Across the rolling hills south of Hebron in the occupied West Bank, vineyards fill the arid landscape, the vines stretching in rows towards the horizon. Next to recently planted stocks, the traces of a forcibly displaced community can still be seen. A child’s bicycle, an old suitcase and a dusty boot are among the belongings left behind by Palestinians who fled after enduring relentless Israeli settler violence.

Issa Abu al-Qabash, known as ‘Abu Safi’, was older than the state of Israel when settlers attacked him and violently expelled him from his home in nearby Khirbet ar-Ratheem. ‘They kept threatening us, every night, every day, every hour they humiliated us… They hit me – five of them – with M16s, right between my eyes. They told me, “You will die if you don’t leave. You have five days to go”.’

Near Abu Safi’s land, new vineyards have recently been planted. The South Hebron Hills are one of the regions where settler grape cultivation is expanding fast. As settler attacks intensify, Palestinian land is depopulated, seized and absorbed into expanding Israeli settlements, paving the way for the annexation of the West Bank.

‘My grandfather bought the land from another tribe during Ottoman times, and we had been living there ever since. It was passed on to my father, and then to us… We lived off this land, from its produce, from its blessings,’ said Abu Safi. But now ‘everything is gone… We are ruined, scattered… They uprooted us, expelled us from our own land.’

Abu Safi died a few months after this interview. Khirbet ar-Ratheem is one of more than 70 Palestinian communities forcibly removed since October 2023, as Israeli violence aimed at displacing and dispossessing Palestinians has escalated across the occupied West Bank. Over the past two years, more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed, including at least 213 children, with thousands more injured in attacks by the Israeli military or settlers, often acting in coordination. (…)

Full article: 3 709 words.

(3) According to figures from Israel’s finance ministry, consulted by Shalom Akhshav (Peace Now), and reported by the organisation Who Profits, which also identified €1m in government subsidies received by Psagot since 2018, www.whoprofits.org/companies/company/4149/.

(5) See psagotwines.com/en/about/.

(7) eeas.europa.eu/archives/delegations/israel/documents/press_corner/20130719_faq_ guidelines_eu_grants_en.pdf/.

(11) See the film by Ian McGonigle, Redemption: Wine and Prophecy in the Land of Israel, 2021.