UNRWA’s West Bank director, Roland Friedrich, said the scenes in Hebron carry “alarming echoes” of the mass displacement in the northern occupied West Bank in early ۲۰۲۵, when Israeli military operations emptied the Jenin, Tulkarem and Nur Shams refugee camps.
More than ۳۴,۰۰۰ Palestinian refugees from the Jenin, Tulkarem and Nur Shams camps remain displaced, according to UNRWA, more than a year after Israel’s “Iron Wall” operation began in January ۲۰۲۵. The operation destroyed more than half of the camps’ residential buildings.
OCHA’s demolition records capture only a fraction of that destruction. Between ۲۰۰۹ and October ۲۰۲۶, the agency recorded ۱,۳۹۹ buildings demolished in the Jenin and Tulkarem governorates, displacing ۴,۱۳۹ people. Those records mainly track demolitions carried out for lack of permits or as punishment, not buildings destroyed during military raids.
An investigation by the research group Forensic Architecture found evidence of deliberate, systematic destruction. Researchers verified more than ۲۰۰ incidents involving the destruction of buildings and streets across four refugee camps, using armoured bulldozers, controlled demolitions and air attacks. They found that roads were widened through homes and gardens to create routes for military vehicles. The group concluded that Israel was applying tactics in the occupied West Bank similar to those it had used in Gaza.
In February ۲۰۲۵, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said Tulkarem and Jenin would come to resemble Jabalia and Shujayea, two of Gaza’s most devastated areas.
The raids have not stopped. Last week, Israeli forces detained four Palestinians in Tulkarem, and in the village of Burin, south of Nablus, troops converted several homes into military barracks, as they have in Hebron.
Near Jenin, the army has ordered the residents of an entire village to leave permanently. “I have sheep and cows. Our entire lives are tied to this land,” said farmer Jabri Yahya. “Last year they uprooted our olive trees, and this year they want to force us to leave. We don’t know where to go.”
