Rights group says it recorded 113 incidents of harassment against Palestinians during olive harvest

The Yesh Din organization reports that it recorded 113 incidents of violence and harassment by settlers and IDF soldiers against Palestinian olive growers and laborers during this year’s olive harvest season, from October 1 to November 15.

The olive industry is an important component of the Palestinian economy and constitutes a key part of household income for tens of thousands of Palestinian residents of the West Bank.

According to Yesh Din, which campaigns against the Israeli West Bank settlements, in 101 of the incidents settlers carried out the violent attacks, and in 12 incidents IDF soldiers alone were involved.

Among the total number of incidents were 68 instances in which settlers and soldiers forcibly prevented Palestinians from harvesting their olive trees.

In approximately 70% of those incidents, either IDF soldiers, police, or settlement civilian security coordinators were present but instead of protecting the Palestinian harvesters, they worked together with the settlers to prevent the harvest, Yesh Din alleges.

Physical violence was used in 43 incidents, in which “settlers and soldiers attacked, beat, or threatened harvesters, including eight cases of live fire directed at Palestinian farmers,” Yesh Din asserts. In one such incident a 59-year-old Palestinian woman from the village of Faqqu’a in the northern West Bank was shot and killed by IDF forces.

There were 52 incidents of theft or damage to Palestinian property in which settlers stole crops and agricultural equipment, damaged property, and set fire to vehicles. In 38 of those incidents, settlers harvested or stole olives on land belonging to Palestinians, while in another 12 incidents hundreds of olive trees belonging to Palestinians were cut down, burnt or otherwise damaged.

“The number of incidents and the cooperation between settlers and security forces leads to the conclusion that preventing Palestinians from [conducting the olive] harvest in the West Bank is a deliberate Israeli policy,” Yesh Din says of the 2024 statistics.

In 2023, Yesh Din recorded exactly the same number of overall incidents, 113, as in 2024.

The IDF and Israel Police did not immediately respond to requests for comment.