The Palestinian Authority has temporarily suspended land registration deals for Israeli Arabs after eight Jewish families moved into homes on the outskirts of Jericho, in a case that has become one of the most contested land disputes in the occupied West Bank this year.

The Authority announced on Friday that it was halting land registration transactions for people holding Israeli citizenship or Jerusalem residency. It said it suspected Israeli Arabs had been involved in brokering and selling properties to Jews in Jericho, and it has arrested a group of land and real estate brokers in connection with the case.

The move followed the arrival of eight Jewish families at newly acquired homes in the city two days earlier, after what reports describe as a covert purchasing operation led by the Binyamin Regional Council and the settlement organisation Nachala. The Palestinian Authority says the sales were deceptive and possibly forged. The settlers involved say the homes were bought legally.

How the homes changed hands

On the afternoon of Wednesday 4 November, about 30 Israeli settlers arrived at a cluster of homes in Ein al-Duyuk al-Tahta, a neighbourhood about two kilometres west of Jericho city centre, and took over eight of them, according to the Israeli settlement watchdog Peace Now. Residents say at least 13 Palestinian households were driven from their homes.

The takeover was coordinated by Nachala, an organisation that funds new settlements and campaigns for Israel to annex the West Bank, together with the Binyamin Regional Council, a state-funded settler municipal authority. A settler representative told the AFP news agency that Nachala had bought the eight homes, with the council's help.

Palestinian officials reject that account. Jericho Governor Hussein Hamayel told reporters that the land belongs to the Palestinian Authority and cannot be sold, describing what was being promoted as a forgery rather than a sale. The Palestinian Land Authority says it has found no preliminary sale transactions, official documents or powers of attorney for the properties, and says it is investigating claims about preliminary contracts.

The homes stand in Area C, the part of the West Bank under full Israeli civil and security control, at the edge of Area A, where the Palestinian Authority holds civil and security control and where most of Jericho city sits. Reports describe the takeover as the first time settler families have moved into homes in Jericho since the signing of the Oslo Accords in the 1990s.

Violence and the United Nations response

Peace Now said the settlers assaulted residents during the takeover, robbed two Israeli activists and shot a Palestinian man in the leg. The United Nations condemned the seizure the following day. Stephane Dujarric, a spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, told reporters that the settlers had reportedly used live ammunition, physically assaulted residents and thrown stones.

The Israeli military has since declared the area a closed military zone, which the United Nations says prevents humanitarian workers from reaching the people who were forced out. In a written response to reporters, an Israeli military official said the action had been carried out without prior coordination or approval from the Israel Defense Forces, and that examination of the settlers' purchase claims would continue in the coming week.

The Palestinian Authority has detained several suspected brokers over the transfer of the homes. A Palestinian source told reporters that the detainees, from Jericho and the Hebron and Jerusalem governorates, had been remanded in custody for 15 days while investigators examine the circumstances of the case. The source said the brokers had persuaded homeowners to sell by telling them the properties were at risk of demolition by the Israeli army because they had been built without permits in Area C, and by suggesting the buyer would be a Palestinian figure from inside Israel.

Why the freeze matters

Palestinian law treats the sale or lease of land to Israeli Jews as an act of treason, which can carry severe penalties, including life imprisonment with hard labour and potentially the death penalty. In 2019, a court in Nablus sentenced a Palestinian man to five years in prison for allegedly attempting to sell land to Israeli Jews.

The freeze is aimed at the suspected brokering network rather than at ordinary landowners, but it also underlines how far the Jericho case has travelled beyond a local property dispute. The competing claims over the eight homes remain unresolved: the settlers insist the purchase was lawful, the Palestinian Authority insists the documents are forged, and neither side's papers have been independently verified.

The Palestinian Authority has not said how long the suspension will last. For the families forced from their homes, the immediate question is simpler: the area around their houses remains closed off, and aid workers say they still cannot reach them.