Settlers stone European diplomats' cars near Taybeh, French mayor assaulted

Israeli settlers surrounded a convoy of European diplomats visiting Palestinian olive harvesters near the West Bank village of Taybeh on Saturday, pelting their vehicles with stones and smashing windows. A French mayor travelling with them was assaulted.

Belgium’s Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot said the group included Belgium’s consul general, French and Polish diplomats and Catholic representatives. “A French mayor was assaulted and a Belgian vehicle damaged,” he said. Prévot tied the attack to Israel’s settlement policy and said Belgium would push for further European Union sanctions.

Video filmed by the activist Amit Orfali shows masked men demanding to see identification. Orfali said the men “threatened to kill us”.

Paris demands arrests

The mayor, Bernard Baudoux, said the attack showed that Israel’s government tolerated settler violence. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot wrote that the settlers had “violently assaulted” Baudoux and called on Israel to arrest the “extremist settlers” and bring them to justice.

Israeli police said they had opened an investigation. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office described the reports as “alleged” and said they required “compelling evidence”, while acknowledging that footage had been published.

The attack comes a day after settlers assaulted an American photojournalist north of Ramallah, an incident Netanyahu said was under investigation and which led the US ambassador to urge Israel to prosecute those responsible.

A violent harvest

The attack on the diplomats was one of many across the territory on Saturday, as Palestinian families tried to bring in their olives.

In Ma’in, in the Masafer Yatta area south of Hebron, settlers attacked residents and six people were hurt, among them four women and a child, the Palestine Red Crescent Society said. West of Ramallah in Deir Ammar, Israeli forces fired on olive pickers and drove them off their land, and settlers shot and wounded two Palestinians nearby.

In Kafr Malek, north-east of Ramallah, settlers killed about 20 sheep on a farm, Mayor Najeh Rustum said. In Beit Furik, east of Nablus, olive trees were destroyed and Israeli forces arrested landowners and pickers. In Deir Jarir, settlers fired live ammunition at farmers and smashed the car of an international activist.

Palestinians say the army routinely protects the settlers rather than the farmers. Rabbi Dov Lior, a prominent figure close to Itamar Ben-Gvir’s Jewish Power party, has issued a ruling that Jews may harvest olives anywhere in the “Holy Land”, even far from Israeli settlements, as a show of ownership.

Some 300 settler attacks are reported to have been documented since the start of October, with settlers advertising some of them on social media.