Beit Aryeh-Ofarim
Beit Aryeh-Ofarim is an Israeli settlement and local council in the northern West Bank. It is located north of Jerusalem and east of Tel Aviv, near the Palestinian village of al-Lubban al-Gharbi, 3.8 km kilometers east of the Green Line. It is situated on the Palestinian side of the Israeli [West Bank barrier], on 8,500 dunams of land. In it had a population of.
Israeli settlements in the West Bank are considered International [law and Israeli settlements|illegal under international law], but the Israeli government disputes this.
Khirbat Khudash is an archaeological site located within Beit Aryeh. It is a well-planned fortified settlement associated with olive-oil production, dated to the 8th century BCE and linked to the Kingdom of [Israel (Samaria)|Northern Kingdom of Israel].
History
Established in 1981, Beit Aryeh was recognised as a local council in 1989. In 2004, it merged with Ofarim. Beit Aryeh was named for former Knesset member Aryeh Ben-Eliezer, a prominent Revisionist Zionist leader who was amongst the founders of Herut.According to ARIJ, the land for Beit Aryeh-Ofarim was confiscated by Israel from two nearby Palestinian villages: Aboud and Al-Lubban al-Gharbi.
In 2011, the Israeli Ministry of Defense signed an agreement with the municipality of Beit Aryeh approving the construction of 100 homes and a bypass road between Beit Aryeh and Ofarim.
In 2020, Beit Aryeh-Ofarim was one of several Israeli settlements that dumped its untreated sewage onto lands of the nearby Palestinian village of Deir Ballut.