'Abdallah Wahadin, 82

My brothers and I have farmland in a wadi a few kilometers northeast of our house and a few hundred meters south of the houses of the Bat Ayin settlement. We have eighty-eight dunams of olive and almond orchards, and grapevines. The trees are about fifty years old. Wooded area lies between our land and the settlement’s houses.

Yesterday morning [26 April], my brother Hammad, 72, and I rode our donkeys to the orchards. Using the donkeys, we weeded and plowed. Around 11:00 A.M., a white van and an army jeep came by and stopped twenty meters from us. Somebody spoke to us with a megaphone from inside the van. He asked if we had laborers with us. Hammad said we were alone. They left about ten minutes later.

We continued working until 12:45 P.M., when we got on the donkeys and headed home, riding on our land. After going about three hundred meters, Hammad was about thirty meters behind me. Then I heard voices. I turned around to look and saw a group of five or six settlers assaulting him. He was on the ground, and then he managed to get away. When I got off the donkey to help him, another group of settlers appeared from between the trees and attacked me. The settlers, in both groups, looked to be about eighteen to twenty or so years old. Three of them surrounded me and tried to overpower me and knock me to the ground, but I resisted. Then a fourth settler threw a big stone at me from close range. It hit me in the back of the head. Lots of blood ran down onto my clothes, but they didn't stop throwing stones at me. Other settlers joined them, making a total of around sixteen.

For more than an hour, we had a stone fight. Dozens of stones hit me. The one that hurt me the most was one that hit me on the left side of my chest. Stones hit Hammad, too. His right hand had been hit, so he had to use his left hand to throw stones and defend himself. During the stone throwing, we managed to make it to a high spot, from which we could strike the settlers. Then they started to retreat and head toward the settlement. We had been injured, but felt good that they hadn’t defeated us. I was pleased I hadn’t given in to them, and didn't let them catch me, and that they were ultimately forced to go away.

We got back on our donkeys and went to Safa. We went into the house of Hussein Muhammad Hussein ‘Aadi, which was at the edge of the village. He helped me and drove me home in his car. Then he took me and my grandson Awas, 15, to al-Hachma Medical Clinic, in Beit Ummar. After I received first-aid, the mayor, Sabri Sabarneh came and took me in a municipal vehicle to ‘Aliyah Hospital, where I was examined and X-rayed. They found that I had a ten-centimeter cut on my head. The doctor stitched the wound with ten stitches and bandaged my chest. I am still tired and am suffering from head and chest pains.

Today, I went with Hammad to the police station in Kiryat Arba and filed a complaint against the settlers who assaulted us.

'Abdallah 'Abd al-Hamid Jaber Wahadin, 82, married with five children, is a farmer and a resident of Beit Ummar in Hebron District. His testimony was given to Musa Abu Hashhash at the witness's house on 27 April 2009.