Caves and Cranes: Development and Self-Determination

Just over a couple hills here in the southern West Bank and the landscape quickly turns to the desert. Nights get even colder and even clearer. As we slept on a rock facing the south we had to be told just how far we could see. Lights line the mountain tops almost looking like shelves of white Christmas lights. "No, that's Jordan, and in between one of the mountain gaps is the Dead Sea." Turn slightly to the right and you can see lights from a '48 town. Military bases and buildings dot the skyline. A view of borders, displacement, violence, and development. And a couple of houses from families trying to remain on their land.

When we went on the tour with ICAHD a few weeks ago they made a stark point that the construction crane was a symbol of Israel and its economic/development prowess. "The crane symbolizes and says, 'look what we can build, look how Western we can be, can the Palestinians do that?' No, but what they don't say is the laws, zonings, and regulations that the occupational forces use to prevent Palestinians from doing just that if they wanted to."

The more time we spend in the Southern hills it starts to feel like a struggle between caves and cranes. Between tents and internet towers. Between two different kinds of developments. One of self-determination, autonomous-cooperative communities, and listening to the land, and the other built on subjugation, apartheid, and imperialist development.

On drives around town we have begun to hear historical stories about how shepherds used to shepherd for three or so months sleeping in caves with their sheep before returning to a village center. Here a group of families or just one could take care of about 1,400 sheep (the cluster of villages totaled about 700 people to 18,000 sheep). These nomadic or quasi-nomadic communities did not utilize cities in the same way we do, and they did not also utilize borders and property lines in the same way America and Israel have enforced. For Bedouin and other nomadic communities they didn't utilize borders at all. In fact it was the Zionist, with agreement from the British mandate, that changed how land was bought and sold in historical Palestine. During the Ottoman rule if a landlord bought or sold land they were not necessarily able to evict the villagers living on that land. If you bought a village the villagers came with it. There was not a complete separation of the land and who cultivated it (taken from Illian Pappe). Until the Zionist insisted that that change and property laws became more exclusive and total. It is clear that in the South Hebron Hills there is a struggle over property lines and resistance against the settlement process of stealing land, and over time you begin to see that it is also a struggle over a way of life. Like most indigenous struggles throughout the world, what is being fought over is not simply land, but also an economic way of life, subsistence, and thus a method of development.

A family member predicted that this season of Olive Harvesting would be the worst ever on record. Not simply because of settler violence during times of harvest, but also because of the consistent refusal of Israeli soldiers to allow Palestinians to care for the trees before harvest.

Climate change and drought get added to the mix, and the trees need more care, but illegal settlers and the army stops the Palestinians for providing that care. He predicted only a five to ten percent yield from what harvests usually average. "Expect a $100 a bottle," someone else quipped. When you put together the battle over borders and land in the context of the battle over olive trees and sheep (one serving as food and the other gives back fertilizer) it reveals a battle over ways of life and a struggle over which economies people are forced to interact with.

Mohammed El-Kurd asks us to stare the Palestinian resistance fighter in the eye. He demands that we don't "de-fang" them by insisting they be "perfect victims." Meaning that they we insist they be fully cooperative, nonviolent, and timid. What does it look like to refuse to de-fang families and communities that insist on holding onto not only their land but also their way of life? And, thus also their economic being that, without violence, could offer alternatives of self sufficiency, autonomy, and cooperation with the land that settler colonialism needs to destroy?

The ICAHD tour made the point that the most important part of Israeli social development is utilities. Staring at settlements all day you can see this. Through their houses without water tanks on top (proof they have waterlines), through their radio/cell phone towers, through the non-indigenous trees, through the sidewalks, paved roads, and garbage pick up. The hoarding and exclusivity of utilities not only serves to make life more appealing to people that want subsidized lives, but also as a way to make life harder on Palestinians in a hope that they leave. Utilities can be viewed as the social dispersal of vital resources. Utilities then can be a weapon against ways of life and an insistence on living under different economic models. In the US water bills (and debt), energy bills (and debt), having to have a cell phone to work, public transportation (and lack thereof), and many others are used as tools to further displacement, gentrification, and imperialist development. Same is true here in Palestine and enforced with more militarized and gruesome ways. And thus, surviving and insisting on your own methods of social resource dispersal is not just an act of resistance, but a threat to the occupation.

