[caption id="attachment_117095" align="alignright" width="228"] A file photo of illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank.[/caption]

Israeli forces have leveled a piece of private Palestinian land near the occupied West Bank city of Bethlehem, a report says.

Israeli soldiers and settlers escorted bulldozers to the land near the village of Kisan, southeast of Bethlehem, to flatten the ground on Tuesday, the Palestinian Ma’an News Agency reported.

The raid happened on 18 acres of land belonging to Palestinian families, said local officials in Kisan.

Israeli authorities plan to build an industrial zone of 150 acres on the land, Khalid Qaddura, the director of Bethlehem's District Civil Liaison Office, said.

He also added that the plan would isolate Kisan from adjacent Palestinian villages and leave it encircled by Israeli settlements and the industrial zone.

Israeli officials have seized large areas of Palestinian land to build settlements. The regime is facing widespread global condemnation over its settlement construction.

The presence and continued expansion of Israeli settlements in occupied Palestine has created a major obstacle in the way of efforts to establish peace in the Middle East.

More than half a million Israelis live in over 120 settlements, built since Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories in the West Bank, including East al-Quds, in 1967.

The Israeli settlements are considered to be illegal by the United Nations and most countries because the territories were captured by Israel in the war in 1967 and are thus subject to the Geneva Conventions, which forbid construction on occupied lands.

By Press TV