The Israeli Border Police arrested three international peace activists near Al Khader town, in Bethlehem area, after they arrived at the town to held Palestinian farmers in harvesting their orchards.
The farmers face enormous difficulties in reaching their lands as a result of the Annexation Wall that Israel is constructing in the West Bank, and the settlements that are constructed on confiscated Palestinian lands.
They have not even been able to bring their products to market as a result of the siege that has been implemented on all Palestine since March.
A group of activists, angered by the Israeli separation and annexation policies, went to the main Jerusalem-Gush Etzion Road, and started delivering the grapes to drivers on the road. The main traffic on the road is made up of Israeli settlers living illegally (under international law) in the West Bank. The international activists were trying to make visible to those settlers the effects of their takeover of the Palestinians’ land, by showing them the boxes of grapes that were going to rot without ever being.
Members of the Israeli Border Guard arrived on the scene and arrested three activists after claiming that they conducted an “illegal gathering” on the side of the road.
The policemen also claimed that the activists placed a can filled with grapes in the middle of the road.
