Jewish settlers steal olives from 110+ trees in Abu Huwar
International Solidarity Movement | October 7, 2013
Deir Sharaf, Occupied Palestine – On the 5th of October, local farmers discovered that the olives from more than one hundred trees had been stolen, and that another ten trees had been damaged or destroyed. Abu Huwar farm, belonging to Yasser Fuqaha, Sidqi Fukaha, Mustafa Fuqaha and other farmers from the Meri family.
A local factory worker reported that he had seen two buses loaded with settlers pull up and unload next to the farm, in the night between the 3rd and 4th of October. About 150 metres into the field the olives had been swiftly picked from the trees, leaving small amounts on the tops, and the damaged trees bore markings from sharp-edged cutting tools. Yasser Fuqaha reported that the amount stolen from him represented about three quarters of his expected total yield, a devastating blow to his income. This attack precipitated the start of the olive harvesting season, and puts pressure on the local farmers to start harvesting the olives before they have reached optimal ripeness.
Abu Huwar has not had an easy run over the years. The local Palestinian farmers reported that, in 1996, the part of the olive grove that was on the other side of the hilltop (itself the location of an illegal settlement) had been completely uprooted by radical settlers and moved into various places on the other side of the 1967 Israeli border. Also, in the period 2000-2008, the farm and surrounding farmlands had been closed off from Palestinians by the Israeli military.
A national symbol, the olive tree represents the most essential source of income and sustenance for many Palestinians. The destruction of olive trees and theft of its yields is a serious crime and a huge loss for the local farmers.
Related articles
Saudi Hires Occupation-Friendly Company for Hajj Security
By Orouba Othman | Al-Akhbar | October 7, 2013
This year, the mandatory Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, or hajj, will compound the Palestinians’ woes. Palestinian pilgrims will be greeted by a company that assists in their repression – and even torture – under the Israeli occupation regime. Indeed, hajj this year will be brought to you by none other than G4S.
This is not the first time that the Saudi government has hired the private security firm, which has recruited a staggering 700,000 to provide hajj-related services this year, according to exclusive information obtained by Al-Akhbar. Most of the leaked reports indicate that security for the hajj season since 2010 has been entrusted to al-Majal G4S, an affiliate of the parent company G4S.
The CEO of al-Majal G4S is a former security official in Saudi named Khaled Baghdadi. The Saudi subsidiary is fully owned by the British-Danish firm.
The parent company has not disclosed the nature of the contracts it has signed with the Saudi authorities. In its periodic reports, G4S makes limited references to its Saudi operations, such as winning a contract with Jeddah Metro to assist with security during the hajj, or stating that the company assists in the transport of more than 3 million pilgrims who visit Mecca each year. In 2011, the website Asrar Ararabiya – Arab Secrets – published an ad by the company asking people to apply to work in Mecca for seven days only, during hajj.
The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign has not been sitting idly by. In a press conference on Wednesday, October 2, the campaign sent a clear message to the Saudi government, urging it to terminate the contract with the company that happens to provide equipment and security services to protect Israeli settlements, occupation checkpoints, and police facilities. The private security contractor has also been implicated in enabling the torture of administrative detainees in Palestine, including children, according to BDS activist Zaid Shuaibi.
BDS activists were not the only ones to react to the news. Sheikh Ekrima Sabri, the head of the Supreme Islamic Council in Jerusalem and the imam of al-Aqsa Mosque, has proclaimed, “This company operates in security, and has activities and commitments in areas under Israeli occupation. Those who help the occupation must be held accountable and are complicit in the crime, as those who help aggressors also are aggressors.”
Shuaibi, speaking to Al-Akhbar, said that the BDS campaign contacted the Palestinian Ministry of Economy, being the competent authority in the issue of boycotting settlements, such as the ones serviced by G4S. But according to Shuaibi, “The ministry did not bother to respond or take action to stop the abuse, even as the company violates Palestinian law by continuing to provide services to the settlements.”
G4S in Israeli Prisons and Interrogation Centers
G4S’ subsidiary in Israel (Hashmira) was awarded a contract with the Israeli Prison Service in July 2007 to supply equipment and security services that enable violations of Articles 49 and 76 of the Fourth Geneva Convention. The company provides security systems and centralized control systems to the Hasharon-Ramonim prison, which contains a section for Palestinian political prisoners.
G4S has installed a central command room in Megiddo Prison, in addition to supplying a wide array of security services to the Damon and Ketziot prisons. In Ofer, the prison where more than 1,500 Palestinians are detained – mostly administrative prisoners – G4S has also installed a central command room and provided protection through peripheral defense systems on the walls surrounding the prison. The company routinely supplies systems for command and control, IT, CCTV, and communications to Israeli prisons.
