Middle East Monitor / October 30, 2020
Israeli settlers cut off electricity poles in the village of Al-Sawiya in the northern occupied West Bank, Maan News Agency reported.
The Palestinian official in charge of the settlement file in the northern West Bank, Ghassan Douglas, confirmed that the settlers from the Jewish-only illegal settlement of Rahalim were responsible for chopping down a number of wooden electric poles with chainsaws, causing power outages in the area near Nablus.
He said: “A number of settlers from the settlement of Rahalim near the village cut off electricity poles with electric saws and destroyed the water network for citizens in the western region of the village of Al-Sawiyah, which led to the disruption of main services for hundreds of Palestinian citizens in the area.”
Douglas pointed out that “the settlers’ operations and attacks are on a major and continuous escalation, especially in the northern West Bank, since the start of the olive harvest season.”
Attacks, assaults and acts of vandalism are frequently carried out on Palestinian towns and villages in the Israeli-occupied West Bank both by illegal settlers and soldiers.
Settler violence against Palestinian civilians, even though almost daily, intensifies during the crucial olive harvest season.
Between 500,000 and 600,000 Israelis live in Jewish-only settlements across occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank in violation of international law.
