Some 200 Arabs on Saturday erected a new tent outpost south of Shchem, resulting in clashes with Jewish residents which left one teen injured.
The Arabs set up tents near Burin village, in an area which is slated for acquisition by the Jewish residents of the village of Yitzhar.
Israeli forces immediately moved to shut down the area, and blocked traffic at the nearby Zaatara checkpoint, stopping several buses full of left wing activists and Arab demonstrators, Ma’an reported.
IDF Soldiers fired tear gas and sound grenades to disperse the Arabs, and detained five.
At Yitzhar junction, Arabs and Jews began to clash, throwing stones at each other. According to the Arabs, a boy from the village of Burin was wounded in the leg by a settler. The army said that the report of the shooting is not verified, and the Civil Administration did not receive a complaint about the incident.
The tents set up in the outpost the Arabs called “Almnatir” have not yet been cleared.
The Arabs are calling the new encampment “Al-Manatir neighborhood” after the traditional stone huts built for watchmen in Palestinian agricultural land.
This is the third illegal outpost erected by the Arabs, in what appears to be a new trend of Arab expansion in Area C territory, which is recognized as governed by Israel.
Yitzhar spokesman Avraham Binyamin said tonight that “due to the provocation of leftists and Arabs, dozens of residents went down to start a protest vigil at Yitzhar junction, and dozens of Arabs began throwing stones at them. One of the Jewish protesters was wounded in the head from a stone and was taken to hospital.”
According to Binyamin, the Border Police at the scene did not arrest the srtone throwing Burin villagers, which led to a stone throwing response from the Jews.
An Israeli military spokesman said forces used riot-dispersal means when Arabs threw rocks at them.
The Arabs are saying their illegal outpost was established to protest Israeli land acquisition for settlement building. Burin is squeezed between the Bracha and Yitzhar settlements.