On Saturday June 11, six or seven armed settlers accompanied by the Israeli military entered the Palestinian village of Qusra and harassed villagers. Before they escaped they threw stones at a village truck smashing the side glass and cracking the windscreen.
At approximately 5.00pm, the Imam of the mosque in Qusra started calling to the population of the village that there were armed settlers (from a new illegal outpost near the village) approaching the village, from one of the surrounding mountains. In a show of strength and solidarity, around 100 villagers went to the mountain with the purpose of defending their land. The army accompanied the settlers and threw several sound bombs to disperse the Palestinians. One of the bombs fell inbetween 19 year old Ismail Aburedi’s legs. It rendered him unconscious and later, deaf and unable to walk. The Israeli army refused to let Ismail be taken to the hospital but it is reported that his friends placed him in the back of a car and raced him to Rafidia Hospital in Nablus where he was kept until 2 am the next day. When interviewed by ISM, Ismail Aburedi said: “We will remain in this land, we have been here for hundreds of years and we will be here forever. These settlers are new, we will stay and I will defend my land. There is no where else for us to go.”
Israeli settlers threw stones, damaging this Palestinian truck.
Israeli settlers threw stones, damaging this Palestinian truck.
The army also tried to arrest 21 year old Burham Hassan, but the villagers dearrested him and managed to “get him back.” Before escaping, the settlers smashed the front and the windscreen of a truck owned by Hosni Aburedi.
Qusra is a village with approximately 5000 people located in the northern of the West Bank, about 30 minutes away from Nablus. The village has already lost around 300 dunams of their land to the surrounding illegal settlements in the area.
This past weekend in the Montpellier, France, over 100 activists from 9 countries gathered for the first ever European Forum Against Agrexco. Delegates from Italy, UK, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands, Spain, Germany and Palestine joined the French organizers for two full days of workshops aimed at strengthening the boycott campaign against the Israeli agricultural export giant.
Agrexco is Israel’s largest fresh produce exporter and European markets account for the vast majority of their sales under the brand Carmel. The Israeli government’s 50% stake in the company as well as their marketing of 60-70% of the fruit and vegetables grown in illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank have made Agrexco a prime strategic target for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign.
Rafeef Ziadah, representative of the Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC), recalled that the campaign against Agrexco includes all three components of BDS: boycott of Agrexco products, divestment via suspension of commercial agreements and sanctions through legal procedures. Agrexco’s complicity in a broad range of human rights violations, profiting from crops grown on stolen land, irrigated with stolen water and worked with child labor, also provides the campaign with ample opportunities to reach out beyond the Palestine solidarity networks to find allies in other social justice movements.
The forum centered on two parallel tracks with the objective of ridding European supermarkets of Agrexco products: boycott campaigns and court actions.
During the boycott workshop, activists presented a review of the campaigns and actions taking place in the various countries, including lobbying retail chains and co-op member meetings, actions at supermarkets and trade fairs, airport blockades and Italy’s very first BDS flash mob. In Belgium last May, over 400 people in 22 cities filed a complaint with the police citing Agrexco’s complicity with violations of international law. In France, the new Agrexco terminal at the port of Sète became a catalyst for the movement, with a mass demonstration of over 1500 people, a remarkable number for a BDS action! Campaigns are also under way in Sweden and Norway, who were unable to send delegates to the forum. In Sweden activists presented the national co-op with a dossier on Agrexco’s activities who promised to investigate. In Norway, the campaing instead focuses on the local importer, who is consulting their attorneys on the question.
Michael Deas, European coordinator for the BNC, underlined the importance of boycotting Agrexco as a company and not just the products it exports from the illegal Israeli settlements. Aside from problems of traceability – Agrexco has been caught on numerous occasions mislabeling products or mixing settlement produce with that from the Israeli side of the Green Line – purchasing any Agrexco products means supporting a company profiting from the occupation and apartheid policies of the Israeli government.
The involvement in the French campaign of farmers unions, Confédération paysanne and Via Campesina, keep the issues of sustainable agriculture and food sovereignty at the forefront. Michael Deas also underlined the role Palestinian farmers unions have and can play in the campaign against Agrexco. In fact, Palestinian farmers unions were crucial role in helping to expose a propaganda stunt organized by Agrexco in France, claiming that boycotts of Agrexco products damaged Palestinian farmers in Gaza.
The legal workshop, with the presence of three Palestinian attorneys from the Palestinian Bar Association, concentrated on possible court actions against Agrexco. While several countries – Belgium, UK, Italy – are currently exploring legal action, the French case has already produced an important result. An agent of the court inspected customs documents for the Agrexco ships docking at Sète and found clear cases of fraud. A 2010 decision of the European Court of Justice ruled that products from Israeli settlements are not eligible for preferential trade tariffs under the EU Israel Agreement. Yet here were invoices for dates from the Jordan Valley declared to be “Israel Preferential Origin.” This proof of fraud, from none other than a court official, will be vital to campaigns throughout Europe.
The two-day forum succeeded in bringing together campaigns across Europe with the goal of coordinating our actions and strengthening the movement for an Agrexco-free Europe. The first step of the newly formed European-wide network will be a Global Day of Action Against Agrexco set for November 26, 2011.
