A/HRC/40/42 outposts trained and armed by the Israel Defense Forces and funded by the Ministry of Defence to guard the settlements and outposts on behalf of the Israel Defense Forces. Civilian security coordinators have policing powers, which include the power to detain, search and arrest. 69 A lack of adequate supervision by the Israel Defense Forces and of clearly defined powers contribute to daily friction between the civilian security coordinators and Palestinians. 70 According to Yesh Din, guards have participated in settler attacks themselves or escorted settlers who were attacking Palestinians or Palestinian property. They have also prevented Palestinians from accessing lands, including grazing lands. During the reporting period, Yesh Din documented an incident of a civilian security coordinator from Mehola settlement taking part in violence against Palestinians and three incidents in which the Yitzhar civilian security coordinator was present during violence or vandalism against Palestinians. 38. In June 2018, a civilian security coordinator obstructed the access of a Palestinian family from the village of Kifl Haris to their agricultural land that had been included within the boundary of the adjacent Ariel settlement in the northern West Bank. The family had been able to access their land through Ariel’s main entrance since the establishment of the settlement in 1978 but in June 2018, a new civilian security coordinator obstructed the family’s access. On 15 August 2018, during a peaceful protest by several family members outside their land, a Palestinian was attacked and injured by the civilian security coordinator. After this incident, the family managed to negotiate coordinated access for a few members until the end of the olive harvest; however, they missed the harvest time for other fruit trees on the land. The family’s future access to the land is uncertain, as they were again barred access at the end of October 2018. 39. During the reporting period, settlers established seven new outposts, six of them farms71 where settlers’ sheep or cattle take over large areas of land and prevent Palestinians from accessing it by means of threats, attacks, fencing and cultivation. This appears to be part of an official policy whereby the Government has encouraged takeovers of land by settlers through agricultural projects.72 According to Peace Now, agricultural outposts are funded by local authorities of the settlements and the Gush Emunim settler organization. 73 40. The constraints faced by Palestinians in accessing their agricultural land put them at great risk of seeing their land declared State land and used for the expansion of settlements. Indeed, according to the Israeli interpretation of the Ottoman land laws that are still in effect in the West Bank, cessation of cultivation for extended periods could result in loss of title to the land. 74 Israel uses this to unilaterally declare “State land”, which has been allocated exclusively for settlements use by Israel and its citizens rather than for the benefit of the local population, as required under international law. 75 In effectively preventing Palestinians from accessing their land, settler violence serves as a tool for the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank.76 41. The denial of Palestinians’ access to land by settlers through violence or intimidation, or by the Israeli security forces to “protect” Palestinians from areas with settler and settlement presence, violates Palestinians’ freedom of movement. Such a violation in turn affects other rights, such as the right to work and property.77 Furthermore, official or unofficial confiscation of land and limiting access through coordination measures violate the prohibition on confiscation of private property enshrined in international 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 10 A/HRC/28/44, paras. 22–23. A/HRC/28/44, para. 22. Out of 25 outposts established since 2012, 15 are agricultural farms. Peace Now, source on file. A/69/348, para. 28. Peace Now; see also Amira Hass, “How settlers use flocks of sheep to take over Palestinian Land”, Haaretz, 13 October 2018. A/HRC/28/44, paras. 26–27. See also B’Tselem, Under the Guise of Legality: Israel’s Declarations of State Land in the West Bank (2012), p. 28. A/HRC/34/39, para. 15. Yesh Din, Yitzhar, p. 13. A/69/348, para. 11; A/HRC/25/38, para. 29; and A/HRC/28/44, para. 40.