A US shipment of Caterpillar D9 bulldozers arrived in the Israeli port of Haifa on Wednesday as Israel is conducting a record number of demolitions of Palestinian homes and structures in the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza.
According to Israeli media, the shipment of bulldozers was reportedly paused by the Biden administration last year due to their widespread use in destroying Gaza.
“The shipment of D9 bulldozers is part of a broad-scale arming and military equipment effort worth billions of shekels, which the US government released and the Defense Ministry procured and transported to Israel,” Amir Baram, the head of Israel’s Defense Ministry, said.
“We must continue to strengthen our military buildup to support all of the IDF’s needs in the current campaign and in preparation for the next decade,” Baram added.
The destruction of homes in Gaza is a key part of Israel’s campaign. A recent report from Haaretz that revealed IDF troops are being ordered to fire on unarmed Palestinians near aid sites also revealed that private contractors are being paid $1,500 for each house they destroy in the Strip.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly told a Knesset committee in May that the IDF was ramping up its demolitions of homes in Gaza so Palestinians had nowhere to return. “We are destroying more and more homes, and Gazans have nowhere to return to. The only inevitable outcome will be the wish of Gazans to emigrate outside of the Gaza Strip,” he said.
Netanyahu and other Israeli officials have made clear that their goal is the destruction and ethnic cleansing of Gaza, and they’re now openly working on a plan to build a concentration camp on the ruins of the southern city of Rafah for the entire civilian population.
In the West Bank, Israel has increased demolitions across the Palestinian territory, including in the northern refugee camps of Jenin, Nur Shams, and Tulkarem, where 40,000 people have been displaced since January.
