Israeli settlers on Tuesday stole the olive harvest and destroyed hundreds of saplings of Palestinian farmers in Sebastia town, northwest of Nablus, according to local sources.

Mayor of Sebastia, Mohammad Azem, was quoted by WAFA news agency as stating that on his first day of picking their olives fenced within the boundaries of the Israeli colonial settlement of Shavi Shomron, Majd Shehadeh, a local farmer, was surprised to find out his 18 dunums of land planted with olive trees were already harvested and stolen by settlers in the morning hours.

He added that the settlers uprooted some 700 apricot saplings and 200 olive saplings from Palestinian farmlands adjacent to the same settlement and prevented the land owners from accessing their orchards.

The assailants also fenced a number of plot of land there as a prelude to seize and annex them to the encroaching settlement.

Settlers have recently stepped up their attacks against olive harvesters in the southern district of Nablus, attacking farmers of Burin town and preventing them from picking their olives. Similar attacks recently occurred in other Nablus-district villages and towns, including Aqraba and Deir al-Hatab.

With more than 12 million olive trees planted across 45% of the West Bank’s agricultural land, the olive harvest constitutes one of the biggest sources of economic sustainability for thousands of Palestinian families.

According to UN OCHA, the olive oil industry supports the livelihoods of more than 100,000 families and accounts for a quarter of the gross agricultural income of the occupied territories.

But, as local NGO MIFTAH notes, “olive trees carry more than an economic significance in the lives of Palestinians. They are not just like any other trees, they are symbolic of Palestinians’ attachment to their land.”

“Because the trees are drought-resistant and grow under poor soil conditions, they represent Palestinian resistance and resilience. The fact that olive trees live and bear fruit for thousands of years is parallel to Palestinian history and continuity on the land.”