The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today said the Trump administration should restore sanctions on Israeli settlers due to their attacks on Palestinian farms during the crucial olive harvest in the West Bank.
Palestinian-owned farms across the West Bank have been subjected to numerous attacks by Israeli settlers. Many of the olive groves are on patches of land that are legally owned by Palestinian farmers but are being blocked by armed settlers. Since the beginning of October, the Palestinian Farmers’ Union (PFU) has logged more than 50 incidents of violence or destruction of olive farms.
In a statement, Washington, D.C., based CAIR said:
“The olive industry is essential to the survival of Palestinians in the West Bank. These violent settler thugs, encouraged and supported by the Israeli government, are intentionally seeking to deprive Palestinians of their livelihood. The Israeli government must be punished for its enabling of terrorist activity in the West Bank, which is ultimately designed to result in the ethnic cleansing of that illegally-occupied land.”
Earlier this month, CAIR said that the International Criminal Court (ICC) and International Court of Justice (ICJ) should investigate the Israeli occupation’s destruction of one million of Gaza’s 1.1 million olive trees in Gaza an act of ecocide and further evidence of genocidal intent.
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CONTACT: CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell, 404-285-9530, e-Mitchell@cair.com; CAIR Government Affairs Director Robert McCaw, 202-742-6448, rmccaw@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-744-7726, ihooper@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Manager Ismail Allison, 202-770-6280, iallison@cair.com