Illegal Israeli settlers attack olive harvesters in West Bank

A Palestinian man was shot and injured in clashes with Israeli forces in Beit Furik town in the occupied West Bank as illegal Israeli settlers disrupted olive harvesters near Bethlehem and Jerusalem, sources said Friday.

According to the Palestinian Red Crescent, a 22-year-old man was shot in the leg during the confrontations in Beit Furik, east of Nablus.

Israeli forces stormed the town, triggering confrontations with local youth, witnesses told Anadolu.

Israeli soldiers reportedly fired live bullets and tear gas towards homes and residents, the witnesses said.

They noted that Beit Furik has faced repeated raids by Israeli forces over the past two weeks, resulting in clashes that caused injuries.

In related incidents, illegal Israeli settlers, protected by the military, attacked and injured Palestinian olive harvesters and foreign activists in Battir village east of Bethlehem, according to the official Palestinian news agency Wafa.

The settlers also attempted to prevent Palestinians from picking olives in the Hizma town northeast of Jerusalem.

Witnesses said that illegal armed settlers from the Adam settlement confronted farmers in the eastern part of Hizma, trying to expel them from their lands.

Incidents of settler violence against Palestinian farmers intensify during October, as the olive harvesting season begins.

According to the Palestinian Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission, there have been 2,777 settler attacks in the occupied West Bank since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on Oct. 7 last year, resulting in the deaths of 19 Palestinians and the displacement of 292 families from 28 Bedouin communities.

According to data from the Israeli anti-settlement group Peace Now, there are half a million illegal settlers in 146 settlements and 224 outposts in the West Bank.

Over the past few years, the Israeli military has conducted regular raids in the West Bank, which have escalated with the beginning of the war on Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023. Palestinians have also been violently attacked by illegal Israeli settlers.

At least 760 Palestinians have since been killed and nearly 6,300 others injured by Israeli army fire in the occupied territory, according to the Health Ministry.

The escalation follows a landmark opinion in July by the International Court of Justice that declared Israel's decades-long occupation of Palestinian land "illegal" and demanded the evacuation of all existing settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.