BBC is witnessing the attack of Israeli settlers on the Palestinian farm in the West Bank

Among the broken remains of olive trees in Brahim Himel, in the occupied West Bank, we saw the convincing men’s approach.

Dozens of settlers, who are accused of the illegal outpost over his farm and across the field towards us, move quickly and carry large sticks.

Sudden and unjustified attack.

Brahim was showing us the trees that he had been hacked to cut this week by settlers from the outpost.

His family cultivated olives here on the ground near Turmus Aya, for generations, making it a target for extremist settlers who believe that killing Palestinian trees and livestock will also kill the idea of a Palestinian state, by forcing residents like Brahim on their lands.

“Fear is normal”, Brahim told me, looking at the hills, where the waxed fabric was accompanied in the settlers’ publication in front of a few caravans and temporary homes. “But there is something stronger than the fear that drives me to stay here – the aroma of my argument and an attachment dating back hundreds of years – even if I pay the price with my blood.”

While convincing men run at us, we are returning to the road and leading a safe distance away.

Within minutes, some Brahim neighbors gather from the surrounding farms and villages with the catapults and stones to confront the attackers.

The vegetable cover is shot on the side of the road, and its smoke indicates the location of the confrontation, as the settlers are chasing a four -way bike of a volunteer emergency crew trying to reach a farm in the middle of the field.

This is now a familiar routine. Palestinians who live in these villages south of Napos say that there are attacks and confrontations on their lands every week, and that settlers use these types of tactics to seize the ground, in the field.

But the speed and prevalence of this breathtaking attack.

In a little more than an hour, dozens of settlers set out through the hills. We saw while leading to an isolated building, and systematically set fire to vehicles and homes.

The shepherds rushed to the farthest series of hills, as they stormed the hills behind the fire, and smoke escalated from several places.

By that time, Palestinians from all over the region arrive to help their neighbors find the main arrival path banned by the Israeli army, as the destruction continues.

According to what was reported, one of the Palestinians was beaten by the settlers, and the army later told us that both sides had threw rocks on each other, and that the Palestinians burned the tires. Four Israeli civilians have received a medical treatment at the scene.

Among the crowds are waiting near the army checkpoint, we found Riva that Hamelil, whose valleys are giving way to a warm smile and embrace her when we talked to her.

Riva told us that her husband was trapped in his farm near the olive farm in Brahim, surrounded by settlers, but the army will not allow her to pass.

She said: “Every day, settlers do so to us – they attack us, reduce olive trees, and burn farms.” “This is not life. No one can stop them. We have nothing to resist. They have weapons, we have nothing.”

We later learned that the settlers had burned part of their property, and that Riva’s husband had left with discounts on his face and leg, after suffering rocks.

The Israeli organization, which monitors the spread of settlements in the West Bank, says that the number of settlement sites – the aggression of settlers – has doubled since Hamas’s attacks on Israel in October 2023, and the Gaza war that followed.

Since the beginning of last year, she says, about 100 settlement sites have appeared across the West Bank. It also found that hundreds of square lands have been seized by settlers in the past few years using the same violent pattern of intimidation – he says, through government support and the failure to enforce the appropriate law by Israel.

Last week, the right -wing minister of finance in Israel, Bezallil Soutrich, announced the establishment of thousands of new housing units in a large bloc from the West Bank to the south, saying that it “will bury the idea of a Palestinian state.”

Between 5-11 August, the United Nations Office for Humanitarian Affairs has documented at least 27 settlement attacks against the Palestinians that led to losses or damage to property or both, over twenty different societies. She said that these attacks led to the displacement of 18 families.

We could not talk to any of the settlers participating in the attack we witnessed. The local settlers Council told us that there are elements on both sides that seek to provoke, which they strongly condemned.

Brahim told us that he had submitted separate complaints about the attacks on his land, but a few Palestinians here have a great belief in the Israeli Justice or Security forces, saying repeatedly that they only protect the settlers.

One of the volunteer emergency crews who came to help during the clashes on Saturday told me that the Israeli army prevented them from reaching the scene.

Yahya Al -Khatib said: “We were trying to save the youth, when the army came, and they were planting us and telling us to escape from here.”

“We were volunteers wearing our jackets. We are not here to attack settlers or harm. We want to put fires and treat the injured. But they (the army) stop us and stand on our way.”

Tensions between the local population and the settlers are complicated due to the increasingly heavy control of Israeli forces throughout the West Bank, which witnessed the extensive evacuation and demolition of refugee camps across the northern West Bank.

From January to June this year, the United Nations found that 149 Palestinians were killed by settlers or Israeli soldiers in the occupied West Bank. Nine Israelis were killed by the Palestinians.

Hours after the clashes that erupted around the Brahim farm on Saturday, another Palestinian victim was added to this dark outcome.

Hamdan Abu Elia, eighteen -year -old, was shot at the hands of the Israeli forces in the village of Al -Maghayer, a few miles from the Brahim field.

His mother told us that he went to see the fires that were lit by the nearby settlers. “I raised it for 18 years, and went in one minute,” she said.

We asked the Israeli army about what happened. She said that the “terrorists” threw rocks and Molotov cocktails in the forces in the village, and that the soldiers “responded to fire to remove the threat.”

Hundreds of Hamdan’s house gathered in his funeral on Sunday, when his body was moved to his mother to say goodbye.

His father, Amin Abu Iilaya, who was borrowed for friends and family, said he refused to show his Israeli tears.

“If they kill our son, we will leave,” he said. “I will not shout and shout and say” Why did he go? “I am not sad because he passed.

In the local mosque, there was a hero’s welcome to Hamdan’s body, where he was transferred for the funeral prayer – the vast Palestinian flags hanging alongside those in Fatah and Hamas from Rooves and windows; Bierr lining.

In the language of this conflict, every birth and every burial only enhances the relations with the earth.

Additional reports by Morgan Jishult Minard