Israeli dumping and burning of electronic waste in West Bank causes rise in cancer, birth defects
A pile of appliances and electronic waste skirts the front yard of a villa in Beit Awwa in the southern West Bank
Nadda Osman reports in The New Arab on 20 June 2026:
A rise in Israeli electronic waste that is being sorted and burned in the occupied West Bank, near Palestinian towns, has been decried as “environmental colonialism” while fuelling concerns over risks to the health of Palestinians civilians, as cancer spreads, babies are born with birth defects, and workers are injured handling dangerous materials.
According to engineer Bahjat Jabarin, the director general of environmental protection at the Palestinian environmental quality authority, 90 per cent of electronic waste that ends up in the West Bank originates from Israel, with most of it smuggled in through towns and settlements along the western border of the Hebron governorate.
Jabarin estimates that the amount of electronic waste taken to the West Bank equates to around 1,000 tonnes a day, and includes any items that have a power source or use batteries. Palestinians have long argued that the practice ensures that Israel develops land that is safe and protected for future settlements, while exploiting Palestinian land and forcing people to leave as pollution increases.
Nouraldin Araj, a Ramallah-based Palestinian researcher who focuses on Israeli environmental violence, said electronic waste being dumped in the West Bank is due to a “deliberately maintained structural legal gap”.
Companies and individuals in Israel are subjected to strict laws regulating how waste is collected, processed and disposed of, while there are no Israeli laws that explicitly prohibit the transfer of waste from Israel to the West Bank.