This refection is based partly on thinking about the people we meet through the lens of Clyde Woods and his book Development Arrested, especially how he highlights the struggle against imperialist/capitalist enclosure and methods of development for people in the Mississippi Delta throughout all of history. It is also an attempt to reflect further on the question of, "Why?" That one word question bounces around your head so often when visiting families and cities in Palestine. "Why are people picking olive trees so threatening?" "Why would they attack shepherds?" "Why?" Because settler colonialism always needs complete and total economic control, and all alternatives must be squashed. It also must be perfect yet its process never ends. This perhaps is also where the "Why?" that gets asked in Palestine also echoes the "Why?" that gets asked about when bulldozers come to violently evict and clear encampments, when twelve agencies show up to raid an apartment building in the middle of the night, and when the United States federal government makes it legal to drill on the spiritual lands of Oak Flat. One part of the "Why?" is simply because the generous and gracious people that live and insist on staying here are a threat to the violent settler colonialist social order. I don't want to not understand them as such.

Roots of Resistance: Olive Harvest in the Shadow of Occupation

On Thursday, October 23rd, about 100 citizens of the Municipality of Sa'ir, a village about five miles northeast of Al-Khalil, marked the opening of the olive harvest season by attempting to harvest their olives in a location from which they have been blocked by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) and settler violence since October 7, 2023. They were joined by at least 20 journalists and 6 international volunteers, who had responded to an urgent appeal from the Sa'ir Committee for Lands Threatened with Confiscation.

The call was for all farmers and landowners to participate widely on that day, to make the 2025 olive harvest season a "message of strength, unity, and cooperation." The Sa'ir Committee had extended a "special invitation to all local and international journalists" to attend and cover the event, which they hoped would convey the "true picture of the farmers' resilience and determination to remain on their land."

The invitation was written by Yusef, our host and one of the coordinators of the harvest. In September 2024, the house that Yusef had lovingly built with his own hands was stolen by illegal Israeli settlers, who kicked out Yusef and 16 of his family members. This expulsion was part of a broader campaign of forced removal. Since October 2023, Yusef shared, 43 families - 450 people - had been expelled from the Sa'ir area. From the street, we could see Yusef's house up on the hill, as well as several of the illegal Israeli settlers who had now commandeered it.

Immediately upon arriving to the groves closest to the illegal Israeli outpost, the harvesters were stopped by the Israeli army. At least seven soldiers, armed with live ammunition and two military vehicles, blocked the Palestinian harvesters, journalists, and international solidarity activists by showing them paperwork that now declared the Palestinian land a closed military zone. Other Palestinians slightly up the road from the Israeli army rushed to try and pick as many olives as possible, but only harvested one or two trees before getting evicted by the IOF.

At least 16 soldiers, some armed with rifles with tear gas attachments, and others with live ammunition, forcibly marched the group - at least 40 Palestinian harvesters, 20 journalists, and 6 international solidarity activists - down the road for a total of 40 minutes, stopping along the way to pull different harvesters out of their groves and prevent them from picking their olives. Members of the group, including at least one international solidarity activist, were shoved by Israeli soldiers, who shouted multiple times, "Your field trip is over. Move!"

During the forced march, two soldiers on a hill on the side of the road cocked their guns and aimed them toward the crowd, while illegal Israeli settlers observed the scene from the hillside.

 

Once the group was outside of the so-called "Closed Military Zone," between 16-20 soldiers and five military vehicles formed a blockade of the road for at least two hours, refusing to allow anybody to pass and return to their fields. Two small groups of Palestinians, likely the owners of the groves, did continue to harvest right near the soldiers, but nobody else was allowed to join them. Several illegal Israeli settlers came down from the top of the hill to attempt to harass the Palestinian harvesters.

After about two hours, most of the Palestinians left, unable to harvest their own olives. Other farmers climbed the steep hillsides to harvest in areas outside the so called "Closed Military Zone," but unfortunately the harvest was extremely scarce in those locations. Some Palestinians are predicting that, between the drought and the intense violence from the IOF and illegal settlers, the olive harvest this year will be only 5-20% of what it normally is.

