Dozens of masked settlers have attacked Palestinians and set fire to cars and olive trees during the annual olive harvest in the occupied West Bank. A BBC team witnessed one of several attacks in farmland near the Palestinian village of Abu Falah. A local official said the attacks had injured 12 Palestinians, including four dual Palestinian American citizens.
A foreign journalist was also among those hurt. Driving into the area early in the morning, we came across the first signs of the violence: a stream of cars carrying wounded Palestinian olive farmers racing out along the narrow stony track, piled high with olive picking equipment, as smoke rose from several fires nearby. The bloodied face of Majdi Fheed peered out from the backseat of one car.
"We were getting our olive trees and almost 15 Jewish guys … started attacking us with guns, with rocks, with special weapons. They hit me on my head [and] my neck – look, I am bleeding!" Yaser AlKam, a council member from the neighbouring village of Turmus Aya told me Majdi - an American citizen - was attacked by settlers with nail-studded sticks, and needed treatment for deep wounds on his head. His elderly mother was also injured.
Another man ferrying the injured to hospital told us that settlers had attacked them with sticks while they harvested their olives, and had burned three cars – including one of his own. "As soon as we got to the land and put our things on the ground, they started to come, so we ran away" said a woman next to him. Asked about the violence, a US State Department spokesperson said they were aware of the reports.
"We condemn criminal violence by any party in the West Bank and call for investigations, arrests, and convictions, of those responsible," the spokesperson said. Watching the vehicles stream past her, 73-year-old Imm Khaldoun told me emphatically that, no matter what happened, she would always return to her land. It's my right [to be here]" she told me.
The UN says the past two weeks have already seen more attacks by violent Israeli settlers than during the entire harvest season last year. Olive picking in the West Bank is now a test of speed, with trees rapidly stripped of fruit as soon as the sun rises, before violent Israeli settlers attack. In another olive orchard nearby, we watched as dozens of farmers used power-tools to strip the trees as fast as they could – one eye on the ridge above us, where a group of settlers at a new illegal outpost had already gathered, and were watching the olive harvest below.
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