THE GARDENS OF SILWAD:

With tearful eyes, Mariam recollected her memories of growing up on the land.

"I remember when I was a child, how I used to collect the stones and thorns from the ground and put them aside. My father would plough the field, while my mother planted the seeds," says Mariam. The land which her parents bought, she recalls, was non-arable at the time. "They worked the land day and night until it became 'one of the gardens of Silwad'".

As she grew up, Mariam grew more attached to the land. "I cannot forget the taste of the water from the well in the field. It was as sweet as honey. I remember it very well and I wish I could return to taste it again."

She recalls that her family used to follow one particular farming rule known as crop rotation - prohibiting the cultivation of the same crops for two consecutive seasons. "One year we would plant wheat, vetch, barley and lentils. The next year we would grow tomatoes, cucumbers, watermelon, okra, and sunflowers."

While her family owns a considerable amount of land in Silwad, the plot where Amona was built remained one of the most fertile, flourishing all year round, before it was taken over by settlers.

On a summer day in the mid-1990s, Mariam and her husband, Mohammad, left their eight children at home to embark on their daily mission to collect the wheat they harvested on their land.

"A group of settlers came while we were working on the field. They began stepping on the crops and spoiling them. My husband tried to expel the settlers from the area," recalls Mariam, explaining that the confrontation had intensified and the settlers had tried to assault them, chanting, "This land is ours - get out of here."

Mariam recalls that, as they feared for their lives, her husband collected his harvesting tools, loaded them onto his horse, and they walked away from the land.

"As soon as we turned our backs and walked a little, the settlers set fire to the land. I ran back and gathered as many wheat stems as I could. I had a feeling that they would not let me enter my land after that day."

That day marked Mariam's last visit to the land.

The next day, Mariam and her husband attempted to access the land, but they were stopped by settlers and Israeli soldiers at gunpoint, she recalled.

Soon after, Mariam headed to the municipal council, armed with title deeds and documents, to prove her ownership of the plot and demand justice, but to no avail.

In the following days when Mariam and her husband attempted to approach the area, a woman from Ein Yabrud, a nearby village, identified as Rutayba Abdul Kareem Jabra, was shot and killed as she walked towards Thahir al-Mazari', according to Mariam.

"She was carrying food on her head and was heading to the fields. As soon as she approached the area, the soldiers shot and killed her, before our eyes."

The head of the Ein Yabrud municipal council confirmed the incident to Al Jazeera.  

Under protection from the army, Israeli settlers remained on the land and built the outpost of Amona in 1997. They expanded and built 40 homes, infrastructure, and public facilities, while Mariam and the other landowners were forbidden from accessing their lands for decades.

Today, after a long and hard battle in the courts with the help of Israeli human rights organisations, Mariam watches the evacuation and demolition of the outpost, which was once the largest in the West Bank, housing approximately 250 settlers. 

Amona is one of about 100 Israeli "outposts" scattered across the occupied West Bank. Israel differentiates between outposts and settlements in that they were built without government authorisation. Both outposts and settlements, however, often involve seizing private Palestinian land and are illegal under international law.

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