Israeli settlers have uprooted more than 3,000 olive trees in a neighborhood in the occupied West Bank of Palestine. The Israeli military ordered the removal of olive trees from an area of 0.27 square kilometers in the Al-Mughayyir neighborhood near Ramallah, carrying out the destruction after imposing a blockade on the area under a pretext. The Deputy Head of the Al-Mughayyir Village Council, Marzouq Abu Naim, said that over the past 24 hours, Israelis had entered 30 houses in the neighborhood and damaged public property and homes as well.
Olive trees are a special symbol representing Palestinian culture. Cutting down olive trees has long been a practice of Israelis to challenge Palestinian autonomy. This is done to seize Palestinian lands and force the country’s citizens to relocate to other areas.
Since Israel began its aggression on Gaza on October 7, 2023, attacks by Israelis on the West Bank have also increased. As settler violence escalated, thousands of Palestinians have been forced to leave their homes. According to statistics released by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), from January 2024 to the end of July this year, Israeli settlers have attacked Palestinians 2,370 times. The highest number of attacks occurred in Ramallah, with 585 incidents. The second highest number of attacks took place in Nablus, a northern area of the West Bank. During this period, a total of 671 Palestinian citizens were martyred in the West Bank, including 129 children.
Hamza Zubaidat, an expert in Palestinian research, said that the uprooting of olive trees and the damage inflicted by Israelis is a crime aimed at forcing Palestinians to leave their homeland. He stated that this is not a new practice by Israelis and that such actions have been ongoing since 1967. Zubaidat further explained that Al-Mughayyir is a neighborhood with a long agricultural history and, like other neighborhoods in the West Bank, the main source of income for Al-Mughayyir’s residents is agriculture. He also mentioned that the Israelis uprooted more than 3,000 olive trees from the most fertile area of the Ramallah region.
Zubaidat added that damaging trees, seizing water springs, and Israelis obstructing Palestinians from working on their own farms are factors that will further worsen the state of hunger facing Palestine.
