On Thursday dawn, illegal Israeli colonizers uprooted 450 olive and almond saplings in Deir Sharaf village, west of Nablus in the occupied West Bank’s northern part.
Ghazi Antari, a local farmer, said the colonizers invaded his land, about ten dunams near the illegal Shavei Shomron colony, built on stolen Palestinian lands, before uprooting at least 450 saplings.
Antari added that, a few months ago, he planted 250 saplings, in addition to the already planted 200 saplings, but wasn’t able to tend to his land for the past three days due to the weather.
He said that this attack is the fourth over the last two years, as the colonizers uprooted more than 400 trees in the three previous attacks.
All of Israel’s colonies in the occupied West Bank, including those in and around occupied East Jerusalem, are illegal under International Law, the Fourth Geneva Convention in addition to various United Nations and Security Council resolutions. They also constitute war crimes under International Law.
Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states: “The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.” It also prohibits the “individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory”.
