Punishing The Olive Tree

CrossFireArabia
May 25, 2026

By Dr Marwan Asmar

Israel’s government, soldiers and settlers destroyed between 13,000 and 14000 olive trees in the occupied West Bank in the first five months of 2026. The figures are based on different Palestinian and Israeli sources.

In May 2026 alone Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said he had ordered the uprooting and destruction of 3000 trees in northern Palestine. The uprooting of these trees were ordered to be felled in a single day.

In early February, 2006 human rights’ groups reported that over 8000 trees were destroyed and a report by the Palestinian Wall and Settlement Commission (PWSC) released last Mid-May showed that 4,414 had been uprooted, destroyed and/or poisoned.

The uprooting of “Palestinian trees” by Israeli settlers backed by the Zionist army has become a normal state of affairs as it has increased viciously since October 2023 when over 37,200 olive trees were “uprooted”, “broken” and “burned” in conjunction with the Israeli war and slaughter of Gaza.

The situation spelled disaster for Palestinian farmers. In cahoots with Israeli soldiers, settlers would go down on Palestinian villages and towns and start uprooting olive trees out of sheer vandalism.

At the end of last April, this is exactly what happened when settlers from the “Adi Ad” settlement descended on the Turmus Aya village that lies to the north-east of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank and started to destroy and vandalize 400 olive trees.

As they did this, on Saturday night, they were guarded by the Israeli army. This attack came days after the settlers descended on the village and set fire to a house and a car there.

The attack on Turmus Aya is not an isolated incident. The village has been targeted for the past few years. The PWSC, a monitoring organization of such attacks said the Israeli army had been responsible for 1,322 of such attacks while the settlers involved for 497 acts of vandalism on different Palestinian cities with Hebron topping the list at (321), Nablus (315), Ramallah (292) and Jerusalem (203).

Statistics point out that Israel has destroyed between 800,000 and 1 million olive trees in the occupied Palestinian territories from 1967 till now. However, since that year, when Israel effectively occupied all of the Palestinian territories, it destroyed 2.5 million trees.

Besides olives, they included orange (different varieties), lemon, grapefruit and clementine trees. The Palestinian territories are known for their varieties like almond, figs, apricots, peaches and plums trees.

These trees were destroyed by the Israeli occupation for basic military takeover to expand the Palestinian lands with Israeli settlements – about 147 settlements and 224 outposts – and create the required infrastructure and roads for these since some of them resemble big cities.

In the case of the Smotrich announcement for example, and the uprooting of 3000 trees on Palestinian lands in the north West Bank, the purpose there was to expand the Israeli Shaked Industrial Park which is next to the settlement there that has the same name.

Gaza, another story

Gaza is another sad story for the Israeli genocide has affected the whole of the agricultural sector. During the last war on the Gaza Strip, Israel destroyed 1 million trees according to Fayyad Fayyad, head of the Palestinian Olive Council. The destruction literally decimated the agriculture sector of the enclave.

Prior to 7 October, 2023, Gaza had 1.1 million trees roughly producing 50,000 tons of olives every year but no more. About 98 percent of Gaza’s tree cropland has been destroyed.

Dr Mazen Qumsiyeh, a biologist at Bethlehem University, calls the destruction in Gaza an “ecocide” as statistics show that over the past two years and more, Israel has destroyed between 500,000 to 700,000 non-olive trees.

Today in Gaza everything has been razed to the ground. There had once been 35 olive oil presses in the Strip but most of these have been destroyed with only five left as of the end of last year.

The loss of a million olive trees is a $50-million-plus-loss since the total olive oil sector (West Bank and Gaza) contributed between $160 and $190 million to the Palestinian national economy as a direct result of exports to regional and international markets.

The olive oil sector accounts for roughly five percent of the Palestinian GDP and 20 percent of the agricultural sector. Further olive oil production sustains 100,000 families in the Palestinian territories.

Marwan Asmar is a writer from Amman and blogs for crossfirearabia.com

News

Israel Attacked Palestine’s Press 300 Times in 2026

CrossFireArabia
May 4, 2026

The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate said Sunday it had recorded about 300 violations and attacks against Palestinian journalists since the start of 2026, amid escalating targeting of media workers.

The announcement came during a rally organized by the syndicate outside its headquarters in the city of al-Bireh in the occupied West Bank, marking World Press Freedom Day and protesting continued attacks on journalists.

Participants raised banners demanding an end to the killing of media workers and accountability for Israel.

“Activities organized on World Press Freedom Day aim to highlight the exceptional and unprecedented conditions under which the Palestinian journalist operates,” Omar Nazzal, the deputy head of the syndicate, addressed the crowd.

Journalists are facing “the fiercest Israeli war machine,” he added, noting that more than 4,000 violations have been recorded against them since the start of the war on Gaza in October 2023.

“The number of journalists killed has reached 262 male and female journalists since that date, including 261 in the Gaza Strip, in addition to six journalists killed since the beginning of 2026,” said Mohammad al-Lahham, head of the syndicate’s freedoms committee.

He added that the current year has also seen 10 direct injuries, 22 arrests, 120 cases of detention or prevention from coverage, and 12 attacks carried out by Israeli occupiers.

Lahham said total violations since October 2023 reached 3,983, including 1,072 in 2023, 1,325 in 2024, 1,286 in 2025, and 300 in 2026.

These violations included 240 cases of direct gunfire at media crews and 352 cases involving tear gas and stun grenades, as well as beatings, confiscation of equipment, and travel bans, he added.

The syndicate said in a report read at the event that it had documented 188 arrests since October 2023, along with the destruction of 187 media institutions and offices and 140 homes belonging to journalists.

The syndicate reported the killing of 713 family members of journalists, indicating that the targeting extended beyond media workers to their social environment.

