News

PHOTOS: Rage and Resignation as Police Evacuate West Bank Amona Outpost

Image by Getty Images

By Daniel J. Solomon February 2, 2017

Israeli police neared the end on Thursday of a days-long operation to evacuate Amona, an illegally-built outpost on the West Bank. Sitting on private Palestinian land, Amona has figured in numerous legal battles since its construction two decades ago. Israel had tried to broker a deal in which the settlers would be moved off their current plot to a neighboring stretch of land, but the country’s Supreme Court overruled that decision, ordering the government to remove the settlers last year. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to build a new settlement on state land for the evacuees, and has announced an expanded settlement-building program since the election of President Donald Trump. Here are some photos from the Amona operation.

Settlers attempt to prevent entrance of police by burning tires.

Image by Getty Images

Israeli police move into Amona for the evacuation.

Image by Getty Images

Settlers block road into Amona with stones.

Image by Getty Images

Police carry settler refusing to evacuate.

Amona settlers during the evacuation by Israeli police. Image by Getty Images

Police guard settlers before putting them on evacuation buses.

Image by Getty Images

Settlers loaded onto bus out of Amona.

Image by Getty Images

Israeli police break into synagogue where 200 holdouts, most of them teens, are resisting evacuation.

Image by Getty Images

Contact Daniel J. Solomon at solomon@forward.com or on Twitter @DanielJSolomon

Daniel J. Solomon is the former Assistant to the Editor/News Writer at the Forward. Originally from Queens, he attended Harvard as an undergraduate, where he wrote his senior thesis on French-Jewish intellectual history. He is excited to have returned to New York after his time in Massachusetts. Daniel’s passions include folk music, cycling, and pointed argument.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO