Israeli settlers set fire to hundreds of dunums of farmland in the northern West Bank village of Beit Furik, locals said on Friday.
High temperatures, dry earth and a water shortage all caused the fire to spread rapidly, witnesses added, noting a delay in the arrival of Civil Defence Crews.
Ghassan Doughlas, a Palestinian Authority settlement affairs officer who monitors the northern West Bank, said the fires started east of the Beit Furik, near the illegal Itamar settlement, an area Palestinians cannot reach because of an Israeli military bridge.
Olive, fig and almond trees were destroyed in the attack in addition to several grape vines, Doughlas said, adding that Palestinian firefighters’ vehicles could not reach the area because of the terrain.
The PA official called on officials from the EU, US, UN and Russia, who make up the Middle East Quartet, to end settler attacks on Palestinians in order to push the peace process forward.
Meanwhile, Palestinians from At-Tuwani in South Hebron Hills found on Wednesday that the fence built between the village and the wood bounding Havat Ma’on Jewish outpost had been partially destroyed during the night, Operation Dove reported in a press release on Friday.
The wire netting, funded by ECHO (European Commission for Humanitarian Aid), UAWC (Union of Agricultural Work Committee) and Save the Children UK, was erected last March with the aim of protecting the crop by defining the borders of the agricultural land belonging to Palestinians and in response to the ongoing and rapid expansion of the nearby Ma’on settlement and Havat Ma’on outpost and, consequently, with the effect to protect the village from Jewish settlers’ raids.
On Thursday morning, Palestinian villagers found 17 poles supporting the fence pulled up on the path running along the Palestinian properties illegally occupied by Havat Ma’on outpost and about 100m of net cut in pieces.
They suspect that the perpetrators of this action are the Israeli settlers from the outpost.
During this year the same fence had already been damaged on May 11th.
On that occasion, the owner of the land filed a complaint to the Israeli police but he never received any update concerning the progress of investigation.
This property damage is just the last of several ongoing provocations carried out by the Israeli army and Israeli settlers which South Hebron Hills Palestinian communities have undertaken to respond to with non-violent struggle.
In a separate incident, Israeli forces entered the town of Azzun shortly after midnight on Friday morning and took three 14-year-old boys from their homes, the head of the municipal council said.
Local official Ahmad E’mran said the town, west of Qalqiliya, was targeted during a night raid, and that a total of five homes were entered and three teenagers taken to an unknown location.
E’mran identified the boys as Nehad Ibrahim, Hamedu Abu Haniyeh and Raed Radwan.
He noted that the homes of Sa’eed Al-Shallu and Mus’ab Al-Drar Radwan were also entered and searched, with families reporting that homes were ransacked.
An Israeli military spokeswoman said three young Palestinians were detained on Thursday evening, saying they were suspected of hurling rocks that damaged Israeli military vehicles on a patrol in the area.
She said the boys were identified and military personnel later entered the town and searched for the teenagers.
All three were taken into Israeli custody and were held for questioning.
Elsewhere on Friday, Egyptian security officials in the Sinai said a search was ongoing for two vehicles suspected of involvement in the rocket launches toward Israel and Jordan on Monday.
Officials said they could not release details as the search was ongoing, but noted that it centred on the 15 kilometres of the Egypt-Gaza border, and officers were searching to match small tyre tracks.
The search follows statements by officials in Cairo saying the launch of an estimated seven Grad-grade rockets toward the Red Sea port cities of Eilat, Israel and Aqaba, Jordan was perpetrated by Palestinian militant groups directed by Hamas.
Officials said Egyptian elements had assisted in the launch from Taba, and later fled toward the border town of Rafah.
Egyptians in Rafah said crossing activity appeared to be proceeding as usual, with no protests following Egyptian accusations of Palestinian involvement in the attacks, which Hamas has pointedly denied.
On Thursday, one Hamas statement said the Egyptian accusations of Palestinian involvement were a pretext to continue the siege on Gaza.
Other statements from the party criticised Egypt for its initial denial that the rockets were launched from the Sinai.
It was not until two days after the attack that officials in Cairo confirmed that the attacks were launched from the Sinai, and blamed Palestinian factions.
An Egyptian security official said forces were still combing the northern Sinai for evidence of the perpetrators of the attack, which killed one Jordanian man.
Until now, one official said, no evidence has been collected and accusations are based on other intelligence information.
Another Egyptian official said authorities in the country remained uncertain over whether or not the rockets were launched from the Sinai, but were working to confirm the possibility.
Meanwhile, Hamas’ armed wing the Al-Qassam Brigades released a statement late Thursday night attesting total non-involvement with the Monday rocket launches that hit Eilat and Aqaba.
‘Military acts from the resistance are carried out inside of Palestine,’ spokesman of the Brigades Abu Obeida said.
He added in a statement that he also welcomed ‘any resistance targeting the occupation, whether from in or outside of Palestine’.
Abu Obeida said that if Hamas fighters had launched the Monday rockets ‘toward Umm Ar-Rashrash (Eilat), then the Brigades would not have been afraid of announcing the attacks as soon as they were carried out’.
The spokesman said Al-Qassam Brigades fighters had a strict policy of ‘not using the lands of any state to carry out our military attacks, the borders of our acts are inside historical Palestine.’
In throwing suspicion on Hamas for the launch of some seven rockets from the northern Sinai, which hit the Red Sea port towns of Eilat, Israel, and Aqaba, Jordan, Abu Obeida said Israel was ‘attempting to export a crisis and justify their planned attack against Gaza’.
The Hamas spokesman warned Arab nations to keep their distance from the Israeli accusations, adding that ‘any party who lines up with Israel on this is participating in the Israeli aggression.’
