Six Israeli reserve battalions will be stationed along the illegal Apartheid Wall that isolates the occupied West Bank from Israel, the military announced on Wednesday.
The decision to call up reserve battalions in replacement of regular forces was approved by the Chief of the Israeli Army, Aviv Kohavi, in order to prevent Palestinians from entering Israel without passing through one of the occupation’s illegal checkpoints in the West Bank.
Israeli troops arrest around 20 Palestinian ppl near the apartheid wall en route to their work places in the city of Tulkarem | from @Kuffiya3 pic.twitter.com/czsGRbUXL0
— Sarah Wilkinson (@swilkinsonbc) April 25, 2022
According to the military, the call-ups, which will stretch over “several rounds”, will be done in a way “that will enable the optimal deployment of the forces in the Central Command, and maintenance of operational competence and routine training in the IDF.”
This comes after Israeli ministers voted unanimously to allocate 300 million shekels ($93 million) to improve a 40-kilometer section of the Apartheid Wall earlier this month.
Late Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, suggested the erection of the Wall in the 1990s, but work only began during the Second Intifada in 2000.
This is how many Palestinians made it to occupied Jerusalem to pray at Al Aqsa Mosque, by climbing Israel's apartheid wall. pic.twitter.com/SC0ZebUJSh
— Palestine Info Center (@palinfoen) April 28, 2022
Only 708 kilometers of the wall have been completed, comprising 62 percent of the entire project.
In 2004, the International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion that the building of a barrier in the occupied Palestinian territory is illegal and said construction must stop immediately and Israel should make reparations for any damage caused. Israel took no action in relation to this and continued to expand the structure.
Much of the structure is built on Palestinian land and in many places it separates Palestinians from their land or from relatives whose properties lie on the other side of the illegal structure.
(MEMO, PC, Social Media)
