With foreign backing, Israel’s solar energy boom is powering apartheid
Shadmot Mehola Solar Field in the Jordan Valley, occupied West Bank
Sofia Fani Gutman, Carolina Pedrazzi and Andrey X report in +972 on 20 February 2026
“How do you charge your phones?” we asked. “With the sun,” Ahmad replied, nodding toward the small cluster of solar panels behind him.
For 47 years, the tiny hamlet of Naba’a Al-Ghazzal, part of the community of Al-Farsiya, has survived on the northern edge of the Jordan Valley in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Home to around 20 members of the Daraghmeh family — including Ahmad, the community’s informal leader — all of their electricity comes from a handful of solar panels. The community used to have a generator, but Israeli settlers destroyed it two years ago and they could not afford to replace it.
Palestinians stand near destroyed solar panels following a settler attack in the Bedouin community of Jaba’, near Jerusalem, 23 February 2025
Al-Farsiya is one of the last remaining Palestinian shepherding communities in the Jordan Valley, after the majority were displaced through relentless state-backed settler violence and harassment, particularly since October 7. The Daraghmeh family counts a few hundred sheep and a small strip of barley fields, a livelihood steadily being strangled by nearby settlers who block access to grazing land and routinely damage crops by running their own flocks through the fields.
Tubas, the closest Palestinian town, used to be a half-hour drive away; these days, since the Israeli military keeps the nearby Tayasir checkpoint almost permanently closed, every trip requires a multi-hour detour.
Across Area C, which makes up more than 60 percent of the West Bank and is under full Israeli civil and military control, solar power is often the only available source of electricity for Palestinian herding communities like this one. Israel has refused to connect these hamlets to the grid, despite its obligation under international humanitarian law to provide basic services to the population under occupation.
This article is part of a project by the Caravan Collective called “The Occupation of the Sun.” Explore the interactive website here.