Israel: trying to make life impossible for Palestinians

JVL Introduction

In August 2025 large numbers of olive trees were destroyed by the Israeli Army i response to “a terror attack” in which an Israeli civilian suffered minor injuries.  The retaliation was swift and extensive and new “shaping the landscape” terminology deployed as well as a clear promise of the war crime of collective punishment.

When the Israeli Knesset votes to annex the West Bank, this is part of what it looks like. The other part of the  increasingly frequent and increasingly brutal settler attacks – with more or less impunity for Israeli perpetrators and heavy punishment for the slightest Palestinian retaliation.  Below the Ha’aretz article is a short but important piece about the vicious settler attack on the villagers of Khallet al Dab’e in the South Hebron Hills whose homes had already been demolished by the Army.  Earlier this week, all the village men were shackled and detained for hours, and three were arrested and badly beaten on the basis of an allegation by a settler boy that video evidence showed were false.

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This article was originally published by Ha'aretz on Mon 25 Aug 2025. Read the original here.