Ever since the beginning of Israel’s assault on Gaza in October 2023, Palestinians in the occupied West Bank have been suffering from an acute unemployment crisis. In the first six months of the war, the unemployment rate nearly tripled, with over 300,000 workers losing their main source of income. 

Over half of those people were working inside Israel until the authorities revoked their work permits following the Hamas attack of October 7. Palestinian workers have repeatedly demanded that their permits to enter Israel be reissued so they can provide for their children and live a decent life, but their requests have so far been denied.

In my village of Umm Al-Khair in the South Hebron Hills, most families no longer have any source of income. On top of a frightening uptick in settler attacks and home demolitions in our community, most residents now find themselves in financial ruin. Already well into the second year of this reality, we are still without solutions or adequate financial assistance. 

Historically, our community subsisted on shepherding and agricultural farming. But over the years, the expansion of the Jewish settlement of Carmel — which seized half of the village’s land when it was established in 1980 — and violence from Israeli settlers and soldiers have rendered the vast majority of our land inaccessible. Forced to find alternative sources of income, many young men in the community began working as laborers inside Israel — until the war put a stop to that.  

Ahmed Hathaleen, a 29-year-old laborer who worked at Israeli construction sites before the war, has been unemployed for over 16 months now. He suffered a severe work injury in August 2023, which required him to undergo surgery in an Israeli hospital to have one of his fingers amputated. By the time his wounds had healed, the war had started and Israel had revoked his work permit. 

With no other income to support his family, Ahmed has been forced to ask friends for money, which causes him to feel embarrassed and ashamed. But, he says, he has no choice: “I am the father of two children: Khaled, who is 2 and a half years old, and Majed, who is 10 months old. I was blessed with Majed in the first months of the war. At these ages, my children need a lot of care, and my inability to work makes it extremely difficult to provide basic necessities for them.” 

To make matters worse, Ahmed receives daily messages and calls from the Israeli hospital where he underwent the operation, reminding him to pay the debt he incurred from necessary follow-up appointments in the months after his surgery. The hospital has given him an ultimatum: pay the outstanding balance or they will transfer his file to the Israeli courts, which will cause him to incur additional costs in the form of lawyer fees and late-payment fines. 

“I currently have nothing,” Ahmed lamented. “I owe many friends money that I borrowed to support my family and children, and I owe the hospital a sum of money that I am unable to repay. The more time that passes, the worse the situation gets. No one cares about us. The Palestinian Authority has not found solutions for us after a whole year without work.”

Many other families in Umm Al-Khair are in a similar situation. Some have even been forced to sell basic necessities such as home furniture in order to support their children.

Ammar Hathaleen, a 32-year-old agricultural worker, lost his job inside Israel when the war started. “I have six children — we have a lot of expenses,” he explained. “Since losing my income, I have no way of supporting them.”

Ammar searched continuously for work in the West Bank but couldn’t find anything. He tried to harvest wheat and other produce in his agricultural fields near the village to save money, but the Israeli army and settlers made accessing his own private land impossible. 

Cut off from our own land

Ammar’s case illustrates the major difficulties Palestinian farmers throughout the West Bank are facing as Israeli government-funded settlements increasingly cut them off from their land. Historically, Hebron and its surrounding villages, such as Umm Al-Khair, have produced most of the West Bank’s grapes, and along with the Jordan Valley it is where most of the region’s animal herding takes place. 

As such, it is no accident that settlers have strategically concentrated their attacks in this fertile area. And with the support of the Israeli army, settler militias have taken control of tens of thousands of dunams of agricultural land. 

Prior to October 7, farmers in Umm Al-Khair who wanted to access their lands on the outskirts of Israeli settlements during the olive harvest and ploughing seasons had to secure special authorization from the Israeli authorities. This past year, however, Israel discontinued the coordination mechanism, preventing many of Umm Al-Khair’s farmers from accessing their lands at all. 

In practice, Palestinians in the South Hebron Hills have been restricted to a 100-meter radius around community centers to herd their flocks, while settler shepherds bring their livestock to graze on privately owned Palestinian land planted with wheat and barley.

We have also suffered an unprecedented number of settler attacks over the past 15 months. Settlers regularly enter the village to harass residents with pepper spray, attack us with sticks, and steal our wood. Earlier this month, settlers from Carmel flew huge drones over our village, furthering their intimidation and surveillance of our daily life.

Meanwhile, we also face increased violence from a newer outpost — technically illegal even under Israeli law, though the army protects it and provides it with services — called Havat Shorashim, which was established in 2022. Starting from July, a group of settler shepherds from this outpost have begun trespassing on our private agricultural land to sever the village’s water pipe — the only source of water for the entire community. Each time we repair it, but it is only a matter of days or weeks until a settler comes and breaks it again. 

Israel’s attacks on the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) have further exacerbated our community’s financial misery. Because the residents of Umm Al-Khair are refugees from other parts of historic Palestine — our ancestors were expelled from the region of Bir As-Saba/Be’er Sheva during the Nakba of 1948 — we depend on UNRWA for aid and social services, including basic food supplies and emergency cash grants. No significant aid has reached the Palestinian refugees of Umm Al-Khair for a year now, leaving our community particularly vulnerable to settler attacks and encroachment. 

Many Palestinian workers stressed the need for international institutions to intervene and exert pressure on the Israeli government specifically regarding the economic situation in the West Bank — whether by allowing Palestinians to return to their jobs in Israel or by allowing aid organizations like UNRWA to provide emergency assistance. The Palestinian workers and farmers of Umm Al-Khair see what is happening to them as a result of intentional Israeli policy, crafted by an extreme right-wing government that aims to weaken the Palestinian population by destroying us economically.