(VOVWORLD) -Israel’s Defense Ministry said Wednesday that it had completed a further 42-kilometer stretch of its West Bank security barrier.
llustrative: Israeli machines and workers build parts of the Israeli security barrier near the West Bank city of Beit Jala, outside Jerusalem, on April 17, 2016. (Wisam Hashlamoun/FLASH90) |
The concrete wall has separated the Palestinian village of Tarkumia, northwest of Hebron, and an Israeli crossing adjacent to the settlement of Meitar, further south.
It did not say how much of the planned 712-kilometer network of towering concrete walls, barbed-wire fences, trenches and closed military roads was now complete. Israel says the barrier, which it began building amid a wave of Palestinian terror attacks in 2002, is crucial for its security.
Palestinians see the barrier as a land grab of territory they want for a future state. Much of the barrier cuts into the West Bank, taking in about 7% of its territory.