Israeli paper says Palestinians being `robbed' of olive trees
By Michael Matza
Knight Ridder Newspapers
December 1, 2002
Form: Philadelphia Inquirer
(KRT) - Salem Watid, 29, looked up from the deserted cafe and cast his eyes down the road to the West Bank border.
"They take too much trees from the West Bank," said Watid, an Israeli Arab, pointing to a deep-rooted olive orchard in the nearby Palestinian village of Zeita, where rows of trees recently were removed.
A gash in the coffee-colored earth marked the line where Israel is building a security fence to keep attackers out. Israeli soldiers guard the site as bulldozers prepare the ground for a barrier that will stretch more than 100 miles along what once was Israel's eastern border, before the country captured the West Bank from attacking Jordanian forces in the 1967 Six Day War.
In some places, the fence's 165-foot-wide security zone will swerve from the 1967 line a half-mile or more into Palestinian land. The defense ministry says those who lose access to their property will be compensated if they can prove ownership - but many Palestinians lack deeds and are losing their land.
Others, even with deeds, may be losing their trees.
The destruction of Palestinian olive trees in the name of security has long been an issue, as Israeli forces frequently uproot groves suspected of serving as cover for snipers.
Now Israel's largest-circulation daily newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth, is reporting that 1,000 or more Palestinian olive trees, many of them more than 100 years old, have been sold to nursery owners in Israel in what the paper calls "a large robbery operation."
"By a cautious estimate," the paper said in an investigative report by staffers who posed as buyers, "at least 20,000 olive trees have been uprooted in recent months. Some are destroyed in the process."
The article noted that some trees were returned to their Palestinian owners to be replanted. But, it said, "a great many are sold to nursery owners in Israel. . . . The (Palestinian) owners, obviously, don't get a red cent."
Olive trees provide a cash crop critically important to the ailing economies of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Easy to transplant and hard to kill, they also symbolize Palestinian identity and aspirations.
Yedioth Ahronoth quoted one unnamed nursery owner who said he sold Palestinian trees for $125 to $5,200, depending on their size and age. Older, gnarled trees are prized by landscapers for their beauty.
The Israeli Defense Ministry, which supervises the fence construction, said Tuesday that it would investigate the allegations.
"We condemn the phenomenon discussed in the report of trees being stolen, and we are carrying out an internal investigation to examine whether there is something to the claims in the article," the ministry said in a statement faxed to the news agency Reuters.
"The ministry pays contractors for the uprooting and replanting, and in their contract there is no clause that allows for trade in the trees. If there is, it is criminal activity that will be investigated," the statement continued.
The defense ministry told reporters that most olive trees removed so far had been replanted in areas selected by the Palestinian owners. If they refused to cooperate, the ministry said, the trees were temporarily replanted, watered for two weeks and left for anyone to take.
Yedioth Ahronoth reporters, hiding their true identities, said they approached a foreman for Ahim Ben Rahamim, one of five private contractors working on the project, and asked to purchase 100 trees.
"No problem, we have as many as you want," the man reportedly said.
The paper then quoted Ahmed el-Rafik, a farmer from Zeita, who said the trees offered for sale actually belonged to him and were planted by his grandfather. "I'm 73, and they were here when I was born," el-Rafik is quoted as saying.
Shimon Ben Rahamim, who co-owns Ahim Ben Rahamim with his brother, was also quoted in the newspaper.
"How many do you want, big or small?" he reportedly told the masquerading reporters. "No problem. Talk to my foreman."
Later, in a telephone interview with The Philadelphia Inquirer, Ben Rahamim denied the allegations.
"The whole story is a fabrication. We haven't sold one tree - ever. Trees that belong to the locals are trimmed and then relocated on Palestinian land. The people who wrote that story, they're all from Peace Now - they all hate Israelis.
"The trees I offered to sell them were from Kibbutz Magal," which is inside Israel, he said. "Some of them I even gave away for free."
