We arrived in the valley at 06:30 and immediately divided into escort teams and protective presence teams. The first teams drove to Ein a-Sakut, where the Al-Farisiya shepherds and their flocks are currently staying, near wheat stubble fields and cornfields with dried ears.
Another team went to accompany S. from Al-Farisiya to a close-by shepherd community that is heavily threatened by settlers from the nearby Sal’it outpost. Only three shepherds remain from what used to be a community of 20. These are lands leased from Palestinians, who themselves now have no grazing grass left near their homes. The settlers, using the force of occupation laws or threats and by scattering flocks with weapons and ATVs, prevent them from grazing in areas they previously accessed.
Meanwhile, in the agricultural area of the village Ein al-Beida, it is still possible to feed the sheep, and the shepherds take every opportunity to do so — even at the cost of leaving their families for two months — to feed the flocks and make a living.
P. from Ein al-Hilweh also received a supportive escort with his cattle herd in the mountains, where there is both water and grass and no disturbances.
In Bardala, a protective presence team stayed while M. irrigated his fields near a threatening outpost established a few months ago. Settlers did not hesitate to threaten him with weapons and even beat M. and his workers with iron rods. The workers are still afraid to return, but M. believes our presence will help them eventually come back and harvest the remaining crops on his dozens of dunams of land.
In the village of Al-Farisiya, it was mostly hot and quiet. No settlers present in the area — they are likely gathering strength in their air-conditioned homes powered by the Israeli electrical grid, which reaches every Jewish home in Greater Israel. Of course, the Palestinian villages do not receive this electricity; they must make do with a limited supply from solar panels donated by the European Union.

The regular ritual of harassment began, as it does, on Saturday afternoon. Ten children in white shirts and tzitzit descended from the area of Maskiyot (a religious settlement opposite Ein al-Hilweh). This time they passed through the residential edges of K. and A. and climbed to “Flag Lookout,” which they built above K.’s home and where the Israeli flag now flies. They did not go to S.’s house this time. We were ready for any incident, but apparently the appeals to various authorities helped — this time, after an hour and a half, they left for Mincha prayer and returned to their homes in Maskiyot.

The harassment resumed at night. In Al-Farisiya, around midnight, three masked men appeared — among them we recognized the settler Gilad Amosi — and hurled large stones at the homes in Upper Farisiya and at the nearby path where three families of brothers live. Luckily, no one was injured, and after 15 minutes they left. But the quiet did not return. Every such event increases the fear among the shepherds and their families, and it is very likely that some of them could not sleep.
Simultaneously, we were called to Khalet Makhul, to the home of Y., one of the shepherds, where a military jeep arrived with a male and a female officer who know Y. They threatened to arrest him because Uri, the settler from the outpost in the Umm Zuka nature reserve, accused him of cutting the fence around the outpost. Y. completely denied it, and the jeep left — but not before warning him that if it happens again, he will be arrested and taken to a military prison.
In the small village of A., where I stayed overnight, Uri’s threats intensified. It’s having an effect, and the residents decided to leave before the threats materialize and the settlers’ lethal violence becomes inevitable. The settlers already sense the impending evacuation, but that doesn’t stop them from continuing to rampage and abuse. At 1 a.m., they came in a car, made a threatening loop through the village, and left as they came. The rest of the night passed quietly.

These are just tiny fragments from the broader policy of cleansing the valley — expelling the locals toward the designated zones of the West Bank cities, the “Palestinian reservation,” which may one day turn into a ghetto.

But perhaps, perhaps, Isaiah’s prophecy will come true: and the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid… And peace will come upon us and upon the world.   I am pessimistic, even apocalyptic — but dreaming is still allowed.