Occupied Palestine: Farmers in the West Bank are being robbed of land and homes by settlers
"The occupation is doing everything it can to make us leave ouR land."
This is the full-length, uncensored version of the reportage published in Norwegian media of my visit to the village Sinjil in March this year: (Okkupasjon og trusler på Vestbredden: – En dag blir vi fri – Dagsavisen)
Photo: Private
SINJIL, WEST BANK: In mid-October 2023, farmer Hussam Aida had over 16 hectares of land stolen by Israeli settlers. They came early one morning when he was on his way to check the area, with the army backing them. They destroyed the land, uprooted olive trees, and completely took over the area.
Conditions for Palestinian farmers became limited and hard since the establishment of the Israeli occupation in 1948, but the daily reality has worsened significantly since the Israeli genocide in Gaza began on October 7th. “I haven’t been there since, I risk being killed because the settlers guard it with weapons. They can shoot us at any time, they have permission from the authorities,” Aida says.
He refers to the fact that several Israeli settlers have stolen land by letting their sheep graze in Palestinian areas, then claiming the area as their own and denying Palestinians access.
The settlers have torn down and destroyed what Aida describes as a paradise that had an abundance of fruit and vegetables and turned it into a grazing area.
He has been to court four times with the case but has lost every time. When it comes to cases between Palestinians and Israelis, they must go through an Israeli court.
“What do you expect to happen when the judge is your enemy? They control everything. Everything is illegal for Palestinians here. Everything is illegal under the occupation,” he says.
Settlements surround the village
The rain pounds on the car window as I drive from Ramallah to the village of Sinjil on the West Bank in occupied Palestine in the middle of March this year.
To the right of the car, a three-meter-high concrete wall stretches several kilometers along the road. It has been erected around the illegal Israeli settlement "Beit El." Along the wall are cameras and heavily armed soldiers—a warning to Palestinians that they are constantly being monitored.
Hussam Aida is far from the only Palestinian farmer on the West Bank in occupied Palestine who has experienced Israeli settlers stealing land and livestock or destroying crops and trees.
We have met some of the farmers who live in the midst of this in the village of Sinjil, about 45 minutes outside of Ramallah.
On the way there, we pass one of the checkpoints. Today we are lucky: the soldiers only stare at us as we drive by, allowing us to continue.
On almost every hilltop, there are settlements where Israeli settlers have occupied land and built houses. It is no coincidence that they choose to occupy the hilltops: it is a strategic choice that makes it easier for them to control the areas around them.
Along the checkpoints that Palestinians must pass every day on the West Bank, Israeli settlers have displayed signage along the roads which states "No future in Palestine" in Arabic.
“La mustaqbal be Falastin,” reads the sign in Arabic. It means “No future in Palestine.” Settlers put up the signs at the settlements after October 7th. They have also tagged the same slogan on the checkpoints that Palestinians must drive through every day. Photo: Muhammad Olwan
When we arrive in Sinjil, we have to turn around several times. Since October 2023, the Israeli army has closed five of the six entrances that Palestinians had to the village. Now there is only one way they can enter: if they try to drive past, they risk being shot by the Israeli soldiers guarding the entrances.
We finally make it in and meet Muhammad Olwan (47), who shows us around the village. Olwan is a coordinator for the Palestinian Farmers Union (PFU) and reports, among other things, on the attacks that the farmers live under.
He drives us up the winding road to the top of the village, which consists of narrow streets with closely packed white stone houses.
“Up there, you see one of the five illegal Israeli settlements,” he tells us, pointing toward the hilltops about five hundred meters away. It’s easy to spot: the settlements are always surrounded by a wall, and the houses often built in European style with slanted roofs. Five illegal Israeli settlements surround the small village.
Muhammad Olwan has lived in Sinjil his whole life and says this year is the worst he has experienced. He lives with his wife and four children in the village.
“The occupation is doing everything it can to make us leave our land. But where should we go? I will never flee no matter what, this is our homeland,” he says.
It started before October 7th
Olwan takes us to the home of Mrawah Abd Al Haq (70), who lives with his wife. Several of his children and grandchildren live in the houses around them. He sits wearing a hat and scarf when we meet him in his living room, trying to stay warm in the cold weather.
“Our problem started before October 7th, we’ve been in this situation since 1948, under an occupation that wants us off this land,” says Abd Al Haq.
Two of his grandchildren run around us in the living room, playing and laughing with each other and hugging their grandfather. But their future in the village is uncertain.
