Israeli settlers raze old monastery in West Bank

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Israeli settlers raze old monastery in West Bank

“Israeli settlers razed this monastery attempting to erase any historical proof that the location of their illegal settlement [Alisheem] is Palestinian,” Ma’ali said.

Days of Palestine, West Bank –Israeli Jewish settlers razed on Wednesday an old monastery in Kafr Ed-Deek, to the west of West Bank city of Salfeet.

The monastery was built more than 15 centuries ago but Palestinian Christian inhabitants of the area, whose grandsons are still living in the nearby areas.

“It was carved in a huge rock in that Palestinian neighbourhood,” researcher Khalid Ma’ali told Days of Palestine. “It is at least 15 hundred years old.”

Ma’ali said that the monastery was deserted years after the 1967 Israeli war of the West Bank as most of the Palestinian neighbourhood of Kafr Ed-Deek turned to a settlements for Jewish-only settlers.

According to the researcher, the old monastery was built during the Byzantine Empire and it was a shrine for Palestinians from different religions before the 1967 Israeli occupation.


“Israeli settlers razed this monastery attempting to erase any historical proof that the location of their illegal settlement [Alisheem] is Palestinian,” Ma’ali said. “They [Israeli Jews] are not haters of Muslims, but of Christians and all other religions,” he added.