Hardline Israeli settlers today chopped off 40 olive saplings and trees for Palestinian farmers in the village of Sinjil, in the occupied West Bank province of Ramallah, as well as embarked on the constriction of a colonial outpost in the village of Jalud in Nablus province, according to local sources.

Muataz Tawafsheh, head of the Sinjil municipality, told WAFA that a group of Israeli settlers chopped off 40 olive saplings belonging to Abu Mustafa Haj Houd, a local Palestinian citizen. He said the attack was the latest in a series of attacks by Israeli settlers on the area over the last few weeks.

Meantime, illegal Israeli settlers embarked on the construction of a new settlement outpost near the village of Jalud, to the south of Nablus in the occupied West Bank.

Ghassan Daghlas, a Palestinian official in charge of the settlement file in Nablus province, said that a group of Israeli settlers placed water tanks and other structures on a Palestinian-owned land near the village, apparently in a prelude to establish a new outpost.

Israeli settler violence against Palestinians and their property is routine in the West Bank and is rarely prosecuted by Israeli occupation authorities.

There are over 650,000 Israeli settlers living in colonial settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem in violation of international law and consensus.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency (WAFA)