In the Jalma and Maskoubieh interrogation centers, which are also serviced by G4S, not even children are spared from torture. It is in one of those centers that Palestinian detainee Arafat Jaradat was tortured to death earlier this year. There, too, Luay al-Ashqar, a Palestinian administrative detainee, became permanently paralyzed in his left leg when he suffered a triple fracture in his spine during his detention.
Under Israeli military law, prisoners can be detained for investigation for 60 days without access to a lawyer, which means that lawyers cannot witness interrogation methods used against their clients. All these practices and more are facilitated by G4S.
Checkpoints, Settlements, and Police Stations
According to a report by Who Profits, “G4S Israel supplied luggage scanning equipment and full body scanners to several checkpoints in the West Bank, including the Qalandia checkpoint, the Bethlehem checkpoint…[and] the Erez checkpoint in Gaza.” The company also provides security equipment to Israeli police facilities in the E1 zone of the West Bank, near the settlement of Maaleh Adumim.
Meanwhile, G4S-serviced checkpoints make life extremely difficult for more than 23,000 Palestinians who work in Jerusalem and the territories of 1948 (Israel proper), who have to wait and are often delayed as they undergo humiliating inspection each morning. G4S also operates in the Israeli settlements, catering to businesses and private citizens.
Europe Reacts
BDS campaigns have been able to achieve some success in Europe while Saudi Arabia continues to ignore appeals to terminate contracts with G4S. The company lost several contracts in Europe, including with Oslo University back in July after pressure by student groups.
In the United Kingdom, the East London Teachers Association put pressure on local authorities to terminate contracts with G4S, which provides services to more than 25 schools in the British capital. Campaigns to boycott G4S have spread to Denmark, Sweden, Belgium, and the rest of Europe. In April this year, G4S failed to renew a 2008 contract to provide security services for parliament buildings in Europe.
G4S in the Arab World
The scope of G4S’ operations and profits in the Arab world is nearly six times the size of its operations and profits in the Jewish state. In truth, its market share in Saudi alone is about 10 times its share in Israel.
The company is active in 16 Arab countries, with a turnover of 501 million British pounds ($805 million) last year, or 6 percent of its total revenues. It employs nearly 44,000, who work in operations ranging from providing security for airports in Baghdad and Dubai, Arab embassies, various Arab sports events, as well as protection for private businesses.
In comparison, G4S earns about 100 million pounds ($160 million) from its Israeli operations, or 1 percent of its total yearly revenues.
Follow Orouba Othman on Twitter.
Fast Times in Palestine – Book Review
Reviewed by Jamal Kanj | Palestine Chronicle | October 5, 2013
(Fast Times in Palestine. Pamela Olson. Seal Press, March 2013)
Whenever I read a biographical book, I make it a point to start with the acknowledgement page to learn a little about the writer. In reading “Fast Times in Palestine: A love affair with a homeless homeland,” I had to start from the end of the book.
In those two pages the author thanked more than fifty individuals, but what got my attention was recognizing her ninth grade teacher for forcing her to write “a journal every day.” A gift the author displayed meticulously in chronicling the places and people she met in every page of a moving memoir of her journey in Palestine.
As I read the book I tried to fathom what drove a young American woman from a small town in Oklahoma with degree in physics to end up spending two years traversing military checkpoints and helping farmers harvest olives in the Middle East.
It could have been her adventurous nature and love for travel that brought her to that part of the world, but it was sheer destiny that tossed her into the abyss of fire to tell the world of her “love affair with a homeless homeland.”
After graduating from Stanford University in 2002, the newly graduated student was working at a neighborhood bar to save enough money for a backpacker vacation in the Greek isles when her French friend suggested Egypt as an alternative, less expensive destination. She traveled to Cairo and the Sinai, where she met an Israeli tourist named Dan who invited her to visit him in Israel.
Her journey took her across the Red Sea to Jordan, where she met—by chance—two peace volunteers, one British and one Canadian, who were on holiday from their work in Palestine. In the few days she spent with them in a downtown Amman hotel, she learned for the first time of the $3 billion the US government pays Israel annually on behalf of American taxpayers.
Stories about occupation, the Palestinian people and human rights activism intrigued her, and she became interested in finding out for herself the truth about life in the West Bank. She jumped on the opportunity when they invited her to come along with them, and they took her to an unlikely tourist destination, a small Palestinian village called Jayyous.
