© Rabbis for Human RightsRabbis for Human Rights activist Moshe Yehudai, who the NGO says was assaulted by a group of masked settlers in the northern West Bank on October 16, 2019.
An 80-year-old Israeli activist said he "feared for his life" on Wednesday when
a group of masked settler youth armed with crowbars charged at him and a group of largely foreign volunteers assisting Palestinian farmers with the annual olive harvest in the northern West Bank.
Rabbi Moshe Yehudai made the comments to Army Radio hours after he and fellow volunteers endured a brutal assault documented by rights groups at the scene.
Of the five volunteers who were injured, four were visiting from the US, UK and other European countries, said a field worker for the Yesh Din NGO.
Yehudai, an Israeli activist from Rabbis for Human Rights, was the fifth person targeted, suffering blows to the arm and head. He was evacuated to the Meir Medical Center in Kfar Saba with a broken arm.
Rabbis for Human Rights recruits Israeli and foreign volunteers to accompany Palestinians, who say
they face regular intimidation and violence while tending to crops located near settlements throughout the West Bank.
On Wednesday morning, roughly ten volunteers were assisting Palestinian farmers from the villages of Burin and Haware when a group of over 30 masked settlers descended from Yitzhar, a settlement identified by the Israeli security establishment as a hotbed for extremism, according to a Yesh Din field worker.
Comment: So is this a people's revolution against a government's financial overreach, like the Yellow Vest protests of France, or another cynical 'color revolution' fueled by the West, as in Hong Kong? Only time will tell, but the photos of protesters in imitation 'Black Bloc' uniform, backpack, and facemask, do not look promising.