With all the extremely useful, though highly technical, talk of legal cases, corporate structures, local affiliates, commercial trade agreements, distribution networks, etc., it’s important to remember that behind the data and numbers, this is about people’s lives.
The land confiscations, the stolen water, the house demolitions, the checkpoints, make it impossible for Palestinians to develop their own economy. A reasonable person can draw but one conclusion, these policies serve to drive the Palestinians from their land. And companies such as Agrexco not only turn a profit, but also provide a direct economic incentive to maintain the occupation and continue the apartheid policies.
Rafeef talked about the first time she saw a Jaffa orange in a UK supermarket. She could smell the sweet aroma, but she couldn’t buy it. She thought of her grandfather, evicted from his land, but who returned to work for the new owner because he just couldn’t give up his land. And how Palestinian produce figures in the minds of refugees, denied their right of return.
Rafeef concluded the forum with an open invitation to all to her house in Haifa, once Palestine is free. Once she can return home.
And the campaign to boycott the products of Carmel Agrexco is a step along the way.
On Thursday June 2 at about 1pm, the villagers of Madama were again victims of a settler arson attack on their land.
According to Samed Hamad, a 15 year old Palestinian who saw the incident, settlers from the nearby illegal settlement Yizhar, set fire to a crop Field on the mountain not far from the place they had attacked on Monday 30 May. Residents of the village went up to the blaze to put it out and it was then that a group of settlers accompanied by settler guards and Israeli soldiers attacked the Palestinians with stones. According to Samed, one of the soldiers later handed over his tear gas gun to a settler to fire at the villagers. The army entered the village from the “bridge” (a main road into the village) and from the settlement, thereby cornering the residents of Madama and trapping them.
Whilst the ISM was in Madama to report about the attack this afternoon, three Israeli jeeps entered the village again, throwing sound bombs and arresting 17 year old Hussein Othman Muhammad, seemingly at random. They tied his hands behind his back with a plastic strap and frog marched him blindfolded to the army jeeps where he was then forced to kneel down and eventually bundled into the back of one. When ISM talked to residents of the village later, they said that Hussein had been up on the mountain helping to put the fire out.
17 year old Hussein Othman Muhammad detained by Israeli soldiers in Madama
17 year old Hussein Othman Muhammad detained by Israeli soldiers in Madama
Palestinian farmland left burned by Israeli settlers
Today marks an increase in the settler campaign against Madama´s residents following an arson attack to wheat crops two days ago and a severe physical attack last week against 66 year old Hamad Jaber Qut which hospitalized him for 5 days.
Madama is a village with 2,000 inhabitants located in the south of Nablus, in the West Bank. According to its mayor, Ihab Tahsin Qut, since the construction of the illegal settlement of Yitzhar in 1985, many villagers have been attacked by the settlers and 1,000 dunams of land have already been confiscated from the village. Settler attacks on the farmers have severely effected the village’s agricultural trade in the past years.
On the morning of Wednesday May 18th, Mohammed, arrived at his farm to find the roof of his farm buildings had been removed and the materials taken away from the property during the night. The farm is situated directly between Etzion settlement and a military police base, South of Bethlehem. The farm has been in Mohammed’s family for generations. He and his brothers grow grapes on the land, and stay in the farm house at weekends and during the summer when the children don’t need to go to school. A significant part of the farm land has previously been confiscated and part of it is now prohibited from being planted as it is close to the base.
There have been previous attacks on the farm with fertilizer and dead dogs dropped into the water source. Following this incident the well needed to be cleaned out and the water replaced. The family have been to the courts and have been given 10 days to replace the roof, otherwise it is viewed by the authorities as a new build, for which the rules are highly restrictive. Work is underway.
On Monday 30 May at 4pm, the villagers of Madama reported that a fire had been started by seven to eight settlers in one of the village’s wheat fields. The field was close to the place where less than a week ago, Hamad Jaber Qut – a 66 year old shepherd, was attacked by 15 settler youths with knives and sticks whilst tending his sheep and getting ready for prayer.
Mohammed, a resident of Madama, witnessed the arson attack which came at the hands of settlers who reside in the illegal settlement, Yizhar which is 1.5km away on top of one of the hills overlooking the Palestinian village. Mohammed saw them throw petrol and light the wheat. On seeing the smoke, the residents of Madama called the fire brigade to put the fire out, by which time the settlers had retreated back into the settlement. The fire was put out in due course.
When the ISM went to see where the attack had taken place, a jeep of Israeli soldiers could be seen watching the area.
This arson attack follows a violent physical attack on Hamad Jaber Qut who has sustained serious injuries to his face including two black eyes, gashes to his head, and bruising to his abdomen and legs after being attacked by 15 settler youths. When asked by the ISM whether he would go back to the land, he replied; “This land is our land, the settlement is in an area they should not be. The settlers did not take into consideration that I was preparing to pray before I was attacked. They are animals. This will not make us feel afraid, we have the right and god will be with us. All the world should know that their [the settlers] existence is illegal.” When asked whether he will go back to the land to tend his sheep, he replied; “Yes, I will go back. They will not stop us going.”
Madama is a village with 2,000 inhabitants located in the south of Nablus, in the West Bank. According to its mayor, Lehab Tahsin Qut, since the construction of the illegal settlement of Yitzhar in 1985, 1,000 dunams of land has already been confiscated from the village.
