Bethlehem: A group of illegal armed settlers, backed by Israeli forces, attacked residents near the village of Al-Minya, southeast of Bethlehem in the southern occupied West Bank, and fired live bullets at them, wounding three in the lower limbs, Zayed Kawazbeh, head of the village council, told the official news agency Wafa. The injured were hospitalised for medical attention. Kawazbeh said illegal settlers also brought their livestock to graze among Palestinian olive trees, describing the move as a deliberate provocation aimed at displacing residents and seizing lands adjacent to nearby settlements.
According to TRTworld.com, illegal settlers set fire to several olive trees and stole some bags of harvested crops from the area. Illegal settlers also raided the Khirbet Makhul community in the northern Jordan Valley, spreading fear among children and women, the news agency said. Settlers also attacked the Al-Maazi Bedouin community, east of Jaba town in occupied East Jerusalem, with attackers hurling stones at Palestinian homes and burning rubber tyres. No injuries were reported.
Later in the evening, the Palestinian Health Ministry said in a statement that medical teams at Rafidia Governmental Hospital in Nablus treated eight people who were wounded after being assaulted by illegal settlers and Israeli soldiers in Nablus towns of Tell, Burin, and Sebastia. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the current olive harvest season in the occupied West Bank has seen the highest level of illegal settler attacks since 2020. The agency added that 126 attacks were recorded in 70 Palestinian towns and villages, while over 4,000 olive trees and saplings were vandalised.
The attacks came amid a sharp rise in settler violence against Palestinian farmers during the annual olive harvest, which typically begins in mid-October each year. According to the official Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission, 259 attacks on Palestinians were carried out by the Israeli army and illegal settlers during the olive harvest season. Israeli attacks have escalated across the occupied West Bank since October 2023, killing more than 1,062 Palestinians and wounding 10,300 others, according to Palestinian figures.
In a landmark opinion last July, the International Court of Justice declared Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory illegal and called for the evacuation of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.