Israel has issued an order to seize the tomb of the Prophet Samuel (Nabi Samuel), an important religious landmark in the occupied West Bank run by the Islamic Waqf, in a move that has been condemned as the latest example of “Judaisation” of Palestinian sites.
On Tuesday, Israel’s civil administration, which carries out Israeli orders in the occupied West Bank, announced that it was expropriating 28 acres of land.
That land includes the Palestinian towns of Beit Iksa and Nabi Samuel, covering the area where the historic Nabi Samuel mosque stands.
The justification given by the civil administration, which is a subordinate to a unit in Israel’s defence ministry, was that the area was being seized “for the public benefit”.
It said it would undertake a development project “to preserve the archaeological site of the Prophet Samuel’s tomb”.
