Drop Site Archives - CrossFireArarbia

“Hay Mr Trump Israel is ‘Eating’ Into Gaza”

marwan
June 18, 2026

Story by Mohamed Ahmed and Abdel Qader Sabbah

GAZA CITY—Mustafa Al-Shawa awoke at 2:30 a.m. on Monday to the sound of gunfire and the rumble of tanks in Al-Tuffah neighborhood of Gaza City. When he was finally able to go outside a few hours later, he found two yellow concrete blocks placed in the middle of the street—the Israeli military had moved them at least one hundred meters further west into Gaza where they now lay close to his home.

“They moved the yellow line forward to the Sanafour Junction. It used to be up by Al-Shaaaf Street,” Al-Shawa told Drop Site News. “This is the yellow line,” he said, pointing to the blocks. “There is another yellow line along Salah Al-Din Street that they have moved closer. Enough of what is happening to us. Enough of this suffering.”

Israel has been steadily encroaching further into Gaza, moving the “yellow line” that demarcates its area of control from 53% of the enclave since the start of the so-called ceasefire in October to well over 60%, in violation of the agreement. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently ordered the army to take 70%.

“We can’t leave the neighborhood because there is nowhere to go,” Al-Shawa said. “If we leave the area we’re in now, we’ll end up sleeping in the streets, in filth. There is no place left. Where are we supposed to go?”

Along certain parts of Gaza, Israeli troops have placed yellow concrete blocks to delineate the new border. Their placement of the blocks further west into the Al-Tuffah neighborhood on Friday accompanied by gunfire, tanks, and quadcopter attacks caused dozens of Palestinians in the area to pack up their belongings and flee later that day.

Families crammed their scant belongings into open cardboard boxes and plastic bags. Trucks were piled up with thin mattresses, furniture, cookware and plastic bins waiting to be carried away. “The yellow line has destroyed us,” one resident yelled as he walked by.

Like nearly all of Gaza, the Al-Tuffah neighborhood is barely standing. Every building is badly damaged or completely destroyed. Residents traverse dirt roads instead of paved streets, flanked by mounds of rubble and twisted steel.

Palestinians in Al-Tuffah neighborhood in Gaza City are forcibly displaced after Israel attacked and moved yellow blocks into the area on June 15, 2026. Video by Mohamed Ahmed.

“Last night was very, very bad,” Nafiz Al-Ghaz, another resident of Al-Tuffah, told Drop Site. “It was a difficult day and an even more difficult night: tanks, quadcopters, gunfire. All night they were telling us, ‘Run, run.’ People are fleeing, taking whatever furniture, cupboards, and beds they can carry. We are on the yellow line. They placed the yellow line right at the traffic junction. …Where are we supposed to go? They might as well throw us into the sea and be done with us.”

Before the genocide began over two and a half years ago, the Gaza Strip was already one of the most densely populated places on earth. Since the “ceasefire” in October, Israel has steadily seized more land, corralling the nearly two million Palestinians in Gaza into an ever shrinking area. Every inhabitable structure is crammed full of people while hundreds of thousands are living in tents and flimsy tarp shacks pitched close together wherever there is room—on the streets and public squares, in stadiums, and on the coastline.

“No one is paying attention to us,” Mohammed Khalil told Drop Site as he gathered up his belongings along the side of a building in Al-Tuffah. “Every day we wish for death,” he said, his voice trembling as he spoke. “Every day we wish to die, to be done with this life.”

Israel has violated the “ceasefire” on a daily basis since it went into effect in October, killing over 1,000 Palestinians in routine attacks and wounding over 3,100, severely restricting the amount of aid agreed upon in the deal, and seizing more land.

“Despite the ceasefire announced eight months ago, Gaza still faces profound uncertainty and immense human suffering,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in remarks to the Security Council last week. “Violence is on the rise, with civilians killed on a daily basis. Humanitarian operations remain heavily constrained. Basic human needs—for clean water, sanitation, food, shelter, health care, and more—are going unmet. And the Israeli Government is declaring its intent to control 70% of the Strip.”

The Security Council voted in November to authorize President Donald Trump’s “Board of Peace” to monitor the ceasefire. In a statement on Sunday, Hamas said it delivered its response in coordination with other Palestinian factions to a proposal it received in April from Nickolay Mladenov, the High Representative of the Board of Peace. Mladenov has turned a blind eye to Israel’s violations and instead called on Hamas to fully disarm despite that not being a part of the phase one deal that Hamas signed in October.

“To the world, there is a ceasefire agreement, but in practical terms on the ground, Israel has moved toward a pattern of gradual escalation that reshapes the aggression and reshapes the genocide in the Gaza Strip through multiple forms,” Ahmed Al-Tannani, a writer and political analyst in Gaza, told Drop Site. “Part of this is the daily killing around the yellow line, in addition to expanding control. Another part is linked to the continuation of assassinations and the bombing of civilians in their homes. In addition to that, it has returned to the policy of evacuating neighborhoods and then bombing them, including in areas west of the yellow line.”

