A unique way of life in the West Bank is under threat after Israel renewed a legal bid to evict more than 1,600 cave-dwelling Palestinian farmers from their land in the desert hills near the Biblical city of Hebron.

Israel´s defence ministry is expected to seek court approval this week to destroy up to 12 traditional "fellaheen" communities situated in an area designated as a training zone for the occupying Israeli army.

The issue has threatened to heighten tensions with the Palestinian leadership, which has refused to resume peace talks with Israel as long as it continues to build settlements on land it occupied in the Six Day War of 1967.

It has also set the Jewish state on a collision course with European powers, particularly the British government which funded the construction of cisterns and sanitation facilities for the cave- dwelling communities, home to some of the poorest Palestinians in the West Bank.

"The UK takes any reports of projects funded by the UK taxpayer being demolished seriously," a Foreign Office spokesman said on Sunday. "We are aware of the legal proceedings and are monitoring the outcome of the case."

The EU´s 27 foreign ministers will issue a strongly worded rebuke on Monday, denouncing Israel for expanding Jewish settlements and demanding Palestinians be allowed to build on their own land without fear of having their homes demolished.

The Foreign Office said it was particularly concerned by the 40 per cent increase in the number of Palestinian property demolitions ordered by Israel last year.

"They cause unnecessary suffering to ordinary Palestinians; are harmful to the peace process; and, in all but the most limited circumstances, are contrary to international humanitarian law," said Alistair Burt, the Middle East minister.

Although the communities under threat have been marked on British maps since the 1830s, no one knows how long they have really existed. In the village of Jenba, one of the largest of the 12 communities, they all remember they were born in the same caves as their fathers and grandfathers.

Sitting on the floor of his cave, its ceiling covered with cobwebs and blackened with stove smoke, Hamid Jabareen, 72 and almost blind, recalled that the only time his father left home was when he was drafted into the Turkish defence of Jerusalem before its capture by Gen. Allenby´s troops in 1917.

With its motley collection of tents and discreetly hidden caves, Jenba is an unprepossessing place far removed from the cacophonous bustle of the West Bank´s sprawling towns and cities.

But behind its narrow doorway, Mr Jabareen´s home – shared with his two wives and myriad children and grandchildren – is surprisingly homely, its natural walls reinforced with stonework and its kitchen and sleeping areas set at split levels.

Mr Jabareen has spent his whole life tending to his flocks and cultivating wheat and barley. The prospect of being deprived of his both his livelihood and the only way of life he has ever known is inconceivable to him.

"It is my land," he said. "It is the land of my father and of my grandfather before him.

"We can only hope that decent and dignified people will raise their voices and say something about it."

The cave dwellers say they have been the victims of a sustained campaign of Israeli harassment for decades.

Settlers living nearby have poisoned their cisterns, burnt their crops, beaten them up and rustled their livestock.

But the greatest threat to their futures began 12 years ago, when Israeli forces forcibly evicted 700 of them after ruling that they were illegally living in a military training zone.

Although they won a reprieve through a court injunction the following year, Israel´s defence ministry is now determined to resolve the matter.

It will disclose the contents of a new court petition this week. Activists say they expect the ministry will seek to evict and demolish most, perhaps all, the communities.

The ministry, which sees the cave dwellers as illegal squatters and accuses them of rejecting compromises to relocate them, refused to be drawn on what course it would take.

Rights groups claimed that Israel´s real intention is to allow settlers to move onto the land once the Palestinians have been ejected.

Ezra Nawi, an Israeli activist, said: "To build new settlements, you need to get the Palestinians out somehow, which is why there has been a campaign of intimidation and harassment to make more and more people leave." (© Copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited 2012. 05/14/12)