Since October 7th, 2023, Israel has killed over 50,000 Palestinians in Gaza, and the medical journal The Lancet believes the number could end up over 186,000 dead. The US-backed genocide of Palestinians is the continuation of the Zionist expansion of “Israel,” which has lasted for over 76 years.
Conditions on the West Bank have also worsened significantly. Palestinians have lived under extremely oppressive conditions since 1948 when the Israeli occupation was first established through massacres and forced displacement, but the past year is one of the worst so far.
Over 15,700 Palestinians in the West Bank, including those who have now been released, have been detained by the Israeli army including children. At least 938 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli army, and over 7,000 are injured, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.
Abd Al Haq and his brother were first arrested during the First Intifada in 1987, when the Israeli army forcibly displaced his family from their home.
The army blew up the family’s house, and they ended up living in tents for over seven months before they could return to what had been turned to dust.
“My wife was pregnant with our son, but he died in her womb when we were living in the tent, as a result of the conditions she was living under,” he says.
When he got out of prison, he and his family began to rebuild the house where he now lives.
Building new walls
The West Bank, which was occupied by Israel in 1967, in many ways resembles an open-air prison, where illegal Israeli settlers, with the support of the army, terrorize Palestinians and do everything they can to make their everyday lives unbearable.
The occupation is in the process of building a new wall around the village of Sinjil. The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights describes the new wall as part of Israel’s plan to change the demographics of occupied Palestine. It is part of an accelerated campaign of annexation plans across the West Bank.
The Israeli occupation is in the process of, based on the organization’s documentation, digging soil 6 meters deep over an area of 1500 meters along Sinjil. This is to build a concrete wall separating the village from the main road in the northeastern part of the area. The operation began on September 28th, 2024, and has resulted in 200 trees being uprooted and the destruction of the area.
The construction of the wall will further isolate the village from other areas and is part of the collective punishment of Palestinians: the isolation makes it very difficult to access other villages in the West Bank.
Attacked by armed settlers
Abd Al Haq was only 13 years old when Israel expanded the occupation to the West Bank in 1967 and clearly remembers how the settlements were established. Since then, he has been attacked three times by armed settlers—the last time was in 2024. They came and attacked him while he was harvesting olives, and broke his arm.
“They attack us just because we are Palestinians, a form of collective punishment. I’m not a politician or a soldier, I’m just a human who demands to live on my land,” says Abd Al Haq, touching his arm that was broken when he was beaten.
He says the Israelis are trying to drive Palestinians away by any means: Israel wants all Palestinians to leave the country and does so through violence, forced displacement, killing, and threats.
“They want to destroy our love for our land in any way, they don’t want Palestinian farmers to be in contact with their land. It’s ugly and evil in a way that’s impossible to describe,” he says.
He says his family had better access to roads and land before 1967, they were not blocked off as they are now. Since October 7th, it has become nearly impossible for friends and families to visit each other if they live in different villages, due to the multiple checkpoints and blockades that Israel sets up.
Now he cannot enter the field where he used to work: the Israeli army has closed off all the entrances and settlers have occupied the area.
“It obviously affects mental health. You feel like there’s a part of your body that you’re about to lose, and you can’t protect it. They are trying to scare the children so they won’t want to live here when they grow up,” says Abd Al Haq.
Caught behind walls and checkpoints
View from Sinjil overlooking the main road. Roadblock at one of the entrances to Sinjil. Photos: Synne Furnes Bjerkestrand
Last year, Israel stole the largest amount of land the occupation has taken from Palestine in over thirty years. Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir have particularly pushed to expand the settlements, which are illegal under international law. Ben-Gvir has been involved in distributing rifles and other weapons to Israelis, reported Al Jazeera last year. Israel finances the settlements.
Checkpoints everywhere
700,000 settlers live illegally on the West Bank, in 150 settlements and 128 outposts, which are so-called temporary camps made up of caravans or small houses. Every area on the West Bank is under Israeli attack, most recently in Jenin, Nablus, and Tulkarem. At least 40,000 Palestinians have been evicted from their homes and have no place to live.
In January, Israel began what they call "Operation Iron Wall," and tens of thousands of residents from the Jenin, Tulkarm, Nur Shams, and El Far’a refugee camps have been forcibly displaced. Infrastructure and homes are being systematically destroyed, according to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).
Residents of Ramallah hardly leave the area anymore: there are checkpoints everywhere and thousands of stories of Palestinians being beaten when they pass them.
