Israeli military has power over Palestinian farmers' lives and source of income.

Wednesday November 28, 2007 13:32 by Ali Samoud - IMEMC News

Open the gate….close the gate, a command which only an Israeli soldier has the right to declare on a huge iron gate set up near the electronic fence supplementing the illegal separation wall in the centre of Faqqu'a village lands.

 

The fate of the farmers of Faqqu'a village located to the north of the West Bank city of Jenin, rests on these words to bring an end to their hardship.

The daily life of the villagers became even tougher as Israeli military forces confiscated huge areas of the village orchards and built the annexation wall on the lands.

 The only one who can make the decision to open or close the gate is the armed Israeli soldier, who wields power over the farmers' source of income because if he decides not to open the door the farmers can't reach their orchards.

 With the approach of the olive harvest season which constitutes the main source of income for the farmers, residents of the village struggle to get military approval to open the gate as they desperately seek to reach their orchards located behind the wall in order to pick their olives..

They Israeli military use fabrication and deception as they refuse to announce the date or the time of the opening of the gate.

The residents still can't reach their orchards and wait in fear and anxiety.

The gate is considered as an extension to the illegal wall, starting at Faqqu'a and expanding through the most fertile lands of Marj bin Amer and reaching Zaboba village.

Military forces across this region have confiscated thousands of dunums of land.

These lands are now under the control of the military administration who established the military presence to protect what they refer to as the annexation wall and to deprive farmers, near the wall, from reaching there lands.

The owners of the orchard go every day to the Iron Gate and wait for long…..long hours with a faint glimmer of hope that the gate will open and they will reach their abandoned orchards.

A local resident expressed her agony saying "Since the beginning of this month we were waiting for the decision of opening the door as we depend on olives to earn our living but our joy was dissipated when the door opened, as it was opened for only half an hour".

 As time runs out, residents of the village are worried about their harvest as the gate is still locked. The village council presented a quick petition to all the international and human rights organization to bring an end to the farmers' hardship and to put pressure on the military operation to retract the order and to open the door.

All efforts used to try to open the door seemed to be worthless.

Opening one Iron Gate could release the severe hardship of a whole village.

jenin | israeli attacks | human interest nisreen at imemc dot org