The Israeli army did not renew a closed military zone order in the Tel Rumeida neighborhood of the city of Hebron, a Palestinian activist group said on Wednesday.
An Israeli army spokesperson could not immediately confirm the report.
If confirmed, the end of the closed military zone in Tel Rumeida would mark the first time the neighborhood of the flashpoint occupied West Bank city is reopened to the public since Nov. 1, 2015.
Since then, Israeli authorities had renewed the closed military zone order every couple of weeks.
In a statement, local activist group Youth Against Settlements (YAS) said it attributed "this success to the Open the Zone campaign that YAS and International Solidarity Movement (ISM) launched on May 3."
Dozens of activist groups have been pushing for the reopening of Tel Rumeida for the past seven months.
For the past six months, non-residents -- including relatives, medics, or journalists -- have been barred from entering Tel Rumeida, while residents were assigned numbers and had to pass through a checkpoint to leave or enter their homes.
YAS coordinator Issa Amro was quoted as saying that the closed military order on Tel Rumeida was "a thinly-disguised attempt to forcibly displace of the Palestinians from Hebron's old city where illegal Israeli settlers reside."
YAS reiterated in its statement that the Tel Rumeida closure was only one of many issues facing Palestinians in Hebron.
"Palestinians in Hebron continue to suffer from massive closures, restrictions, and violence," the group said, highlighting the case of Shuhada Street, which has been almost entirely closed off to Palestinians since 1994.
"Youth Against Settlements will continue working to end the systems of apartheid and separation in Hebron until the military occupation of the West Bank is ended and equality is achieved for all people in Palestine."
Mistreatment of Palestinians in the Hebron area has been common since the city was divided in 1997 under the Oslo agreements.
The majority of the city was placed under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority, while the Old City and surrounding areas were placed under Israeli military control, known as H2.
The area is home to 30,000 Palestinians and around 800 Israeli settlers who live under the protection of Israeli forces. Hebron residents frequently report attacks and harassment by the settlers, carried out in the presence of the forces.
