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Bil'in and Saffa are boxed in on the west by eight Israeli settlements, comprising the Modi'in Illit block in the Ramallah Governship, occupying 10.6 square km that are expanding and seizing village lands. The Separation Wall takes more - about half of Bil'in's four square km for two km of Wall with more planned for a new settlement, expansion of existing ones, and virtual imprisonment of Bil'in and Saffa residents by the Wall's route when it's completed. Thus, residents continue weekly protests to save their land, village, and futures.
Since 2006, they've also done grassroots organizing and held annual conferences on popular resistance for villagers, activists and academics to discuss effective tactics. In addition, legal actions were taken beginning in the winter of 2004. Three years later, the Israeli High Court ruled part of Modi'in illit's construction illegal. It affected unfinished housing that couldn't be completed until the Wall's route was moved several hundred meters west. It meant returning 25% of Bel'in's land to the village that never happened because the ruling wasn't implemented, building continues, and so does do protests against it.
On Christmas day, villagers attempted to march to their stolen land dressed as Santa Claus carrying a Christmas tree decorated with tear gas canisters and percussion grenades regularly used against them. Assaulted by Israeli soldiers, they again suffered tear gas attacks, but planned further actions, including one held on December 29 supporting Abu Rahmad near Ofer Prison where he's held.
On December 28, Stop the Wall "held its first West Bank-wide youth conference this month," the result of two years of planning and organizing. Despite the above arrests and continued Israeli repression, two days of "fruitful discussions (were held) on grassroots resistance, boycott and the role of the youth in the national struggle" that won't end until it succeeds."
Commentaries in the Israeli Press
On December 23, Haaretz writer Amira Hass headlined, "Danger: Popular Struggle" saying Israel "found the true enemy who refused to whither away: The popular struggle against the occupation."
As a result, in recent months, efforts to suppress it have increased against:
"Palestinians and Jewish Israelis unwilling to give up their right to resist....demographic separation and Jewish supremacy." In turn, demonstrators have faced "live ammunition, late-night army raids and mass arrests," mostly in Bil'in and Na'alin whose lands have been systematically stolen and their residents abused.
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