“The olive unharvest season.”
I publish the following update from the city of al–Khalil (a.k.a. Hebron) in Occupied Palestine where I have been traveling and talking with people since 23 October. The trip was funded by the remaining donations from a GoFundMe campaign earlier this year. Thank you to all who made this second visit to Palestine possible.
20 November—It’s olive harvesting season in the West Bank. The annual harvest lasts two months, from mid-October to mid-December. Olives are among the most important crops for Palestinian families who rely upon olives and olive oil as staples in their diet. The production of olive oil is also critical to the economic wellbeing of communities and families who depend upon selling excess oil for income. Without this yearly financial infusion, families tip into poverty and entire communities suffer.
As illegal settlements expand throughout the West Bank the harvesting season is increasingly fraught with violence. Villagers are harassed, chased off their land, and shot at by settlers, often as soldiers from the Israeli Occupation Force stand by watching. On 23 October, I was in the village of al–Mughayyir in the Ramallah governorate. Villagers there have been unable to reach the olive groves that surround their community since 7 October last year. Anyone approaching the land risks being shot at.
Taking our chances that afternoon, we drove into the farmland and groves on a narrow dusty road. From there we could see the main paved road that cuts through the fertile valley. That road is now closed to Palestinians and is lined with Israeli flags. On a nearby hill I could see an illegal outpost and watchtower with another flag on top. From there settlers continuously monitor the fields. From the hilltop they can quickly descend into the valley to chase off any Palestinians attempting to harvest olives.
Al–Mughayyir is a remote and vulnerable community frequently attacked by settlers, who raid during the day, and the I.O.F. which prefers to terrorize people at night. Seventy percent of al–Mughayyir’s farmland—encompassing olive groves, vineyards, wheat fields, almond trees, vegetable fields, and greenhouses—is now inaccessible and has been since last October. For a second year in a row, villagers were not able to harvest their olives. As we drove through the neglected farmland, our village guide, a man named Kathem, stopped the car and asked me to take a picture of him in front of his land—land where grapes, olives, and wheat have been left to shrivel or rot.
I took three pictures of Kathem standing proudly before his withered wheat fields, a stoic look on his face. As I snapped the photos, the other passengers watched nervously from the car, glancing back to the outpost. It was not safe for us to linger. We hurried back to the car and headed for the relative safety of the village.
For now, a picture is all Kathem has of his land.
This is the reality for rural Palestinians whose lands are being encircled like a tightening noose by illegal settlements. In the West Bank, everything changed for the worse after the Hamas attack last year. In the village of Battir—a region famous for its historic agricultural terraces and designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2014—the I.O.F. established a checkpoint at the entrance to the rural road that serves as the only access to the farmland and olive groves. A year later, during this harvest season, the checkpoint was still in place. As was the case last year, the I.O.F. designated only three days for farmers to enter their lands and harvest olives. It is a task that usually takes entire families two weeks. More than once, villagers showed up on the designated day and hour only to be told the gate wouldn’t be opened.
Last Friday, in the village of Tarqumiyah in the Hebron governorate, settlers chased Palestinian families from their olive groves and stole all the olives that had been harvested. They then destroyed the olives. It is as Kathem told me when we first met in May, “They are made to destroy,” he said. “They are a destruction machine. They kill, they steal, they take everything. Everyone in the world wants peace and stability. They don’t.” He concluded, “They want to kill and steal.”
In past years, hundreds of international volunteers helped with the olive harvest providing a “protective presence.” But with the U.S.-Israeli genocide still going strong in Gaza, the bombing in Lebanon, and continuous threats of a wider regional war between Iran and Israel, most activists and internationals are staying away. This has left Palestinians even more vulnerable to attack.
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