Some of the checkpoints are permanent, while others are called "flying" checkpoints: they appear out of the blue along the roads. Others are called "hisshiss" (mosquitoes in Arabic), and are posts that are impossible to see in the dark. Suddenly, the soldiers are there, and they can shoot the passengers in the car if they think they are driving too fast or doing something they consider "wrong." The UN has warned about the increased violence at the checkpoints.
At the checkpoints, Israeli soldiers stand with large rifles, and they often stop the cars, causing long lines. Palestinians are forced to watch people being beaten bloody by soldiers, with no ability to do anything: if they even lift a finger, they risk being shot themselves.
The occupation blocks the roads
Abd Al Rahim Bashar (75) lives in Al Hadidiya near the Jordan border, in one of the areas on the West Bank most severely affected by attacks from Israeli settlers. His farm is completely surrounded by them, and like the farmers in Sinjil, he cannot access his land due to roadblocks.
Abd Al Rahim Bashar (75) is a farmer in Al Ghor in Occupied Palestine. The occupation is now surrounding his home. Photo: Synne Bjerkestrand
He was in Ramallah a couple of weeks ago, where he participated in a seminar for farmers on the West Bank, organized by the Palestinian Farmers Union (PFU).
“We now spend three to six hours getting here to Ramallah, when it should have taken an hour. Due to all the checkpoints, everything takes much longer,” he tells us.
He has lived in the area his whole life and can remember the beginning of the occupation. The Israeli military and settlers now surround his home.
“They’ve tried to set fire to my land. This has happened more times than I can count.”
Abd Al Rahim Bashar tells us that one of the key issues to highlight is the forcible takeover of Palestinian homes and how the occupation physically tries to expel all Palestinians from Palestine.
“And it’s not just Israel; Europe and the USA are occupying us. It benefits Europe that the occupation is here, but they know that this land actually belongs to us,” he says.
Abd Al Rahim Bashar says that there is a big difference in daily life before and after October 7, 2023.
“Before, there weren’t so many checkpoints, they only looked at our IDs and sent us on. The settlers didn’t destroy our homes as quickly as they do now. They want to harass us to the point where we get tired and move away.”
In October last year, settlers set fire to olive trees in Turmus Aya, and local Palestinians helped put out the fire. Only a year earlier, the village had been attacked, and one person was killed. Photo: Eid Ghafri
“They do exactly what they want”
I also meet Mahmoud Ahmad (50), who lives just below one of the settlements in Sinjil, in the village Turmus Aya. It is cold, and we sit by a gas stove in the barn on the farm. Over the past few years, he has been attacked and arrested by the Israeli army several times.
On March 6th, 14-year old Palestinian Omar Mohammed Rabea was killed by the Israeli Occupation Forces in Sinjil’s neighbouring village of Turmus Aya. Two other Palestinian teenagers were injured.
In June 2023, the village was attacked by 400 settlers. The Palestinian father of two, Omar Qattin (27), was killed as hundreds of Israeli settlers stormed the area. They set fire to dozens of cars and homes. Both Mahmoud Ahmad and Muhammad Olwan arrived in the area to help put out the fires.
Much of Ahmad’s land was confiscated by newly arrived settlers who occupied the area under the protection of the Israeli army last year. Just a couple of months ago, he and his family had $5,000 and several gold pieces stolen when settlers, with the help of the army, broke into their home.
“They destroyed everything they came across, and stole gold and anything else they could. I feel like nothing is illegal, they do exactly what they want,” Ahmad says, adding that the settlers come to the area around his house daily.
He says that there is no security for any Palestinians on the West Bank:
“We Palestinians on the West Bank have stopped feeling anything that could resemble security. The Israeli army is not an army; they are criminals. You in the West talk about human rights, democracy, and freedom, but where are these principles for Palestinians?” he says.
In 2022, he was illegally arrested while working on his land. He was taken to Ofer prison, where he was held for four days. The prison is located outside Ramallah and is one of many Israeli prisons where Palestinians are illegally arrested and tortured. It is just one of many times he has been arrested by the Israeli army.
“It was incredibly difficult. God must be with those who are in prison here. We were beaten and almost didn’t get food. The guards beat us for anything, it’s criminal,” he says.
Despite the extreme conditions Palestinians live under, the farmers in Sinjil still hold on to hope:
“We are still strong and steadfast, despite everything that has happened. We have faith in God, in our people, and in our possibilities. One day, we will be free,” says Mrawah Abd Al Haq.
