Seven of the eight families living in the Tal a-Smadi area, near the village of al-Jiftlik in the central Jordan Valley, were forced to leave their homes due to settler and state violence.
On Tuesday, 3 February 2026, three families, numbering 35 people including 24 children, took down their homes and moved to other areas in the village of al-Jiftlik. In the past year, and particularly in recent months, settlers have frequently invaded the families’ residential compounds and wandered among the homes. Settlers also began cultivating all the land west of the residential area, making it very difficult for the families to take their flocks out to pasture.
While the families were moving their belongings to their new place of residence, staff from the settlement regional council of Arvot Hayarden and the Civil Administration chased after them and confiscated a tractor with a trailer loaded with household items.
That same night, settlers and soldiers raided the residential area of the families who had left, and burned down and destroyed the tents and structures the families had not yet taken down and relocated. As a result, on the morning of Wednesday, 4 February 2026, four more families, numbering 17 people including four children, left the area.
In total, seven families, numbering 52 people, including 28 children, who had lived in the Tal a-Smadi area for years, left. One shepherd family remains in the area, numbering eight people including two children. The family resides a short distance east of the compound whose residents were forced out.