(MENAFN) Illegal Israeli settlers launched assaults on two Palestinian localities in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, ravaging fruit-producing trees, according to a human rights organization.

The Bedouin advocacy group Al-Baydar reported that a cluster of unlawful settlers stormed Al-Maliha village, situated west of East Jerusalem, accompanied by police forces.

They temporarily detained several villagers before releasing them afterward.

In a separate incident, Israeli settlers felled numerous trees on agricultural land in the Firasin area, north of Tulkarem in the northern part of the West Bank.

Al-Baydar emphasized that this land has been farmed for many years and serves as a vital means of sustenance for its proprietors.

These assaults, it stated, “reflect a systematic Israeli policy to put pressure on Palestinian farmers and threaten their economic and social stability,” maintaining the exact wording inside quotation marks.

Data from the Palestinian government’s Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission indicates that unlawful settlers perpetrated 7,154 assaults throughout the West Bank since October 2023, resulting in the deaths of 33 Palestinians and the displacement of 33 communities.

Combined settler and military operations have caused the deaths of at least 1,072 Palestinians and left approximately 10,700 wounded during that timeframe.

In a pivotal judgment issued last July, the International Court of Justice declared Israel’s occupation of Palestinian land unlawful and urged the removal of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

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