Israeli authorities notified the residents of Khirbet Hazil, north of Rahat city in the Negev, of their intention to remove a tent set up in protest of demolitions and forced expulsions, reported WAFA news agency.

The authorities handed the Hazil family living in the community a notice to tear down the tent they have set up in protest of the demolitions and large-scale leveling of their land as a prelude to seize it.

Meanwhile, Palestinians of the Negev held a protest opposite to the Israeli court complex in Bi'r al-Sabi' (Beersheba), the largest city in the Negev, for the ninth consecutive day demanding the immediate release of some 150 Palestinian citizens of Israel who were detained almost two weeks ago over their participation in demonstrations against the razing of the lands of their families as part of an “afforestation” activities of the Jewish National Fund (JNF), primarily in the village Sa'wa Al-Atrash.

The Israeli Land Authority allocated some 1,300 donums of land belonging to the Hazil family to JNF despite the fact that the family has title deeds proving their ownership of the land and its use for crop cultivation by the clan.

The Israeli authorities have so forth leveled 370 donums out of the 1,300 in preparation to plant them with forests.

The JNF and the Israel Lands Authority are planting forests in the Negev “to displace Palestinian Bedouins, viewed as ‘trespassers,’ from their lands,” according to Adalah, a group that advocates for the rights of Palestinians in Israel.

“This is racial discrimination par excellence,” Adalah said.

The violent police crackdown and “afforestation” campaigns recently prompted Nearly 2,500 Americans to sign a petition calling on US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken to intervene to stop the Israeli ethnic cleansing campaign against the Palestinian citizens of Negev.

Since 1948, the Jewish National Fund has planted hundreds of millions of predominantly European conifer trees on the remains of Palestinian villages depopulated in 1948 and 1967 to erase their existence and prevent their residents from returning.

While boasting that its tree planting helps mitigate climate change, in reality the European pines and cypress tree species have fueled forest fires exacerbated by dryer conditions.