Israel Razes Two Settler Outpost Structures

Israeli forces demolished four structures in the Oz Zion and Ramat Migron settlement outposts in the West Bank early Thursday, prompting clashes that saw six people arrested, Israeli officials said.

"A temporary structure and water tower were demolished in Ramat Migron," civil administration spokesman Amir Koren told AFP. "The site was abandoned."

"In Oz Zion, two wood structures were razed. One of them was inhabited," he said.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld told AFP that as a result of the Oz Zion razing, "six people were arrested for disorderly conduct and entering a closed military zone."

Illegal structures in both outposts, which are near the West Bank Bank city of Ramallah, have routinely been built without government permission by settlers and then demolished by Israeli forces.

According to Koren, such demolitions are "part of the policy to not enable the expansion of outposts or the establishment of new ones."

Ramat Migron is adjacent to Migron, the oldest and biggest outpost in the West Bank which is slated to be evacuated by August 1 under the terms of a Supreme Court decision.

Israel considers settlement outposts built without government approval to be illegal and often sends security personnel to demolish them. They usually consist of little more than a few trailers.

The international community considers all settlements built in the West Bank -- including east Jerusalem -- to be illegal.

Elsewhere on the West Bank on Thursday, Palestinians said settlers set fire to a car near the northern city of Nablus.

Ghassan Daghlas, in charge of monitoring settler activity in the northern West Bank for the Palestinian Authority, told AFP that "settlers from Yitzhar torched a car early on Thursday morning in Einabbus village south of Nablus."

"They fled the scene when the villagers spotted them," he added.