B2. PALESTINIAN CENTRAL BUREAU OF STATISTICS, LAND DAY PRESS RELEASE, RAMALLAH, 30 MARCH 2015 (EXCERPTS)

On 30 March 1976, thousands of Palestinian citizens of Israel gathered to protest the Israeli government’s plan to confiscate at least 20,000 dunums of Palestinian land near the villages of Sakhnin and ‘Araba in an effort to judaize the Galilee. In one of their first acts of mass resistance, Palestinians in Israel staged demonstrations that spread from the Galilee to the Negev. Six Palestinians were shot and killed by Israeli forces and hundreds more were wounded or imprisoned. On what has come to be known as Land Day, Palestinians commemorate these events annually with different forms of collective action held on 30 March.

The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) commemorates Land Day with the release of a short report outlining the ways in which Israel has destroyed or confiscated Palestinian land in the preceding year. Presented below is the PCBS 2015 Land Day press release, which can be accessed at www.pcbs.gov.ps.