Earlier this month, Israel bombed Al-Jawazat displacement camp west of Gaza City, killing six Palestinians and wounding 20 others, just one of many attacks on areas far from the “yellow line.”

“Attacks are still taking place around us. Here in the Al-Jawazat camp, there have been multiple strikes on tents,” Raed Hajjaj, who lives in a tent within the crowded displacement camp, told Drop Site. “It’s not like before, when massacres were happening continuously and the world’s attention was focused on Gaza. Now, with one or two attacks every day or two, or several times a week, the world is occupied with other issues. We all know what they are—the U.S.-Iran war, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, and other developments. These things have distracted the world from us.”

Attacks From Israeli Military Bases

Mohammad Al-Zaghl pointed to the bullet holes that ripped through the fabric of his makeshift bathroom on Monday morning. He constructed the small shed out of tarp and wood close to his tent in the Halawa displacement camp in Jabaliya, northern Gaza.

The most frequent Israeli attacks target Palestinians living close to the yellow line in places where the military has built 25 kilometers of massive earth berms to physically divide Gaza. Newly constructed military bases atop the berms appear as elevated colonial forts overlooking a displaced and devastated Palestinian population.

The Halawa camp lies just a few hundred meters from an Israeli base atop one section of the berm—an imposing wall of earth lined with spotlights facing outward and an Israeli flag hanging from a flagpole inside the base alongside several towers.

“The Israelis are about 500 meters away from us,” Al-Zaghl told Drop Site. “There is not just one tower—there are one, two, three. From all three directions, we cannot escape the gunfire. Every day there is shooting. Everyone stays in their place, in their tents.”

Palestinians in Halawa displacement camp in Jabaliya recount Israeli attacks from military bases that overlook the camp on June 15, 2026. Video by Abdel Qader Sabbah.

Like thousands of others, Al-Zaghl has been living in Halawa ever since he was forcibly displaced from the Jabaliya refugee camp. In January, as he was sitting at the entrance of his tent, he heard a burst of gunfire before realizing he had been shot in the abdomen. An angry scar runs along his lower back and a smaller entry wound is visible on the left side of his stomach.

“Today it is worse than before. You hear constant gunfire, explosions, and noise,” he said.

Youssef Shaman, 15, was also shot from the Israeli military base overlooking Halawa. He said it happened in March, as he was going to collect water for his family. “While I was on my way, there was a crowd gathered around the water, and they started shooting at us from the tower,” Shaman told Drop Site. “People were hit, and I was shot in my leg. They kept firing at us from the tower. We could see the Israelis shooting at us.”

Shaman shows the bullet wound on the inside of his thigh just above the knee. An older scar runs along the top of his ankle where he was hit by shrapnel in an earlier airstrike that killed his brother. Along with other eyewitnesses, Shaman said the shooting attacks from the nearby base have steadily increased over the past few months.

“We can see them, and they can see us,” he said. “They look for someone to snipe and open fire on them. They deliberately watch and shoot us. They climb up the hill where we can see them, in their military vehicles and tanks, and then they start shooting at us. …The shooting has increased. They fire at us all day long.”

Israel has not faced any consequences for its wholesale abandonment of the ceasefire over the past eight months, with the violations becoming more acute and attacks intensifying to drive Palestinians further inward, seize more land, and continue the genocide.

“The Israeli occupation still considers the war to be ongoing, and the objectives of the war—linked primarily to achieving the strategic goal of displacing the Palestinian people—are still in place,” Al-Tannani said. “The ceasefire agreement has not brought about any change for the Israeli government.” Drop Site

Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Jawa Ahmad contributed to this report. Sami Vanderlip edited the video.

News

Watch Out: Israel is Secretly Filling The West Bank With Settlements

CrossFireArabia
May 12, 2026

DEIR AMMAR, Occupied West Bank—Mustafa Badaha drove along the edge of his land, past rows of olive trees he could no longer access. A red string put up by Israeli settlers demarcated the border of what was stolen from him in Deir Ammar, a Palestinian town around 17 kilometers northwest of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank. The settlers had recently established a new outpost in the area named Ramataim Zofim.

“Everything is legal—I have permits—but it makes no difference. A settler comes and simply says, ‘This is my land. You have no place here,’” Badaha told Drop Site. For years, he cultivated the land, building a small summer home where his family would gather. “Now, no one can go there—if we try, we are attacked,” he said. “What was once my joy is now my greatest fear.”

A red string put up by Israeli settlers on Mustafa Badaha’s land in Deir Ammar in the occupied West Bank demarcating the land they took over. April 30, 2026. Photo by Naqaa Hamed.

Settlers began routinely attacking Palestinians in the area back in August 2025. “They came here armed, created problems with the youth and the families, and even fired live ammunition,” Badaha said. He contacted the Palestinian Authority, who reached out to Israeli authorities. “The attacks kept increasing day after day. At first, the settlers were about 500 meters away, then gradually they kept getting closer until they reached the houses,” he said. “Every day there are provocations. They block the road, and with the youth we reopened it several times. Recently, there was another major attack and they blocked the road again.” After contacting the Israeli police, the Israeli military eventually arrived and detained Palestinians from the community instead of the settlers.

