Skip to main content
A nice hot day in Palestine
For a decade, JENNY KASSMAN has returned to the occupied West Bank to bear witness to the increasingly brutal treatment of native villagers by Israeli settlers and soldiers — without international pressure, the outlook remains bleak
DESPICABLE: Jamila next one of the olive trees cut down overnight

EVERY October, when I tell people I am travelling with a group to the village of Burin in Palestine for the olive harvest, someone will respond — not really knowing what else to say — with “oh, how lovely! The weather will be nice and hot!”

In fact, in October the weather in the part of Palestine where we stay — the occupied West Bank — tends to be variable, with overcast and rainy days, particularly in the second half of the month.

However, our group from Britain and Ireland feels the heat in other ways — the heat generated by the burning of olive groves belonging to Palestinian farmers by Israeli settlers (who I prefer to call colonists) who also attack village homes.  

Donate to the Fighting Fund
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
Israeli soldiers entering Madama for a raid in October 2024
Features / 29 November 2024
29 November 2024
JENNY KASSMAN details how Israeli military raids, settler violence and harvest obstruction are devastating Palestinian communities during the 2024 olive harvest as the world turns a blind eye
A mural depicting slain Palestinian American journalist Shir
Features / 18 July 2022
18 July 2022
Whenever Israel’s crimes make the headlines, they are swiftly effaced from the public narrative as military and commercial interests take precedence over justice for Palestinians, argues JENNY KASSMAN
Palestinian demonstrators gather
during a protest against ex
Features / 22 December 2021
22 December 2021
Farmers in the West Bank are cut off from their olive groves by laws to defend and extend illegal Israeli settlements – when they do go to harvest, they are attacked, sometimes by the army too. JENNY KASSMAN reports on the deteriorating situation
Similar stories
Israeli soldiers entering Madama for a raid in October 2024
Features / 29 November 2024
29 November 2024
JENNY KASSMAN details how Israeli military raids, settler violence and harvest obstruction are devastating Palestinian communities during the 2024 olive harvest as the world turns a blind eye
Suspended Israeli MP Ofer Cassif speaks at the Marx Memorial
Features / 24 November 2024
24 November 2024
OFER CASSIF, a communist member of Israel's Knesset suspended for calling out genocide, discusses war, ethnic cleansing and worsening repression by the violent, bigoted regime in Tel Aviv
Two fellow international solidarity activists carry posters
Features / 13 September 2024
13 September 2024
LINDA PENTZ GUNTER highlights the longstanding pattern of the US government shielding Israel from accountability, as Rachel Corrie’s family joins calls for a transparent investigation into the latest killing of a US peace volunteer
NO ONE IS SAFE: Karam Harara holds the body of his two-year-
Features / 25 May 2024
25 May 2024
With bombing unending in Gaza and settlers rampaging in the West Bank, the ICC’s moves charge Israeli officials, though an important milestone, show no sign of changing the occupation’s genocidal course, writes VIJAY PRASHAD