The author tackles the paradox of occupation in very straightforward layman’s terms, describing how a forty-mile journey from Jerusalem to the Palestinian city of Nablus would take a full day crossing a separation wall, changing cabs six times and navigating permanent and flying Israeli military checkpoints. Meanwhile a much longer trip with her Israeli friend on “Jewish only settlement roads” could be completed uninterrupted in a much shorter time.
She also describes how the separation wall isolates villagers from their olive groves and farms—for many their only livelihood—while hilltop Jewish-only settlements encroach on centuries-old trees and isolate Palestinian towns and villages into islands surrounded by Zionist colonies and the army that protects them.
Ever more fascinated by the wickedness of occupation and the joys of life among Palestinians, Pamela Olson took a low-paying job in Ramallah as an editor and head writer for the Palestine Monitor to study and document the daily human rights abuses under Israeli occupation.
Living and working in the Palestinian political capital, Pamela entered Palestinian politics from its widest doors by becoming the foreign press coordinator for a major candidate in the 2005 presidential election.
In her two years between Jayyous and Ramallah, the author takes the reader on an extraordinary expedition very few of us will ever get the opportunity to experience in a lifetime. She takes us along with her via immaculate descriptions of the spring greenery on hills and meadows—not yet raped by the concrete desertification of the Jewish only settlements—or smoking Nargila (hookah) on porches with friends in Jayyous or sipping coffee at westernized cafés in Ramallah.
What makes this book special is the writer’s ability to keep the reader spellbound with her vivid descriptions of events, people and places. The reader is able to feel the author’s inner glee meeting beloved friends, pain while witnessing and experiencing the horrors of occupation and the melancholy of bidding farewell to people who became part of her family in Palestine.
– Jamal Kanj (www.jamalkanj.com) writes weekly newspaper column and publishes on several websites on Arab world issues. He is the author of “Children of Catastrophe,” Journey from a Palestinian Refugee Camp to America.
Jewish settlers cut down and burn hundreds of trees in Nablus and al-Khalil
Palestine Information Center – 05/10/2013
NABLUS — Jewish extremist settlers attacked olive groves in Deir Sharaf village west of Nablus northern West Bank on Friday night.
The settlers attacked Palestinian lands near Shavei Shomron settlement where they cut down trees and bulldozed Palestinian lands in the area, a PIC correspondent reported.
The lands’ owners were stunned Saturday morning at the site and bulk of the damages caused by the settlers’ violent attack against their agricultural lands.
Settler attacks usually witness a sharp escalation during the olive harvest season, and include the uprooting of Palestinian trees, in addition to attacks on residents, and international supporters, while picking their crops.
Meanwhile, Israeli settlers burned Palestinian land planted with grapes near Kharsia settlement in al-Khalil southern West Bank.
Local sources told Quds Press that the Israeli settlers burned down a four-dunum piece of land planted with grapes owned by the Palestinian citizen Mousa Jaber.
The Palestinian farmers called on human rights institutions to intervene to put an end to the Israeli violations and attacks against them and their farms.
Related articles
- Israelis torch Palestinian car, slash tires of five others (alethonews.wordpress.com)
- Settlers open fire toward shepherds south of Nablus (altahrir.wordpress.com)
- Illegal Israeli settlers attack Palestinian villages in Nablus (occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com)
Extremist Israeli Settlers Harass Residents, Close Street, Near Jenin
Israeli Settlers – Safa News
By Saed Bannoura | IMEMC & Agencies | October 3, 2013
Late on Wednesday at night a number of extremist Israeli settlers closed the western entrance of Ya’bod village, near the northern West Bank city of Jenin, and harassed several residents. Soldiers invaded the village and broke into a store.
Local sources said the settlers were dancing in the streets, chanting anti-Arab slogans, and were cursing at the residents, and conducting provocative acts.
The settlers used generators to light the streets, and to power loud speakers, while Israeli soldiers were deployed in the area without attempting to stop them, the Safa News Agency has reported.
Later on, the army invaded the village, not to remove the settlers, but to break into a local store that belongs to resident Salah Abu Dyak.
The soldiers violently searched the store and withdrew from the village.
On Thursday morning, several Israeli military jeeps installed a roadblock at the eastern entrance of Ya’bod, and nearby villages, and blocked all Palestinian traffic.
Soldiers stopped and searched dozens of cars, and questioned the passengers before forcing them back, forcing dozens of residents to take unpaved rough roads to reach their places of work, universities and schools.
Dozens of soldiers further invaded Sielet Ath-Thaher town, south of Jenin, broke into the home of resident Nasser Ibrahim Malloul, and handed his son Bilal, 27, a military warrant ordering him to the Salem military base for interrogation.
