Rabbis begin planting 1,000 olive trees in West Bank

Image: RHR

Source: Rabbis for Human Rights

Rabbis for Human Rights write: Last Friday we began Planting Justice, our annual olive tree planting campaign with a planting day in as-Sawiya, south of Nablus, with 20 international activists including participants of our joint Winter Solidarity Program with Achvat Amim.

Over the Planting Justice season we will be planting 1,000 olive trees with 12 Palestinian communities across the West Bank. Our priority is to plant with communities who face settler violence and military restrictions to access their lands.

In As-sSawia we were warmly warmly welcomed by the Head of the Village Council and planted some 50 saplings together across two locations and distributed another 20 to the village. Right as we were finishing up, the district commander of the IDF arrived with soldiers and presented us with a closed military zone order, with immediate effect. The reason: we were considered a security concern.

We were invited into the community to enjoy each other's company, but discovered that the army had set up checkpoints at the gates. The military does not want to see Israelis and others working in solidarity with Palestinians. We refuse to accept this reality and we have scheduled planting justice days every Friday for the next two months. Already over 100 Rabbis, volunteers and activists have signed up to join us. If you are in the region please consider joining, or send to a friend who lives here..

Read more about Rabbis for Human Rights: www.rhr.org.il/eng

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