al-Auja is a Palestinian

Palestinian people

The Palestinian people, also referred to as Palestinians or Palestinian Arabs , are an Arabic-speaking people with origins in Palestine. Despite various wars and exoduses, roughly one third of the world's Palestinian population continues to reside in the area encompassing the West Bank, the Gaza...

 town in the Jericho Governorate

Jericho Governorate

The Jericho Governorate is one of 16 Governorates of the Palestinian National Authority within the Palestinian territories. It is located along the eastern areas of the West Bank, along the northern Dead Sea and southern Jordan River valley bordering Jordan...

 in the eastern West Bank

West Bank

The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...

, located ten kilometers north of Jericho

Jericho

Jericho ; is a city located near the Jordan River in the West Bank of the Palestinian territories. It is the capital of the Jericho Governorate and has a population of more than 20,000. Situated well below sea level on an east-west route north of the Dead Sea, Jericho is the lowest permanently...

. The town has a total area of 107,905 dunam

Dunam

A dunam or dönüm, dunum, donum, dynym, dulum was a non-SI unit of land area used in the Ottoman Empire and representing the amount of land that can be plowed in a day; its value varied from 900–2500 m²...

s, however its built-up area comprises only 832 dunams. After Israel's occupation of the West Bank

Israeli-occupied territories

The Israeli-occupied territories are the territories which have been designated as occupied territory by the United Nations and other international organizations, governments and others to refer to the territory seized by Israel during the Six-Day War of 1967 from Egypt, Jordan, and Syria...

 in the 1967 Six-Day War

Six-Day War

The Six-Day War , also known as the June War, 1967 Arab-Israeli War, or Third Arab-Israeli War, was fought between June 5 and 10, 1967, by Israel and the neighboring states of Egypt , Jordan, and Syria...

, 30,147 dunams of al-Auja's land was classified as "closed-off area" barred from Palestinian use. It is situated 230 meters below sea level.

Agricultural land makes up over 10% of the town's jurisdiction, mostly planted with bananas, oranges, and vegetables for which al-Auja is well-known. Irrigation water is mainly supplied from the al-Auja spring.

According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics

Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics

The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics is the statistical organization under the umbrella of the Palestinian Cabinet of the Palestinian National Authority....

, al-Auja had a population of over 4,000 inhabitants in mid-year 2006. In 1997, refugee

Palestinian refugee

Palestinian refugees or Palestine refugees are the people and their descendants, predominantly Palestinian Arabic-speakers, who fled or were expelled from their homes during and after the 1948 Palestine War, within that part of the British Mandate of Palestine, that after that war became the...

s constituted 24.7% of the population. Located in "Area A", complete control over al-Auja was transferred to the Palestinian National Authority

Palestinian National Authority

The Palestinian Authority is the administrative organization established to govern parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip...

 in a 1994 deal which also included Jericho and Gaza

Gaza

Gaza , also referred to as Gaza City, is a Palestinian city in the Gaza Strip, with a population of about 450,000, making it the largest city in the Palestinian territories.Inhabited since at least the 15th century BC,...

.