Salfit Olives Between Fear and Loss... Farmers Await the Harvest Season with Anxiety

Salfit - Afaq News - Ahood Al-Khafash - As the olive picking season approaches, farmers in Salfit Governorate are facing this year's season with increasing anxiety, amid Israeli assaults on trees and agricultural lands, and restrictions that prevent some of them from reaching and caring for their fields, threatening part of their crop and annual source of income.

Olives are considered one of the most important agricultural crops in the governorate, not only for their economic value but also for their connection to the lives of families who have inherited the cultivation and care of these trees from generation to generation. However, this current season comes laden with fears of new losses added to what farmers have suffered over the past years.

Farmers recount stories about trees they have planted and cared for over decades, and about seasons that brought family members together in the fields, before those trees became a source of concern due to the practices of the Israeli occupation and its settlers, amid fears of losing their fruits, damaging them, or uprooting them.

Farmer Khalil Al-Taqtaq, 78 years old, from Salfit, says that he and his family have been deprived of picking their olives for four years due to being denied access to their land located behind an iron gate. He explains that his land, which spans 42 dunams, contains about 450 ancient olive trees that used to produce between 150 and 170 tins of oil annually, forming a primary source of livelihood for his family.

Al-Taqtaq says: "We are waiting for this season with great anticipation, but today we do not know if we will reach our trees or lose the fruits of an entire year." For him, the issue is not just about losing a crop, but extends to a family income they rely on year after year.

Elderly Fatima, 80 years old, cries over the situation she has reached, after being deprived for the second consecutive year, along with her family, from accessing her land in the Al-Matwi area. She says, with tears preceding her words: "I took care of the olive trees more than I took care of my children; I accompanied them year after year, worked hard on them, watered them, and nurtured them, and today I am deprived of them. In a good season, we used to produce about 40 tins of oil, but today we only produce 10 tins, due to our inability to access the land because of the assaults by the settlers residing in the outpost." While trying to hold back her tears, she adds with pain, "My loss is not just a season of olives, but the extraction of years of hard work, memories, and a livelihood I have waited for all year."

In Wadi Al-Sha'ar, citizen Nashat Ishtayeh received another blow to his season after settlers cut down about 40 mature olive trees he owns. He says with sorrow that these trees were part of his family's source of production, and losing them means losing trees that took many years to reach the production stage, which cannot be compensated in one season or year.

According to the Director General of Agriculture in Salfit, Engineer Ibrahim Al-Hamd, farmers face difficulties in accessing their lands even during the period leading up to the harvest, which requires preparing the fields, cleaning them, and carrying out the necessary agricultural work.

Al-Hamd pointed out that the spread of settlements and outposts in various areas of the governorate complicates the situation, explaining that there are 14 outposts and 24 settlements established on the lands of citizens in Salfit.

He clarified that forecasts indicate the production of about 2400 tons of olive oil in Salfit this year, provided that farmers can access all the olive trees and harvest the entire crop, making any restrictions that prevent access to the lands a direct threat to the quantity of production and the economic return for farmers.

The repercussions do not stop at the loss of the season's crop, as Al-Hamd pointed out the uprooting of more than 5,000 ancient olive trees in various areas of the governorate since the beginning of the year, in a loss that strikes at the root of agricultural wealth before its fruits reach the markets or family tables.

The ancient trees in Salfit Governorate hold a value that exceeds their annual production, as they require decades to reach the stage of yielding. Therefore, their uprooting means losing an agricultural resource for the coming years, in addition to the economic burdens borne by families that rely on oil and olives for their livelihood.