Israeli army, settlers target Palestinian olive harvesters in West Bank

This olive harvest season in the occupied West Bank has witnessed the highest level of damage and number of illegal Israeli settler attacks since 2020, a United Nations agency has found.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) on Friday said 126 attacks were recorded in 70 towns and villages, and more than 4,000 olive trees and saplings were vandalised.

Israeli settlers set fire to two Palestinian vehicles in the town of Deir Dibwan, east of Ramallah, media correspondents said on Friday.

In the town of Sinjil, north of Ramallah, Israeli soldiers took possession of Palestinian farmers’ olives after expelling residents. While olive groves are located under Area B of the West Bank, which, under the terms of the Oslo Accords, does not require Palestinians to coordinate with the Israeli army, the area was declared a closed military zone.

A closed military zone order is a measure that enables the army to bar entry into a certain area and is valid for a limited time. Israel has confiscated Palestinian land from its owners by declaring it either “state land” or a “military zone”.

For decades, the Israeli military has uprooted olive trees – an important Palestinian cultural symbol – across the occupied West Bank as part of successive Israeli government efforts to seize Palestinian land and forcibly displace residents.

The latest attacks came after Israeli soldiers on Tuesday used tear gas to disperse Palestinians harvesting their olives in the village of Turmus Aya, near Ramallah, after settlers arrived on the scene.

Such actions contravene army directives, which require soldiers to protect olive harvesters. In 2006, Israel’s High Court of Justice ruled that “a military commander must avoid closing areas in a way that would deny Palestinian residents the ability to access their agricultural lands”.

OCHA said at least 112 Palestinians have been injured since early October, and more than 3,000 trees and saplings were vandalised.

Between October 14 and 20, the UN agency documented 49 Israeli settler attacks against Palestinians. Two-thirds of the attacks occurred in the context of the olive harvest season, which officially started on October 9, affecting Palestinians in 25 villages and towns.

Consolidating annexation

Settler violence has been surging in the occupied West Bank, with 757 attacks recorded in the first half of 2025 alone, according to data from the Israeli NGO Peace Now. This marks a 13 percent increase compared with the same period last year.

The September 2025 deadline for the end of the Israeli occupation demanded by the International Court of Justice has passed without improvement.

Last week, Israel’s parliament voted to give preliminary approval to a bill to impose Israeli sovereignty on the occupied West Bank, in a move tantamount to annexation of the Palestinian territory.

It will now go to the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee for further deliberations.

The vote came a month after United States President Donald Trump stated that he would not allow Israel to annex the Palestinian territory.

Annexing the occupied West Bank would effectively end the possibility of implementing a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, as outlined in numerous United Nations resolutions.

The Trump administration has been adamant that it won’t allow Israel to annex the occupied territory.  US Vice President JD Vance, while visiting Israel last week, said Trump would oppose Israeli annexation of the occupied West Bank, and it would not happen. Vance said as he left Israel,” If it was a political stunt, it is a very stupid one, and I personally take some insult to it.”

But the US has done nothing to rein in Israel’s heavy assault and crackdown on Palestinians in the West Bank as it trumpets its Gaza ceasefire efforts.