Over and over, Yusef expressed the desire of the villagers to live in peace, to harvest their olives in peace, and to remain on their land. "We inherited this land from our ancestors. We are eating from the soil and we will remain here."

As the invitation from the Sa'ir Committee declared, "Let us all stand united behind the blessed olive tree, a symbol of peace and steadfastness, and make this a day that expresses our deep connection to the land and our identity. Together we protect our land."

Olive Harvest: A Dangerous Resistance

"Why do you think the Israelis continue to destroy this beautiful land by building up so many monstrous checkpoints and dropping so many bombs?" I asked our Palestinian driver, a long-time nonviolent activist leading our caravan of over 60 internationals, Israelis, and Palestinians heading to the olive harvest. Despite a life-time of activism, this man has been more careful lately with his resistance after having recently spent an unimaginable six months in Israeli prisons, suffering untold abuse.

"They want to make us all leave," he responded. "They want to make it so unbearable for us here that we choose to leave, so they can take all the land for themselves."

 

We were on our way to Beita, a Palestinian village north of Ramallah, (read about Beita's amazing history of organized resistance here) to assist families in harvesting their olives. A joyful family event that takes place for about a month each fall, olive harvesting has become a major symbol of Palestinian resistance to the Israeli occupation. Every year, Palestinians risk arrest, injury, and even death by harvesting olives on their own land. Soldiers prevent Palestinians from harvesting by randomly declaring large tracts of land "closed military zones," arresting and disappearing anybody who enters their own fields. Illegal Israeli settlers viciously attack Palestinians and international observers, beating them with metal pipes and shooting at them with live fire.

The area's Popular Committee (the name given to the multiple Palestinian grassroots networks organizing the nonviolent resistance to the ethnic cleansing) had coordinated the international support for day. The hillside where we would be harvesting was full of hundreds of trees, and close by were several new illegal settler "outposts" - groups of trailer homes used by ideological Israelis to stake claim to land. Though the more than 225 settler outposts are illegal even by Israeli law (all Israeli settlements, even the 134 Israeli sanctioned ones, are illegal according to international law), continue to be defended and protected by the Israeli military.

Upon our arrival, we learned that three Palestinian villagers had already been beaten by illegal Israeli settlers and taken to the hospital. About seven soldiers brandishing automatic weapons - their fingers on the triggers - met us at the top of the mountain. Aggressively, they barked out their declaration that Palestinians were now "forbidden" to access certain tracts of land where they could harvest their own olives. Though we stayed where they told us to, the soldiers soon unleashed sound grenades and tear gas upon our group anyways as a form of intimidation, and stood watch as a menacing group of seven illegal settlers harassed our group. One journalist with our group was shot in the foot with a tear gas cannister, and needed medical attention.

Throughout the morning, as we warily harvested olives, several military and settler security vehicles continued to drive around us, demonstrating how the Israeli military is in collaboration with the movements of illegal Israeli settlers. More soldiers arrived to let us know of new areas of land that were now also "forbidden" to harvest from.

After a few hours, chaos broke out. On a hill across the way, illegal settlers firebombed a Palestinian vehicle - a new land rover - that was being used to cart olives down the mountain.

Large flames and plumes of smoke consumed the car as a group of about 30 masked illegal Israeli settlers carrying clubs and pistols began attacking Palestinian harvesters with stones. About half of our group moved toward the harvesters and the burning car to offer protective presence while the other half stayed back to stay with other harvesters, to film, and to take cover. As we watched more illegal Israeli settlers move along the ridge, we heard live fire and shouts of "Get down! Take cover!"

"Yalla! Let's go!" shouted our Palestinian organizers with urgency, as they ushered us down the steep, rocky hillside. We ran from the live ammunition for about 15 minutes, helping one another slide down breaks in the rock terraces, until Palestinian vans picked us up and brought us to our vehicles parked safely at the bottom.

Members of the Palestinian Popular Committee who had been interacting the most closely with the settlers brought us hot sandwiches that they had prepared for us in advance. We counted our numbers to make sure all were safe.

