The smell of charred sheep is still in the nostrils of farmer Khalil Abu Ghanem two months after the heinous crime committed by settlers against 75 heads of goats in the town of Al-Samou, south of Hebron Governorate.
The incendiary substance thrown by extremist settlers inside Abu Ghanem’s pen turned all the animals inside into charred sheep, and their appearance, as documented by the farm’s surveillance camera, reflected the unimaginable horror of the crime.
The head of the “Farmers' Associations Union” told Al-Quds Al-Arabi that what is happening is a complete destruction of the livelihoods and lives of farmers.
The town of Al-Samou’ has about 26,000 inhabitants, most of whom depend on agriculture and livestock farming. Attacks on livestock and animals are considered secondary to attacks on burning and confiscating land, even though they play a major role in creating economic, social, and developmental transformations in the life cycle for farmers, and contribute to their displacement, according to agricultural expert Abbas Melhem, in an interview with Al-Quds Al-Arabi.
Melhem believes the incident was “shocking and actually happened,” stressing that targeting livestock sources such as cattle, cows, horses and chickens is like cutting off the second hand of the Palestinian farmer, after targeting the lands that constitute the primary source of life and survival.
Despite the heinous crime of burning dozens of sheep inside Abu Ghanem’s farm, the settlers contacted him after the incident, confirming that he deserved what happened to him, and threatening that future attacks would be more violent.
Local sources estimated the material losses at about 200,000 shekels. This is a new settlement policy that falls under the so-called “price tag” attacks, which target Palestinian property to intimidate and tighten the noose around them.
These attacks are part of a series of repeated violations targeting Palestinian property in the vicinity of the town of Al-Samou’, where occupation forces raided homes, set up military checkpoints, threatened the lives of residents, and restricted their movement.
settlement ring
Activists believe that one of the main reasons for Al-Samou’ being subjected to these violations is its proximity to Israeli settlement clusters established on Palestinian land, including the Asael settlement, southwest of Al-Samou’, which is located three kilometers southeast of the Shama settlement, and falls within the jurisdiction of the South Hebron Hills Regional Council.
In Khirbet al-Tawil, southeast of Nablus, the settlers’ attack was different, as groups of settlers attacked, in mid-May 2026, shepherds in the village that belongs to the town of Aqraba, south of Nablus, using a “tractor,” a four-wheel drive vehicle, to run over a flock of sheep.
During the operation, citizens documented the settlers advancing into the middle of the flock, which tried to take shelter behind a tree, but the vehicle managed to run over four sheep.
The video showed the vehicle standing on the run-over sheep, which were making sounds of pain and agony, without the settlers batting an eyelid.
Over the past few months, the theft of sheep, cows, and Palestinian property by settlers has transformed from isolated or exceptional cases into a widespread, organized, and protected phenomenon by the Israeli army. The details are similar in all communities, documented by videos published by citizens and foreign activists, and confirmed by reports from human rights organizations, most notably the Israeli human rights organization “B’Tselem”.
According to data provided by the “Al-Baydar” human rights organization, settlers stole more than 12,000 head of livestock during 2025 and up to the present day, and about 1,500 head since the beginning of 2026.
In an interview with Al-Quds Al-Arabi, Abbas Melhem, head of the “Union of Farmers’ Associations,” shared his concerns about the consequences of the thefts, which have made the lives of farmers and livestock breeders an unbearable hell.
Melhem emphasizes: “If we steal your land, it is like cutting off your hand. As for the second hand, it is cut off if you are deprived of the animals that you raise, which are the second source of life for farmers.”
He adds: “If the land and animals are targeted, what happens is the complete destruction of the farmers’ livelihoods and lives, thus turning the farmers’ lives into hell and depriving them of all means of resilience.”
Melhem believes that the settlers are fully aware of where and how to uproot the Palestinian farmer from his steadfastness. As for the process of killing, confiscating, stealing, and taking everything that makes his life possible, it means killing life and all its components and his land.
He continues: “What is happening is the greatest act of torture and a terrible act of murder.”
He believes that sheep thefts occur daily, and the thieves are known. There are videos, and the faces of the thieves are often visible. When you file a report with the Israeli police, the answer is always the same: the sheep don't belong to you.
According to Melhem, the number of goats and sheep stolen from the beginning of the year until today is approximately 20,000 heads, as there are numbers that are not officially registered, and this includes those that were slaughtered or stolen.
He believes that the data indicates that targeting farmers reinforces forced eviction measures.
Regarding what the data says about the livestock sector, Melhem stressed that the data previously said that we had 1.75 million sheep, which is the food security reservoir of Palestinian meat, but the numbers today do not exceed 480,000 sheep, and this means, approximately, a percentage of 28 to 29% of the total number of sheep that existed in Palestine a few years ago.
He adds: “The previous number achieved a very high level of food security, whether in meat or in dairy products and cheeses.”
According to Melhem, the problem lies not only in that shortage, but also in the presence of those who fill the void, as the thieving settlers carry out the upbringing operations by stealing or even buying, due to the financial support and security protection provided by the army.
It is expected with regret that the situation in the West Bank will change during the next five years, so that if a Palestinian citizen needs a sacrificial animal for Eid al-Adha to get closer to God, he will have to buy it from settlers.
Annexation and control
Malham believes that the current right-wing Israeli government, for the first time in the history of successive occupation governments, has set its sights on implementing a policy of annexation and control, and in order to achieve this, it has entrusted that field task to the protected settlers.
He says: “In certain cases, there are groups of settlers who have more power than the army, and they directly enforce the law. For this purpose, organized and semi-organized armed groups have been formed, and the goal can be summarized as cleansing the Palestinian land and emptying it of its historical inhabitants.”
He points out that there are techniques used by settlers, such as attacking farming families and expelling families or preventing them from accessing their lands, sabotaging agricultural projects and existing agricultural structures for farmers, in addition to stealing and killing sheep and preventing herds from reaching grazing areas, which are among the most important areas for shepherds and livestock breeders.
He points out that the settlers’ night attacks rely on attacks aimed at intimidation, beating and wounding, tying up and threatening to burn, sabotaging livelihoods, stealing fodder, tools and basic items, as well as disrupting water, irrigation and agriculture networks, which makes them “effective and repeatable attacks, and achieves the settlers’ goals.”
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