Palestinian Bedouins in al-Araqib: "We won't leave" : Charlotte Silver

Surrounding the parameters of al-Araqib are nascent trees that the JNF, or as the organization is known inside Israel, Keren Kayemeth Le'Israel (KKL), has planted. Their trailer and office is within eyesight of where another resident of al-Araqib, Sheikh Siyakh al-Turi, and I spoke.
Sheikh Siyakh condemned the Palestinian Authority and its complicity in Israel's treatment of all Palestinians in exile, in the occupied West Bank and Gaza and in Israel. "In the end, who sold our cause?" he asked. "The Palestinian leadership, because the leadership just collaborates ... We are the ones standing here; having no food or water and the PA is receiving so much money in international aid. We are the ones protecting the land, so they should support us."

Sheikh Siyakh al-Turi in al-Araqib village (Elo B)

Reclining under a recently constructed tent in the Bedouin village of al-Araqib, Sheikh Siyakh al-Turi gestured toward the bare terrain surrounding his home. "This is a great example to the world of what Israel is doing to its citizens," he said. Only a kilometer away from one of Israel's largest highways, the village is utterly quiet; most villagers have left for their day jobs outside of al-Araqib, leaving only a few to stand watch in the event that the Israel Land Administration returns to demolish the village yet again.
As is widely known, Israel continues to deepen its claims on land in the occupied West Bank -- detaching Palestinians from their lands with Israeli-only roads, settlement expansion and the wall. However, the state is aggressively pursuing a similar project within the green line, Israel's internationally-recognized armistice line with the occupied West Bank.

Many Palestinian citizens of Israel are being displaced not with settlements and a wall, but with the planting of a forest. As it has in the past, Israel asserts that its intentions are beneficent and noble -- to make a desert bloom with trees. But these trees will be planted on land inhabited by Palestinians for many generations, and people are being violently forced out of their villages to make room for those trees.
In the Negev (Naqab) region, there are no signs to direct a visitor to al-Araqib; and even after you arrive you may still wonder if you have indeed found the village. Since 27 July 2010, Israel has conducted twenty demolitions of every home and structure in the village, leaving little tangible manifestation of a community that has lived there since the Ottoman Empire.
Not provided with water, plumbing, electricity or any other public services supplied to the rest of Israel's citizens, villagers of al-Araqib are fully tapped into the revolts around the Arab world that are challenging the stability of tyrannical regimes. Villagers insist that such a revolt will come to the West Bank and Israel soon.