SALFIT, Friday, November 22, 2019 (WAFA) – Some 50 Palestinian vehicles were vandalized in the latest spate of Israeli settler attacks in the West Bank district of Salfit.
Israeli settlers slashed the tires of some 50 Palestinian vehicles and spray-painted hate graffiti in Kafr Ad-Dik village, west of the West Bank city of Salfit.
Mayor of Kafr Ad-Dik Ibrahim Issa Ad-Dik told WAFA that a group of Israeli settlers sneaked their way into the village, slashed the tires of some 50 vehicles, and scrawled anti-Palestinian hate graffiti on several vehicles and the external walls of houses.
Graffiti reading “A closed military zone” was scrawled in Hebrew at the external wall of a villager’s house, according to Ad-Dik, who noted that this was the second time the village was targeted by settlers in a year.
Located almost 10 kilometers to the west of Salfit city, Kafr Ad-Dik has a total population of some 5,700 and occupies a total area of 15,529 dunams.
Under the Oslo Accords, an agreement made 25 years ago that was supposed to last just five years towards a self-governing country alongside Israel, the Palestinian Authority was given ed control over a small pocket of land occupying 2,254 dunams and accounting for only 14.5 percent of the village’s total area, classified as Area B, while Israel maintains control over the remainder, classified as Area C.
Israel has seized at least 1,444 dunams belonging to the village for the construction of four nearby colonial settlements, namely Bruchin, Alei Zahav, Pedu‘el and Leshem, with the settlement construction causing damage to the Byzantine-era St. Simeon the Stylite Monatsery, known to Palestinian villagers as Deir Samaan.
Many Palestinian activists and rights groups have repeatedly blamed Israel for fostering a “culture of impunity” for Jewish settlers committing violent acts against Palestinians.
“Price tag” refers to an underground anti-Palestinian Israeli group that routinely attacks Palestinians in the occupied territories and inside Israel.
The Israeli government still refuses to label it as a terrorist organization and considers it only as group of vandals. It also considers such acts as hate crimes against Palestinians.
Settler violence against Palestinians and their property is routine in the West Bank and is rarely prosecuted by Israeli authorities.
Settlers‘ violence includes property and mosque arsons, stone-throwing, uprooting of crops and olive trees, attacks on vulnerable homes, among others.
Over 600,000 Israelis live in Jewish-only settlements across occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank in violation of international law.
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