An ancient olive tree cut down: this image is worthy of being the state’s symbol for a poster marking its 75th year, which I would raise on Tel Aviv’s Kaplan Street with a single explanatory sentence: “The electric saw belongs to Jewish settlers, the hands – to the State of Israel.” And I would also add: “Sponsored by the indifference, disregard and silence of most of Israel’s citizens.”
From late December 2002 until early May, “unknown individuals” cut down, sawed, broke and uprooted about 5,000 trees in Palestinian villages in the West Bank. That’s nothing new. This agricultural and environmental terror, dripping with hatred of human beings and nature, has been part and parcel of the settlements and outposts’ spread since the 1990s.
Sometimes the unknown individuals can be seen from a distance and also from up close, sometimes their attacks are recorded on cameras. Sometimes they beat up the olive pickers and the plowers. Nor does the presence of Israeli soldiers and police officers deter them. They know that these forces will protect them and then arrest the Palestinians who wanted to protect their trees and their crop.
The police “won’t find” any suspects, let alone file charges against them. Had they not been serving the goals of the state with their violence, the law and order authorities wouldn’t have allowed them a free hand. The attackers live or are guests in the Jewish colonies built by the state in an area that doesn’t belong to it, and they look like religious Jews. I won’t write “God-fearing” Jews, with atheistic sarcasm, lest I be reprimanded by my friend Mikhael Manekin of the new “faithful left” movement.
Saplings, young trees a few years old and ancient trees. Those who chop and vandalize in the groves don’t reject any type of tree or any kind of vandalism. But the sight of the ancient trees belonging to the residents of the village of Qaryut, which were sawed and cut down in the past month and a half, is particularly shocking. Thousands of trees are planted on the gently descending slopes of Qaryut’s hills. They have thick trunks and wide branches – the delicate, whitish blossoms herald an abundant olive crop come October and November. The mutilated trees are on the slope of one of the hilltops that has been taken over by the settlement of Eli.
Since early April, the residents have discovered that again and again, every few days, more of their trees are getting chopped down. The freshness or dryness of the leaves tell whether it was a new or less recent attack. On Friday villagers told me that two days earlier, they discovered a few more newly destroyed trees, even though the Israel Police had claimed earlier last week that they were “investigating.” The villagers haven't seen any police officers come to the groves, nor was any plot owner called to give testimony.
A Palestinian woman gestures as she stands beside an olive tree after it was cut down in the West Bank village of Litwane, near the Jewish settlement of Ma'on. Credit: Reuters
I don’t know whether the trees are 150 or 200 years old, but many of them were clearly planted by people who have long since passed away. Every family knows which plot belongs to it, every brother and sister knows which trees belong to whom, and the name of the grandfather or great-grandfather who bequeathed them. The olive trees are living proof of the continuous, long-term presence of the Palestinians in their homeland. And there’s nothing like the newer trees to demonstrate the continuation of an agricultural family tradition and the natural, non-aggressive and non-invasive bonds to the land.
It’s clear: The vandals, with their supremacist violence, aim to deter farmers from reaching their land, so it can be added to the hundreds of thousands of dunams they have already grabbed in the West Bank in similar ways. In response to their serial aggression, the government resorts to the tried and true patent: It punishes the Palestinians who are being attacked and forbids them from reaching their olive groves and their fields, except for a few days a year.
But the vandals want more: They want to erase the Palestinian continuity and rootedness in this country; they want to destroy the clear connection between thePalestinians and their land. Every tree chopped down is a metaphorical expulsion, which they intend to carry out.