The settlers who kill Palestinian farmers and imitate their lives

In the hills of the occupied West Bank, a strange and painful irony unfolds every day: the same Israeli settlers who seize Palestinian land, burn our olive trees and shoot at our farmers now imitate the very way of life they are destroying.

As a Palestinian farmer, every October, when the Day of the Cross (Youm Al-Salib) passes, the first drops of rain fall and the colour of the olives begins to change, I know that the season has arrived. The air grows heavy with humidity and the promise of new oil. I take my tools, gather my family and go down to the fields. These are ancient rituals, passed down from my mother, who knew the signs of the land by heart — when to prune, when to harvest, when to rest.

The land smells of thyme and wet earth; birds sing as if blessing the season. For a moment, peace seems to prevail — until my eyes fall upon the top of the hill and I see settlers camping on the ridge, rifles slung over their shoulders, playing farmers while denying us our right to farm. It is like killing the victim — and then walking in his funeral procession.

Occupation and cultural appropriation

They occupy the mountaintops overlooking our villages, where shepherds once grazed their flocks and farmers tended terraces carved by their ancestors. They have scarred the indigenous landscape of our homeland. They hate us — the people of this land — despise our language, music and culture, yet imitate our rural traditions as if they were their own.

In recent years, illegal settler outposts have mushroomed across the West Bank. From these hilltops, settlers harass shepherds, steal olive crops and drive families from their ancestral lands. According to B’Tselem and ARIJ, settler violence has reached record levels — thousands of attacks each year on Palestinian farmers, homes and orchards. The UN OCHA documented an increase of over 45 per cent in attacks since last year. Dozens of families have been forced to abandon their lands. The goal is clear: to erase the indigenous people, stealing not only land but also lifestyle, folklore and cuisine.

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And yet, from those same hills, settlers hold weddings under olive trees, pick olives by hand, cook shakshuka — fried tomatoes in olive oil with eggs — over wood fires, make tea in blackened tin pots and play the shibabeh, the flutes that echo in Palestinian villages from Jenin to Hebron. They dress in rough cotton shirts, build small gardens — hakura — and pose as if they have inherited a bond with the land they have only stolen.

They call this “returning to nature”, but it is a performance — a desperate attempt to fabricate belonging where none exists. Their imitation is not admiration; it is appropriation born from an illegitimacy complex. Deep down, they know they are strangers here. They feel the void of uprootedness and try to fill it with borrowed symbols and stolen traditions.

It is a tragedy of contradiction: they destroy the olive tree but long for its shade; drive out the farmer but envy his simplicity; occupy the land but imitate the life of those they dispossessed. Their desire to appear native exposes their alienation.

Land as identity

For us Palestinians, the land is not a lifestyle or a weekend escape — it is history, memory and identity. Every olive tree carries generations’ stories. Every plot bears an Arabic or Syriac name tied to the memory of people who have lived here for millennia. Every spring has a name, every terrace a story. Each stone was lifted by hands that loved this soil and knew its secrets.

When I see settlers swimming in our springs, building picnic tables by our wells or hosting weddings to Palestinian folk music, I feel more than anger. It is sorrow mixed with disbelief — a sense of violation of land and meaning. They destroy the roots and then pretend to be rooted. They kill the farmers and then play the farmer’s song.

They can copy gestures of belonging but cannot inherit its soul. They can cook shakshuka, but never taste it as we do — seasoned with labour, patience and longing. They can sing our songs, but their voices will never carry the love and pain that shaped them. Our essence is made from this country’s clay.

The land remembers

Their imitation reveals a profound truth: the Palestinian way of life is the authentic expression of this land. Settlers want to appear native, blend into the landscape and erase visible signs of occupation. But no matter how much they borrow, their presence remains a violent intrusion. They cannot wash away truth with olive oil or cover injustice with a folk tune.

You cannot become indigenous by stealing land or mimicking its people. Belonging grows from justice, not imitation.

As long as settlers continue to kill farmers, steal olive harvests and drive families from their homes, their attempts to root themselves will remain hollow. They may occupy hilltops, but they cannot occupy the truth.

When I stand among my olive trees at dusk, I feel their silence speak. They remember the generations that tended them, the hands that watered them, the songs sung beneath their shade and the footsteps that traced terraces. They have seen conquerors come and go, yet they remain — steadfast, rooted in justice, memory and belonging.

The settlers may mimic our life, but they cannot imitate our love for this land — love cannot be faked, and roots cannot be transplanted by force. They may borrow our songs, food and customs, but cannot inherit the centuries of care, sweat and devotion that shaped this land and its people.

This land will always know its children — whose skin carries its dust, whose language was born from its hills, whose songs rise with its wind. Our skin is the colour of its soil, our hearts beat with its rhythm. No imitation, violence or occupation can ever change that truth. The olive trees will outlast them all, and so will we.

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