler coordination, he added, “We are talking about continuous siege operations that completely tighten the stranglehold on the Palestinians.”

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We will not leave

Inside the cordoned area, residents remain defiant despite the encroaching military and settler presence. The Israeli army has converted a home at the top of the hill into a military barracks and declared the area a closed military zone to expel international solidarity activists and members of the Israeli group Peace Now. However, the military has simultaneously refused to execute nine eviction orders against the illegal outpost established on the western outskirts of the town by the Hilltop Youth militia in Area B—the very outpost from which the settlers are operating and besieging the Palestinian homes.

Qusai Abu Reida, a besieged resident, communicated his resolve to Al Jazeera. “We will remain steadfast and we will remain patient, meaning even if they cut off our food, nourishment, and medicine, and meaning even if we drink water and salt, we made a pact with ourselves and our neighbors Youssef and Rizq that we will not leave here except as martyrs,” Abu Reida said. He affirmed, “It is impossible for us to leave this house, as this is our effort and the effort of the land of our ancestors, meaning we will not take it lightly and give it to them.”

Strategic terror

Political analysts and human rights advocates view the siege of Qusra as a calculated blueprint for broader ethnic cleansing. Mustafa Barghouti, Secretary-General of the Palestinian National Initiative, told Al Jazeera that the operation has a clear tactical and strategic purpose. “The first tactical goal is to seize these lands and thousands of dunams and seize this area and expel these people and ethnically cleanse them from their homes through threatening them with terrorism,” Barghouti said. He warned that the true danger lies in the precedent being set for the rest of the occupied territory, stating, “But the strategic goal is a message to all the villages of the West Bank that this that is happening in Qusra will happen in other places.”

Erika Guevara Rosas, Amnesty International’s Senior Director for Research, Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns, echoed this assessment. She stated that “the horrors unfolding in Qusra reflect the relentless escalation and expansion of an accelerating and well-documented pattern of coordinated and strategic settler terror, enabled, backed and funded by the State of Israel”. This systemic violence aligns with a rapid settlement expansion campaign, with the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission reporting that settlers have established over 300 outposts since October 2023, while the Israeli government has advanced plans for 104 new settlements.

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