Related articles
AL-KHALIL (HEBRON): Entery Denied: Part II*
CPTnet | September 24, 2013
* The word “entry” is intentionally misspelled to reflect the misspelling on the Israeli “Entery Denied” stamp.
I made a second attempt to cross the border. Spoiler alert, I didn’t make it.
I have been volunteering with Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) in Palestine for one year. Due to visa restrictions all volunteers have to come into the country under a tourist visa, and leave every three months to renew our visas. Last week I was returning across the Allenby Border Crossing for my fourth stint. I was questioned extensively about myself, my family, my plans for my visit, and the work of CPT. After 7 hours of questioning and waiting I was told I was denied entry. I asked the reason for my denial. They did not give a clear answer, but did suggest that part of the reason involved not having sufficient evidence to support back my story. The soldier suggested I return later with a letter from CPT, evidence of where I was going to stay, and added that I should get a letter from the Israeli embassy. I took his advice, but the Israeli embassy was closed for over a week. So I returned to the border with a letter from CPT stating our work, my position, and my purpose for entering the country. I also printed out two letters from Israeli friends ‘inviting’ me.
My second attempt was similar to the first. I was questioned multiple times. I was asked to trace my family lineage back three generations. I was asked to prove my religion. I was accused of lying about my reasons for coming to the country. I found this ironic because I have always been honest about my reasons for entering, and it has brought me nothing but trouble.
Finally I was denied entry again. This time, the soldier explained it was because CPT is not a recognized organization. I told the soldier that we legally do not need to be recognized by Israel, and I asked why this was a reason for not letting me in. He said his commander said I couldn’t come in for that reason, and that was the end of the conversation.
In recent months Israeli border security has kept two other CPTers from crossing (that is 50% of the CPTers attempting to enter during that time). This is the first time someone has explicitly stated that it is because we are with CPT, although we assumed as much before.
CPT has been working in Hebron for 19 years. We are a member of the Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA). We receive grants from the United Nations and from Save the Children UK. CPT is a well known, respected INGO in the region. We have no explanation for the targeting of CPTers at the border in recent months and I question why the Israeli authorities see people working for a ‘violence reduction program’ as a threat.
For Part I of Jonathan’s first border denial click here
Related articles
- Military Training Amid Villages in South Hebron Hills (alethonews.wordpress.com)
- AL-KHALIL: Settlers re-occupy Abu Rajib house (alethonews.wordpress.com)
- Child Shot In The Eye In Hebron (alethonews.wordpress.com)
- Netanyahu Orders Court To Allow Settlers Back Into Hebron Home (alethonews.wordpress.com)
Child Shot In The Eye In Hebron
By Saed Bannoura | IMEMC & Agencies | September 28, 2013
Palestinian medical sources have reported that a seven-year-old child lost his right eye after being shot with a rubber-coated metal bullet fired by an Israeli soldier in Al-Fawwar refugee camp, south of the southern West Bank city of Hebron on Saturday.
The sources added that the child’s mother was also shot by a rubber-coated metal bullet in her shoulder.
The mother and her child were trying to return to the refugee camp; they were far from clashes taking place between the soldiers and local youths.
Eyewitnesses said that the mother and her child were trying to cross a road in an attempt to find a way back to their home after the army closed the main entrance of the camp.
Nasser Qabaja, head of the Disasters Unit at the Red Crescent in the southern part of the West Bank, stated that an ambulance transferred the child from Abu Al-Hasan Hospital to the Hebron Governmental Hospital, before moving him to the St. John Eye Hospital in occupied Jerusalem.
Furthermore, dozens of soldiers occupied rooftops of a number of homes in the area, and fired gas bombs, concussion grenades and rubber-coated metal bullets leading to a large number of injuries, mainly due to the effect of teargas inhalation.
One-third of Palestinian homes in Jerusalem are threatened with demolition
MEMO | September 26, 2013
An international human rights organisation has revealed that one-third of the Palestinian-owned houses in Jerusalem face demolition under the pretext that applications for building permits were incomplete. This, claims Euro-Mid Observer for Human Rights, is a way for the Israeli authorities to continue their demographic war against Palestinians in the Holy City. Israel gives Jerusalemite Palestinians the right to use just 13 per cent of the area of occupied East Jerusalem to meet the needs of their growing population.