“The youth were insulted, detained for over an hour, searched, and had their IDs checked. I asked the officer, ‘What are we supposed to do? You tell us not to react, but settlers are the ones attacking,’” Badaha exclaimed. “We are living under constant attacks. This is our home, our land—we have water, electricity, internet—everything. Yet there is no safety.”

Ramataim Zofim is one of 34 settlements secretly approved by the Israeli security cabinet in late March, a decision that was only revealed in Israeli news reports last month. It marked the largest number of settlements approved by any Israeli government at one time. The decision to officially approve new settlements or to legalize outposts allows for the establishment of water and electricity infrastructure, further entrenching their presence on Palestinian land.

The 34 new settlements established by the Israeli security cabinet join 68 settlements the current government has approved since its formation a little over three years ago. By comparison, only six new settlements were formally approved by Israel in the 30 years between the signing of the Oslo Accords in 1993 and the establishment of the current government. Over the past three decades, thousands of additional housing units have been approved within existing settlements, like Ma’ale Adumim which lies just east of Jerusalem and is home to up to 40,000 Israeli settlers.

“This represents an unprecedented pace and scale of expansion,” Amir Daoud, director of Publishing and Documentation at the Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission, told Drop Site. Until the establishment of the current Israeli government there were 127 official settlements in the West Bank, according to the Israeli group Peace Now. Adding over 100 new official settlements represents an increase of nearly 80%.

“These new sites are distributed across the West Bank in what can be described as a fragmented but comprehensive pattern, effectively targeting the entire territory,” Daoud said. “Overall, this wave of approvals reflects a clear race against time to impose as many facts on the ground as possible, in order to achieve long-standing strategic goals.”

A map of the 34 newly approved Israeli settlements approved in March 2026. Credit: Peace Now.

All 34 of the new settlements are located in Area C, a technical designation established under the Oslo Accords that divided the West Bank into three sections. Area A is technically under Palestinian civil administration and security control; Area B is under Palestinian civil administration but shares security control with Israel; and Area C is under full Israeli control.

The International Court of Justice, UN Security Council resolutions, and international law experts agree that all Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank are illegal under international law.

“Consistent with long-standing settlement policy, these new sites contribute to the fragmentation of Palestinian areas while simultaneously creating territorial continuity between settlements,” Daoud said. “This is especially evident in central parts of the West Bank, where settlement placement further disrupts Palestinian geographic cohesion.”

Five of the newly approved settlements are in the governorate of Al-Khalil (Hebron) in the south of the territory and home to the largest Palestinian city in the West Bank. One of the settlements, which lies southwest of the city of Al-Khalil, named Meged, has affected land that Fahed Qawasmi and his family have cultivated for generations.

“My sister and I lost about three dunams [about 0.75 acres] of our land,” Qawasmi told Drop Site. “We only realized what was happening from neighbors—they had already taken around 300 to 400 dunams [about 74 to 100 acres] before reaching our land…We rushed there, but settlers attacked my brother on the land.”

The establishment of a new settlement has geographical ripple effects far beyond the actual settlement itself. “If a settlement is built, it won’t just take the land it stands on. It will expand around it, turning the surrounding areas into closed military zones,” Qawasmi said. “That means more land lost, more restrictions, and no access—not just for us, but for nearby homes and fields as well.”

Qawasmi said that grapevines more than 100 years old and police trees planted by his father were all uprooted. “This land is extremely valuable to us—not in money, but because it was passed down through generations. My father inherited it from his father, and so on. We were even offered to sell it before, but we always refused. This land is not for sale,” he said. “To lose it like this, without any right, is devastating. It destroys you emotionally.”

In the north of the West Bank, six of the newly approved settlements form a semi circle around Jenin, surrounding the Palestinian city from the west, south, and east.

“The land involved here is around 500 dunams [around 123 acres], and what’s happening now—through road construction and gradual takeover—means this entire area could effectively be confiscated,” Mohammad Arqawi, the head of the village council of Al-Arqah village in Jenin, told Drop Site. “And when 500 dunams are affected, it doesn’t just impact one group. It affects farmers, traders, workers, shepherds—the entire local community.”

A staggering 40,000 Palestinians have been displaced across the West Bank since the beginning of 2025 by demolitions, settler attacks, and access restrictions, according to a statement by the Deputy Spokesman for the UN Secretary-General Farhan Haq. Meanwhile, violence by Israeli settlers and soldiers against Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem has skyrocketed to unprecedented levels. According to the United Nations, between October 7, 2023 and April 23, 2026, at least 1,088 Palestinians—including 238 children— have been killed. Forty-two of them have been killed since the beginning of 2026. The UN said that the first four months of 2026 have seen the most violent start to a year since monitoring of settler violence and harassment began in 2013.

“This is just the beginning—the impact will grow,” Arqawi said. “Every time settlers attack, the army is present. The situation has become almost routine—settlers and army operating together on a daily basis.”

* Sharif Abdel Kouddous contributed to this report which is published in the Drop Site website