JAKARTA - The United Nations has sounded an alarm over a spike in mass evacuations in the occupied West Bank, describing it as the worst since Israel began its occupation nearly six decades ago.
The United Nations says Israel's ongoing military aggression, which is now entering its seventh month in the northern West Bank, has forced tens of thousands of Palestinians to flee their homes, sparking fears of a possible "ethnic cleansing."
A spokesman for the United Nations Aid and Work Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA)urut Touma stated that military operations in the West Bank were the longest since the Second Intifada in the early 2000s.
Speaking to reporters in Geneva via video call from Jordan, he said what had happened had an impact on many refugee camps in the region and caused the largest evacuation of Palestinians in the West Bank since 1967, reported by WAFA July 16.
Meanwhile, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights warned that mass evacuations carried out by occupation forces could be considered "ethnic cleansing."
Since the start of Israeli aggression in the northern region of the occupied West Bank in January - particularly in Jenin and Tulkarem - some 30,000 Palestinians are still forcibly displaced, said Thameen Al-Kheetan, spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioners' Office for Human Rights (OHCHR).
He added that during the same period, Israeli forces issued demolition orders for about 1,400 houses in the northern West Bank, which described the figure as "worrying."
Al-Kheetan noted that the Israeli demolition had displaced 2,907 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank since October 2023.
He also stated that about 2,400 other Palestinians - nearly half of the children - were displaced by attacks by Israeli invaders, and expressed regret at their cumulative results was the emptying of most parts of the West Bank from Palestinians.
Permanent eviction of civilians in occupied areas is a transfer of residents who violate the law, Al-Kheetan said, stressing it can be seen as "ethnic cleansing" and "crime against humanity."
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Al-Kheetan also reported 757 recorded settlers' attacks in the occupied West Bank during the first half of this year, an increase of 13 percent compared to the same period in 2024.
He said the attacks injured 96 Palestinians in occupied areas only in June, the highest monthly death toll in more than two decades.
Separately, UN data states that since Israel's war in the Gaza Strip began on October 7, 2023, at least 964 Palestinians have died in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem.
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