BITTER HARVEST: Settlers olive trees control

APN Middle East Report, 22.10.07. “The equation that has been created here in the hills of Samaria is clear,” observed Israel Television’s Mabat Correspondent Ohed Chemo in his broadcast on Wednesday. “He who controls the olive trees controls the territory. And what can be more explosive than a Palestinian olive harvest that takes place adjacent to the fences of the [unauthorized] settlement [outpost] of Havat Gilad. Yesterday, it ended with injured [Palestinians].” Chemo was referring to an incident where a Palestinian farmer, Abed Al-Fahah Al-Hidni, suffered a head injury after reportedly being attacked by six settlers. Rabbis for Human Rights filed an official complaint with Israeli police over the incident; police have initiated a search for the perpetrators. This was the second reported attack within a week on Palestinian farmers in that area. Zecharia Seada, an activist with Rabbis for Human Rights, pointed to an intimidation campaign, telling Mabat that it is evident “from the fields that are not worked well that they [the Palestinian farmers] are scared to come and get near them [the settlers]. I, as one of the residents of the area, I say to you, that I too am scared of them. You should know that.” Yedioth Ahronoth’s Yehuda Litani writes on Thursday that such attacks have become an annual phenomenon in which Palestinian farmers “accuse the settlers of attempting to steal their only ‘poor man’s possession’ – the olive and oil harvest that tens of thousands of families live on during the long winter months… The attacks on the harvesters, the damage to the olive orchards and the uprooting of trees are regarded by the Palestinian public as an attempt to uproot them from their land, especially since security officials display unfathomable helplessness with regard to protecting the Palestinian peasants and [to] deterring settler aggression.” In this context, Litani concludes that the stakes are higher than the fate of an olive harvest: “If the security officials do not display determination this year in their dealings with the clashes and a firm hand against the phenomenon, representatives of the government will find it hard to persuade the Palestinians that their intentions are indeed serious also in fateful matters such as the establishment of a Palestinian state, the transfer of territories and reaching an agreement about Jerusalem. Despite the fact that this is allegedly a peripheral matter, perhaps it would pay for those at the helm of the government to remember the words of Ecclesiastes: ‘Thy name is better than good oil.’” (Ma’ariv-NRG, 10/16/07; Mabat, 10/17/07; Ynet 10/16/07; Yedioth Ahronoth, 10/18/07)