The Israeli military continues its relentless assault on the cities of Jenin and Tulkarm and their respective refugee camps in the occupied West Bank, amid growing concerns over what rights groups have described as war crimes and ethnic cleansing. For over 76 days in Jenin and 70 days in Tulkarm, the occupation forces have carried out large-scale military operations marked by extrajudicial killings, home demolitions, and forced displacement, all under the cover of international silence and political complicity.
According to local sources, more than 21,000 Palestinians have been forcibly displaced from Jenin alone, with a further 4,000 families uprooted from the camps of Tulkarm and Nur Shams. The Israeli army has systematically destroyed over 600 homes in Jenin and nearly 400 in Tulkarm, with thousands of other residential units rendered uninhabitable. Many of the homes that were not destroyed have been seized and transformed into makeshift military bases, further entrenching the occupation and subjecting civilians to prolonged danger and psychological trauma.
The humanitarian consequences have been catastrophic. Essential services have collapsed, and educational life has been severely disrupted, with schools closed for over two months. Five schools remain completely shut down, affecting the future of thousands of students. In addition, the ongoing siege has led to the deliberate destruction of infrastructure, including roads, water pipelines, and electricity networks, deepening the crisis in both cities and creating unliveable conditions.
This sustained campaign of violence has also resulted in dozens of deaths and injuries, many of whom are women, children, and unarmed civilians. Rights organisations have stressed that these actions constitute a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law, particularly the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits collective punishment and the targeting of civilians during armed conflict. The use of displacement as a weapon of war, as well as the targeted destruction of civilian infrastructure, has prompted renewed calls for international accountability.
The continued assault on Jenin and Tulkarm, in the absence of any meaningful international intervention, reflects a dangerous normalisation of Israeli war crimes against the Palestinian people. The occupation’s tactics—marked by systematic destruction, collective punishment, and demographic engineering—serve not only to displace Palestinians from their land but also to break the will of an entire population. As the humanitarian catastrophe deepens, human rights groups urge the international community to abandon its complicity and act decisively to end the siege, ensure accountability, and uphold the rights of Palestinians to safety, dignity, and self-determination.
