LONDON: In Tulkarem, a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, residential buildings have been reduced to piles of grey rubble, the facades of shuttered businesses blackened by soot. Damaged vehicles jut from the wreckage, and the surrounding streets are eerily quiet.
As of late September, about 32,000 Palestinians had been forced to flee the camps of Tulkarem, Nur Shams, and Jenin after months of Israeli military raids, orchestrated under Operation Iron Wall, according to the UN Relief and Works Agency.
Israel launched the campaign in Jenin in January, later expanding it in February to include the Tulkarem and Nur Shams camps. The military said it was targeting Iran-backed armed groups that had grown stronger in the camps and were launching attacks against Israelis.
What began as a series of targeted raids to neutralize Palestinian armed groups and protect Israeli settlements, has since become a sustained military campaign that has displaced thousands and reshaped life in the northern West Bank.
Samir, a displaced resident of Tulkarem camp whose name has been changed for his safety, says Israeli forces have demolished 24 properties belonging to his extended family over the past nine months. Each four-story building, he said, housed an average of five people.
