In Israel and the Occupied Territories, Israeli settlers have destroyed or damaged several areas of Palestinian land in ongoing attacks in the West Bank. On Tuesday, Israeli settlers damaged Palestinian trees with saws, one day after more than 1,500 olive trees were set ablaze. Palestinian farmer Mohamad Rajab of the Burin village says the attacks have continued for several days.

Mohamad Rajab: “As we arrived, we looked at the land, and there were five or six settlers cutting the olive trees. Some were cutting, others were damaging, using hand-held saws. When they saw us, they fled. The Palestinian coordination force came and found all these trees damaged. If we had waited another hour, we would have found everything destroyed. There are more than 200 olive trees. Yesterday, they burned some thirty other olive trees. A week ago, they burned another twenty olive trees, and a month ago they burned two-and-a-half acres of wheat.”

The settler attacks came in apparent response to Israel’s announcement that it will begin removing unauthorized outposts established without official Israeli government consent. But Israel has defied US calls to freeze settlement activity and ignored Arab offers of peace in return for ending the occupation of Palestinian land. Although the Obama administration says it opposes the settlements, it hasn’t proposed any suspension of the billions of dollars in US aid to Israel.