Deir Nizam, Ramallah District: Settlers attacked olive harvesters, soldiers hurled tear gas and stun grenades at the farmers and drove them off their land

A settler pushing one of the farmers. Photo courtesy of the farmers

On Saturday, 25 October 2025, at around 8:30 A.M., ten members of the Tamimi family from the village of Deir Nizam set out to their land, located about 800 meters west of the village. A settler outpost, Havat Kela David, was established over the past year about 350 meters from the plots.

The farmers began harvesting their olives, until, at around 11:30 A.M., a settler arrived and started threatening them and shouting at them to leave. The settler called for reinforcements, and shortly afterwards, three more settlers arrived, one armed with a rifle and the other two with handguns. One of the settlers had several dogs on leashes.

The settlers began pushing the farmers, demanding their ID cards, scattering the olives they had picked, and pulling the tarpaulins out from under the trees. One of the settlers also beat one of the family members in the face with a stick.

The settlers called for soldiers, who ordered the farmers to leave and threw tear gas canisters and stun grenades at them. A female soldier pushed a farmer who was filming on her cellphone, sat her down on the ground and demanded that she delete the footage. When another young man from the village arrived, the soldiers beat him.

The settlers and soldiers forced all the farmers to leave without taking the farming equipment and food they had brought with them.

B’Tselem field researcher Mohammad Romaneh collected testimony from one of the farmers, Fadel a-Tamimi, 63, a father of nine, who related:

A settler dragging one of the olive-harvesting tarpaulins. Photo courtesy of the farmers

My wife has a roughly 1.5-dunam plot of land with olive trees (1 dunam = 0.1 hectares) west of the village, in the a-Dibaq area, which was classified as Area C under the Oslo Accords. The plot is part of an 21-dunam area owned by my wife’s family.
About five months ago, settlers set up an agricultural outpost, made up of several tents and caravans, about 300 meters west of our land, in an area called a-Naqar, in the middle of the lands of the villages of Deir Nizam, Deir Abu Mash’al and ‘Abud. There’s one settler who’s always there, tall, fair-skinned and light-eyed, about 30–35 years old. He usually walks around armed with a rifle, and sometimes has a dark-skinned settler with him, who covers his face with a mask.
On Saturday, 25 October 2025, at around 8:30 A.M., I went out with nine family members for the first time this season to the western groves. We got to the plot at around 9:00 A.M., spread out tarpaulins, brought equipment and ladders and started picking olives. Things were calm, and there were no settlers or soldiers present.
We worked until 11:30 A.M., and then suddenly, a young settler, about 20–22 years old, arrived from the direction of the main road east of our land. He stopped at a distance of about 30 meters from us and started shouting at us in Hebrew to leave because “this is his land”. I went up to him and asked why we should leave our land, and he threatened me with a stone. When we said we called the police, he dropped the stone, shouted “David!” and waved his hand westward, towards the outpost.
After a few minutes, three settlers arrived from the direction of the outpost: the fair, tall one, armed with a handgun, another one with a rifle, and a third one, whose face was covered, also armed with a handgun. He had dogs on leashes. They entered the land and scattered the food we had brought with us. A dog lunged at my relative, and one of the settlers pushed her, then another settler pushed her with his rifle and started making a phone call. The fair-skinned settler beat my brother-in-law, 58, in the face with his stick. They demanded that we leave, threw the olives we had collected, and pulled up the tarpaulins.
After about five minutes, a military vehicle stopped by the main road and two male soldiers and a female soldier got out, came over to us and ordered us to leave. When we told them we called the police, they spoke to us in an offensive manner. After about ten minutes, another military vehicle arrived with six soldiers, who approached and started throwing tear gas canisters and stun grenades at us. My sister-in-law tried to film this, but a female soldier pushed her, forced her to sit down and deleted the footage from her phone.
The settlers and soldiers forced us to leave the land and leave behind our farming equipment: eight tarpaulins, two electric olive shakers and ladders, eight sacks of olives weighing about 30–35 kilograms that we picked, as well as the water and food.