RAMALLAH, Oct. 14 (Xinhua) -- Israeli settlers set fire to a mosque and attacked Palestinian farmers harvesting olives in several areas of the West Bank on Wednesday, according to Palestinian sources.
Palestinian security sources told Xinhua that settlers stormed the village of Mikhmas, east of Ramallah, after midnight and set fire to a mosque, a nearby olive tree, and a vehicle.
Rawhi Fattouh, head of the Palestinian National Council, condemned the arson attack, describing it as "a barbaric act and a dangerous escalation of settler terrorism."
In a statement, he said the Israeli government continues to support and protect settler groups, encouraging them to target Palestinians, their property and religious sites with impunity.
Meanwhile, a 17-year-old Palestinian boy was injured in a settler attack in the town of Beita, south of Nablus in the northern West Bank, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said in a statement Wednesday.
Local sources said settlers attacked farmers harvesting olives in the town and injured the boy.
Settlers also attacked olive harvesters in other parts of the West Bank, amid the annual olive harvest season, according to local sources.
Amir Daoud, an official from the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission of the Palestine Liberation Organization, said settler attacks had become an "organized policy aimed at displacing citizens and preventing them from accessing their lands."
In press statements, Daoud said settler attacks had escalated over the past four years, evolving from isolated incidents in limited areas into a means of imposing new realities on the ground, with the support and protection of the Israeli government.
Separately, a joint statement issued Wednesday by the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics and the Environmental Quality Authority warned that rangelands, covering approximately 2,111 square km in the West Bank, are facing increasing pressure from settlement expansion and restrictions on herders' access to their lands and water sources.
It added that settler violence and restrictions on access to grazing lands and water sources had displaced 118 Palestinian pastoral communities between 2023 and 2025. ■
