Reply #2: Concerns over rising settler violence in the West Bank

[Scurrilous]

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""These trees are holy to me. They're so old you can't put a value on them," says Nidam Qaraweq, a Palestinian olive farmer from the West Bank village of Awarta.

He pokes at the blackened, and gnarled trunks which are hundreds of years old. A large piece of what is now charcoal breaks off in his hand.

"They're all dead," he says angrily.

Last month, around 20 of Mr Qaraweq's olive trees were destroyed by fire.

He says Jewish settlers from the adjacent settlement of Itamar deliberately set his fields alight in an arson attack."

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"The United Nations says the number of attacks by extremist Jewish settlers on Palestinians resulting in either injury or damage to property has roughly tripled since 2009.

The UN says so far in 2011 around 10,000 Palestinian-owned olive trees have been destroyed or damaged in attacks by settlers.

"They've made life very difficult for Palestinians in the West Bank," says Ramesh Rajasingham, Head of the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

"You have settler attacks on Palestinian property, on shepherds. In some cases, they attack kids going to school."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-15753945