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Israeli settlers uproot 500 olive trees in West Bank

Arab-Israel Relations Materials 2 January 2015 04:21 (UTC +04:00)
Israeli settlers have uprooted more than 500 olive trees in a central region in the occupied West Bank.
Israeli settlers uproot 500 olive trees in West Bank

Israeli settlers have uprooted more than 500 olive trees in a central region in the occupied West Bank, Press TV reported.

Locals said Thursday that the settlers had repeatedly attacked agricultural lands east of the town of Turmus Ayya, located north of the city of Ramallah, in the past week.

They said that more than 500 olive saplings out of a total of 8,000 planted since mid-December 2014 had reportedly been uprooted in the area.

Amil al-Barghouti, the president of the Palestinian Resistance Committee against the Wall and the Settlements, said "the barbaric act" occurred under the cover and protection of the Israeli army.

Olives are a vital source of income for Palestinian farmers.

Palestinians say the violent attacks by Israeli settlers are systematic and are often ignored by Israeli officials.

The Al-Tadamun Foundation for Human Rights, a Palestinian NGO, said in an annual 2014 report that an estimated 8,000 trees, some of them hundreds of years old, were damaged and destroyed altogether by the Israelis in the noted year.

Israel has uprooted more than 800,000 olive trees in the occupied Palestinian territories since 1967.

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