The syndicate said the targeting of journalists “is not individual behavior” but part of a “systematic policy” aimed at restricting journalism and silencing the Palestinian narrative, particularly amid field coverage of events.

It called on the UN and international organizations to provide urgent protection for Palestinian journalists, open independent investigations into violations, and ensure accountability.

The Israeli genocidal war on Gaza began on Oct. 8, 2023, and has killed more than 72,000 Palestinians and wounded over 172,000, according to Palestinian figures.

Despite a ceasefire in effect since October 2025, Israel continues daily strikes and a blockade that has killed hundreds more and worsened humanitarian conditions in the enclave, home to about 2.4 million Palestinians, including 1.5 million displaced.

News

Israeli Settlers Uproot 400 Olive Trees

CrossFireArabia
April 27, 2026

Israeli settlers are on the rampage. Their latest vandalism is the destruction of 400 olive trees in the village of Turmus Aya, northeast of Ramallah West Bank.

Sources say settlers from the settlement of ‘Adi Ad’ which was established on the lands of the village came down to its groves, Saturday night, and proceeded to fell the trees.

The attack came days after the settlers set fire to a house and a car in the village as part of an increase in attacks against the people and property of the village according to a media report.

According to the Palestinian Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission, Israeli forces and settlers, who are also referred to as colonists, carried out 1,819 attacks last March, according to Palestinian news agency Wafa. It added this is part of a systematic campaign in a systematic campaign targeting Palestinian people, land, and property.

The Israeli occupation continues to uproot olive trees in different Palestinian villages, towns and cities with no apparent reason and employing bulldozers if the acts are carried out by the Israeli army to make sure the trees no longer exist.

As well as Turmus Aya, there has been an increase of uprooting of trees in Nablus, Burqa village and Jenin.

According to the Palestinian commission the Israeli army is responsible for 1,322 of these attacks, while settlers carried out 497 acts of vandalism, adding Hebron topped the attacks at 321, Nablus 315, Ramallah and Al-Bireh 292, and Jerusalem 203.

Opinion

US-Iran: Who Will Blink First!

Dr Khairi Janbek
April 24, 2026

One would say that our main inheritance from the Covid period is the term, new normal, which has been since used, conveniently, in any circumstance we found baffling to our senses.

So one wonders if the stand in Hormuz will not be our current new normal, which will mean putting up with the economic consequences of the blockage and trying at the same time to find different routes for trade. Here, one is talking economics and trade simply because the loss of life and destruction doesn’t more matter in comparison to budgets and the flow of goods.

In fact each time anyone finds an intelligent reason for this ongoing conflict, the rediculous actions of the protagonists proves the impossibility of saying an informed or otherwise opinion. For all intents and purposes, all what can be reasonably said, is that for now, the war is supposed to be inconclusive despite the threats flying around, because essentially no one wants a regime change in Iran because no one can predict the consequences.

Therefore, back to economics again, the strategy seems, who will blink first and accept the conditions of the other to return to Islamabad. Iran with its enormous financial and economic problems which fears a new uprising in the streets once the stalemate with the US becomes the norm, or the USA with the mid term elections looming, rising inflation and higher energy prices, as well as volatility in stocks and shares prices in Wall Street.

When it comes to the situation in Lebanon, clearly the link with Iran is in fact Hizbullah; which is by its own admission the Party of Veliyati -Fatih in Lebanon, under the current circumstances, with the Israeli invasion of the south of Lebanon, for the first time in the history of Lebanon, not a sect, religious community, or power group, but in fact the official state representatives are talking about direct negotiations with Israel for peace, and in fact negotiating directly with each other in Washington.

For the Lebanese state, the situation now is legitimacy over the whole geography of the country, and limiting the possession of arms only in the hands of the Lebanese army and security. However, here also we face the scenario of whether the egg comes first, which is for Hizbullah Israeli withdrawal first, or the chicken, for the Lebanese government to negotiate the withdrawal of Israel.

Leaving the devil out of the details, would it mean ultimately, that a diplomatic agreement between Lebanon and Israel makes Hizbullah the enemy of both Israel and the Lebanese state together?, and what would the Lebanese state do as a next step, if Hizbullah decides to keep its weapons?

Then of course, there is the festering wound of Gaza and the West Bank which hardly warrant any news considering the scale of what is going on in the Gulf and in Lebanon. For Gaza, the vision fluctuates between lost peace, Israeli occupation withdrawn yellow lines, and Hamas with its show of force, amidst refugees, squalor, destruction and whether aid can go in or not, while on the other hand AI generated images of its rise beach resorts which no one is likely, from now on, be able to think about even if they can afford and realize them.

Future? What can one say save for bleak.

As for the West Bank, one has to apologise for saying that the Arabs, before anyone else, are reconciled with idea that the PNA is no longer there, apart from of course, moneymaking, here and there, and that what is termed as Palestinian territory will become a Bantustan in the sea of expanded Israel. Thus where do we go from here, well, there are people with paid salaries to think about!

Janbek is a Jordanian columnist based in Paris

News

100,000 Perform Friday Prayers in Al Aqsa

CrossFireArabia
February 28, 2026

About 100,000 performed the Salat prayers in Jerusalem’s Al Aqsa Mosque on the second Friday during the holy month of Ramadan. Palestinians from the occupied city of Jerusalem and the West Bank flocked to the mosque compound despite the severe restrictions imposed by the Israeli occupation forces. Despite the checkpoints – Qalandia and the one leading to Bethlehem – 1000s of Palestinians began to assemble in the city since the early morning. Israeli soldiers checked the ID cards of those attempting to enter the city, banning men below the age of 55, and 50 for women from going through the checkpoints. It was reported that anyone below those ages – reportedly 100s of Palestinians – were turned back.