A report from Euro-Mid shed some light on the widespread Israeli settlement programme in Jerusalem. It mentioned that the financial committee of the Israeli-controlled Jerusalem municipality decided to support 1,500 new settlement units in the city at the end of August. The human rights group also pointed out that Israel’s bulldozers are still razing Palestinian homes in Al-Tour neighbourhood because the authorities plan to set up the “National Israeli Park”.
According to the UN, poverty is getting worse among Palestinians in Jerusalem. Euro-Mid noted that the unemployment rate rose to 78 per cent in 2012 compared with 64 per cent in 2006. More than 40 per cent of Palestinian Jerusalemites now live below the official poverty line; one of the reasons is the disparity in wage rates between Israeli and Palestinian labourers.
Euro-Mid has called upon Israel to stop its frenzy of settlement construction in the occupied territories and to protect Palestinian sovereignty over East Jerusalem, as the potential capital of a Palestinian state.
Related articles
- Israel levels 7 Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem (worldbulletin.net)
- Jewish settlers occupy Palestinian land in Al-Quds (worldbulletin.net)
- Dozens Injured In Jerusalem, Two Kidnapped (imemc.org)
- Palestinians Attacked By Soldiers In Jerusalem’s Old City (imemc.org)
Netanyahu Orders Court To Allow Settlers Back Into Hebron Home
By Saed Bannoura | IMEMC & Agencies | September 23, 2013
Following the deadly shooting of an Israeli soldier in Hebron city, in the southern part of the occupied West Bank, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, vowed to boost settlement activities, and ordered the Civil Administration, to take all needed measures to allow the return of Israeli settlers into a Palestinian home they previously occupied in Hebron.
The Israeli Civil Administration Office is run by the Israeli military in the occupied West Bank.
Back in April of 2012, a group of settlers was removed from the home, near the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron. They allegedly purchased the property but the purchase was deemed invalid, especially since such deals must be first approved by a commander of the Israeli occupation army.
The settlers were removed after the then-Israeli Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, issued an order in this regard following a court ruling.
The decision to allow the settlers to return to the property was made on Sunday night; Netanyahu said that the settlers “must be allowed into the home without any delay”.
After being removed from the property, the settlers filed several court appeals, demanding a recognition of the alleged transaction, while Israeli Defense Minister, Moshe Ya’alon, also vowed to do whatever he can to authorize their “return to the home”.
Netanyahu made his decision hours after a Palestinian sniper shot and killed an Israeli soldier in Hebron, following ongoing tension that led to clashes between the soldiers and dozens of local youths who hurled stones at them.
It is also related to the death of an Israeli soldier who was killed two days ago in the Qalqilia district, in the northern part of the occupied West Bank.
“Anyone who attempts to remove us from Hebron, from the city of our patriarchs, will just achieve the exact opposite”, Netanyahu said according to the Israeli daily Haaretz, “We will boost our settlement activities”.
Netanyahu said that the “return of the settlers to the Hebron home would still have to go through legal means”; yet, he ordered all related government facilities, to do whatever they can to ensure their fast return.
His decision comes despite the fact than an appeals committee, looking into the purchase did not recognize the documents presented by the settlers, but criticized the way this purchase was denied.
Haaretz added that, should the process be finalized, Netanyahu and his Defense Minister could sign off the deal, and authorize the settlers back.
In related news, Israeli Economics Minister, Neftali Bennet, demanded that Netanyahu stop the release of Palestinian political prisoners, as part of peace talks with the Palestinians, and said that the Palestinians “must be punished for the killing of the two Israeli soldiers.”
Bennet, of the Jewish Home Party, who also serves at the Ministerial Council, said that “the release of Palestinian prisoners is based on progress of talks, and our duty should be a war on murderers…” according to the official.
Israel’s Transportation Minister, Yisrael Katz, said that he previously voted against the release of any detainee, and that the release of what he called “terrorists” encourages others to attack Israel.
Following the fatal shooting of the Israeli soldier in Hebron, the army initiated a large campaign and broke into and searched hundreds of homes close to the Ibrahimi Mosque area where the soldier was shot.
Hundreds of Palestinians were kidnapped, and where rounded up in the southern area of the occupied city of Hebron.
The soldiers also occupied rooftops of several homes, using them as monitoring towers, while the army operated in the area.
The military declared Hebron a closed military zone, preventing the Palestinians from entering or leaving it.
Last week, Israeli soldiers shot and killed one Palestinian, and injured four, including three children, in different attacks carried out in the occupied Palestinian territories.
The army carried out 49 invasions into Palestinian communities, and kidnapped at least 41, including 9 children.
Two Palestinians have been killed, dozens have been injured, and hundreds were detained, by Israeli forces since the beginning of the month.