A total of twenty were injured, eleven Palestinians taken to the hospital. A Palestinian suffered a gunshot wound by an Israeli settler; and one solidarity activist was evacuated to a hospital after having been beaten with batons by Israeli settlers, breaking her arm. A total of eight cars were set on fire, and one ambulance was flipped over.

"This is what they have to experience every day," remarked one stunned international volunteer. Most of us were at a loss for words. Later that evening, we read the news dispatches of similarly violent olive harvest events around the West Bank. (See full list of injuries at Beita, as well as attacks from around the West Bank on that SAME DAY here.)

As we were driving to the next site where we would harvest the next day, I asked our driver if the day had gone as he had expected. "Yes," he replied soberly. "We expected the violence. But it was good to have so many of us. It gives the villagers courage to continue."

And continue they have. The very next day, the villagers of Beita returned to the hillside to harvest and show that they would not be intimidated.

Unfortunately, as it has happened in almost every harvesting location around the West Bank in the last couple of days, the military prevented the harvest from continuing.

Given such a violent start to the olive harvest season, it is looking like this year harvesting olives will be a dangerous form of resistance for Palestinians. Those who choose not to harvest because of fear of violence will lose their groves due to Israel's absentee property law.

Many people here believe that the ceasefire Israel was forced to sign in Gaza, while a relief for so many, will now cause the Israeli military and illegal settlers to focus their attacks on the West Bank, and speed up their plan of ethnic cleansing. It has already begun.

Oppression Without Bloodshed

November 21, 2015 | Meta Peace Team, Phoenix Jones | Occupied Huwwara 

On a daily bases, Human Rights / Occupation Laws are being broken, by the Occupying Israeli government. One of which is the function of farmers requiring a permit to tend and harvest from their orchards.  A second are settlements erected on Palestinian land.

Act 46: Family and rights, the lives of persons and private property, as well as religious conventions and practice must be respected. Private property cannot be confiscated.

Act 49: The Occupying power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.

On Wednesday and Thursday last week, Scott, Bud and myself accompanied a Palestinian farmer to his olive orchard in Occupied Huwwara, near the Huwwara checkpoint.

checkpoints are composed of two elements - an infrastructure which impedes vehicular  and pedestrian traffic and permanent presence of Israeli security personnel (e.g. the IDF, the border police, the civil police, a private security company). Security personnel usually check the documentation of persons crossing the checkpoint and conduct searches on their vehicles and their belongings. (United Nations definition)

 Below the Brakha- Samiratian Settlement (Israeli settlements are Israeli civilian communities built on lands occupied by Israel since the 1967 Six-Day War.)

On Wednesday, while harvesting a military van parked and the soldiers called the farmer that owns the land down. They spoke to one another.  The farmer returned from the conversation with the solider.  We then, all notice soldiers standing above us on a hill.  The Farmer is called back down by the soldiers to talk.  This time a Jewish - Israeli woman went down with him to try to talk with the soldiers.  As they spoke, we all exchanged glances, aware of the soldiers still standing above us.  As the farmer made his way back up, with the jewish - Israeli woman behind him and the Israeli military behind her.  We were all there standing between the olive trees.  I then came to the understood that the military was saying we had to go, more specifically the farmer had to vacate his land.  How is it that  this farmer could be forced off of his own land.  Israel has made it an illegal act to harvest, prune trees or tend to your land without a permit.  The farmers permit was for Thursday, not Wednesday.

We returned to the farm on thursday, not long after starting to harvest an Israeli truck pulled up, he was speaking to an Israeli settler.  myself along with Bud began taking pictures.  The Israeli soldier called us all down.  With broken english and signals he told those that have reached the gate between them, no pictures.  The Israeli settler is there with the soldiers, telling Bud that he cannot take pictures and he must erase the pictures he took.  I never completed the walk down to the fence.  We all made our way back up to the orchard.  soon after we resumed working, we saw soldiers above us, closer than the previous day. we harvested the whole day with exception to a coffee break and lunch. As the day began to wind down (because the permit was for morning to 4pm) the soldiers became more visually closer.  About 2 hours before the permit expired, the soldiers yelled down from their hilltop in hebrew, I am sure rushing us along.  Maybe an hour before the permit expired the soldiers yelled down to us, once again.  The farmer asked what time is it, when we answered his hands moved a little faster.  The farmers are required to be completely off of the land when the permit expires.  with some minutes to spare the farmers had packed up their supplies and olives and we were headed down the hill.

