SALFIT, Wednesday,
October 20, 2021 (WAFA) – Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh said today during an
olive picking event in the north of the West Bank that the olive tree symbolizes
resistance in the face of settler colonialism.
Speaking while
picking olives with local residents in the city of Salfit that his government
will do all it can to help the farmers sustain on their lands.
“The olive tree
symbolizes our resistance in the face of settler colonialism. We're in Salfit
today to pick olives with our people here: we affirmed the government's
commitment to exerting all possible efforts to support the farmers'
steadfastness in Salfit and all of Palestine,” said the Prime Minister,
explaining that since the Israeli occupation started in 1967, Israel uprooted more
than 2.5 million trees in Palestine, including 800,000 olive trees.
“This shows that
Israel wants to uproot not only the people from their lands and homes, but also
the trees," he said.
"The attacks
on the trees, the stones and the people in Palestine were on the agenda of the (United
Nations) Security Council this week," said Shtayyeh. “Our battle with the
occupation is on the ground and our battle is a battle of steadfastness.”
The olive harvest
season is meant to be an annual celebratory time in Palestine. However, the
joyful time has become overshadowed by Israeli land restrictions and brutal
settler attacks.
Settlers have
recently stepped up their attacks against olive harvesters throughout the West
Bank.
Over 9,000 olive
trees have been destroyed in the West Bank since August 2020, according to the
International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which called on Israel to
ensure safe, timely, and adequate access for Palestinians to their olive groves
in the occupied West Bank.
With more than 12
million olive trees planted across 45% of the West Bank’s agricultural land,
the olive harvest constitutes one of the biggest sources of economic
sustainability for thousands of Palestinian families.
According to UN Office
for the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance (OCHA) in the occupied
Palestinian territory, the olive oil industry supports the livelihoods of more
than 100,000 families and accounts for a quarter of the gross agricultural
income of the occupied territories.
M.K.