This is not an isolated incident, nor is it close to being the most overt.  This is what Israel has created, illegally.  All over Palestine laws are being broken by the Israeli government and the human rights of Palestinians are being ignored.  It is the job of the outside nations to hold Israel accountable for their crimes.

Our liberation is bound together, and your solidarity is mandatory!

anyone wishing to host a presentation on Meta Peace Team members experience in the West Bank, please contact www.metapeaceteam.org.

Permission to Farm My Land

November 16, 2015 | Meta Peace Team, Phoenix Jones | Occupied Burin

Land stolen by Israeli Settlers, that once Palestinians used for orchards, farming and livestock.  Now whenever Palestinians want to harvest or tend to their orchards (what is remaining after Israeli army had uprooted trees and Settlers have purposely burned down acres of trees) , on their land , they must receive a permit from the Occupying Israeli government.

Tree burned by Israeli Settlers

Settlement homes in Occupied Burin 

Settlement atop of hill in occupied Burin

Yesterday, Scott and I accompanied a family for Olive Harvest.  The family requested that we accompany them because of fear the Israeli settlers would come down from the settlement that sits on stolen land to terrorize, abuse or murder them. We also assisted the family in harvesting olives.  The permit that the family received from the Israeli government only gave them permission to harvest from the morning until 12noon, if the family continued to harvest after the time allotted the Israeli army, police, or border patrol would come to forcefully/violently remove them from their land.  During an olive harvest all of the olives can be used for something from canning, pressing for oil or making soap, but under occupation Palestinians often do not have the “luxury” to harvest and separate all that is there.   The family’s movements were so precise, only harvesting from the bountiful, rich trees and leaving behind any olives that were not plump. As we were harvesting I saw each of them at different points glance up the mountain to the settlements.  Upon reaching the last row of trees some had been scorched and beyond that, others had been burned to the ground.  I also noticed while harvesting olives that the trees were in dire need of pruning.  Prior to Occupation, Palestinians were able to tend to their land as needed, the occupation has placed unrealistic time restraints on Palestinians, that no farmer could adhere to in maintaining a healthy orchard.   Israelis that have stolen the land atop of that mountain, just beyond the orchard, were responsible for damaging and burning those trees, robbing that family of so much more than Olive trees that have been in their family for generations.

Our liberation is bound together, and your solidarity is mandatory!

Olive harvesting as experienced through our eyes this season; part II : Jamma'in

Jamma'in is located about 6 km to the southwest of us. The stone quarry/cutting industry is a major source of employment and income for the village followed closely by agriculture – mainly olives. MPT accompanied a Jamma'in family on four occasions. They treated us very well – picking us up, feeding us two meals per day, and driving us home each evening.

Leaving home about 7:00 AM we started each day with a 30 minute tractor & trailer ride over a rough rocky road. We dropped down hill to the south from the village and crossed the major road toward the very large settlement of Ariel. The area between the road and Ariel is a huge olive grove. We picked at the high eastern edge of this grove finding ourselves uncomfortable near an outpost just off the western edge of the settlement of Kafr Tappuah. The family reported to us that last year a settler showed up one day with two threatening dogs. The following day internationals accompanied the family. About ten settlers arrived with guns. The internationals called the military who arrived and sent the settlers away. Understandably this family felt a strong need for international accompaniment.

We are pleased to report that the only disturbance to this year’s picking routine was the appearance of a wild boar. The men threw rocks and chased it off before either MPTers got a confirming glimpse or photo.

It takes this family about 10 days to complete their work. It is difficult to leave such a situation before completion but other needs called us away. We were happy to be able to assist in getting other internationals to join this family for most of their days. Much of the olive harvest work is just like this. Days are long and hard, friendships grow, stories are told, and goodbyes are filled with conflicting emotions.

...................…a view of the illegal Israeli outpost from as close as we chose to approach.

.....................This looks like a big pile but closer inspection identified it as a rock pile home which belonged to the previous generations of this family. Settlers now use it as a campout location or so we were told.

...........................This is the lower entrance; there is a sizable room inside and an interior stone stairway to the upper “deck”. The family was fearful of this place and asked us not to go there but one MPTer had already taken the tour.

…....................sorting olives prior to bagging. That is a stained MPT knee at the top of the photo. There was a lot of kneeling and picking off the ground with this family.

…........loading the trailer for the bumpy ride into the sunset down the hill and up into town.

........ We were fed in two different homes; one at a table with the father only dining with us; the other seated on the floor with the whole family present. The family included the nicest, cutest kids. They came and went so quickly we were never able to determine how many there were.

Olive harvesting as experienced through our eyes this season; part I : Burin

“If the Olive Trees knew the hands that planted them, Their Oil would become Tears.”

― Mahmoud Darwish

As the olive harvesting season nears completion our team felt there were a lot of things worth sharing from our days immersed in the olive picking. We didn't happen to witness any of the violent settler attacks that took place this year. They happened but not where we were picking. Were we in the wrong place or were we the reason it did not become a problem area. Who knows? Sometimes the less dramatic stories need to be shared and it’s precisely those that we’ll try to relate in this blog entry as seen through our eyes.

Burin – amidst the settlements

The olive harvest this year started in early October and timed perfectly with our team’s arrival in Huwwara. Neighboring Burin was the first village where both picking and our work as team started.

Because of its location between mountains topped by two Israeli settlements Yizhar(with the Yitzar outpost) and Bracha, Burin falls completely into Area C of the West Bank and is under full Israeli control. Ytzhar is at the forefront of the so called "price tag" policy or campaign which calls for attacks against Palestinians in retaliation for actions of the Israeli government against West Bank settlements (for more information please visit: http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/yitzhar-extremists-all-settlers-must-fight-construction-freeze-1.287512)

Yitzhar settlement

Those who own olive grove land must receive “prior coordination” from the Israeli Civil Administration (a part of the military administration) in order to be able to tend to their land. Many Palestinians cannot prove land ownership as customary traditions saw land being passed down from one generation to the next without the necessity for formal land registration. Others refuse to apply for “permission”, or if it is given, will only pick on days without it. We accompanied some families who had chosen to pick without permission from the Israeli army. The first day we picked a hundred meters away from Bracha. We saw the olive trees bordering the settlement that had been set on fire earlier in June this year along with about 1500 other trees were reported to have been burned in a single settler’s attack. The total number of trees reported to be destroyed in Burin this year goes up to 4000 and this number seems to be only going up every year. (http://www.poica.org/editor/case_studies/view.php?recordID=3412). (NOTE: We are unable to verify the accuracy of this data. 4000 seems extremely high given the data in the UN report of our previous blog.)

The second day we accompanied another family who chose to harvest without permission from the army. Despite our visibility from and proximity to the settlement of Yitzar, we could not help but be awed by the fact that these were obviously days devoid of fear. Farmers sang songs and joked around with internationals under the strong sun. This seemed as much of an act of resistance as picking without permission.

After a couple of days of picking with different families in Burin, we started to see familiar faces and in turn villagers also started recognizing us. While waiting at the village’s center for our work assignmetn, we were the object of unexpected gestures of kindness. A man selling flowers once approached us and merely handed a flower without saying a word, then went back to his morning duties. The small falafel shop sent a kid carrying some tasty sandwich for our second breakfast of the day. It felt good to be connected to these incredibly nice people and receiving these small but deeply appreciated tokens.

Olive Harvest Accompaniment, and Internet difficulties for Team in WB

The MPT Fall 2011 team is safe and well and settled in at our home base location in the West Bank this week.

They have been meeting with local folks and our contacts in the area to renew connections and let folks know we are back on the ground for the coming season.

They have begun accompaniment for the Olive harvest time, helping to reduce the threat of violence when asked to go into the fields with Palestinians picking their crops.

For the time being, the demands of this busy time and very limited access to Internet means it will be a few more days at least until the team can post full first hand reports of their work. Keep watching as they will be up soon!

To read more about what Olive Harvest time is like, search "olive harvest" in the search box above for last year's Fall posts.

Thank you for your continued support, and leave your comments for the team on the blog comments section!