Afrinpost – Special
The operations of seizing the olive fields by force and preventing Kurdish citizens from entering their properties to inspect them and harvest the olive season continue, as in the village of Qizilbasha. The gunmen of “Suqour al-Sham” militia, affiliated with the Turkish occupation and the organization of the Muslim Brotherhood in the occupied Kurdish region of Afrin in northern Syria, are blocking the path in front of elderly people, and preventing them from entering olive fields, attacking two of them.
In the context, the “Afrinpost” correspondent reported that armed men affiliated with the “Suqour al-Sham” militia expelled four elderly Kurds in the Qizilbasha village of the “Bulbul / Bulbul” sub-district in Afrin countryside, and prevented them from entering their olive fields, and they were not satisfied with that. As they attacked tow citizens after they showed their determination to enter their fields, and the gunmen said: “We will harvest olives, and you will come after us to harvest what is left.”
The reporter added that the total number of olive trees owned by the four elderly citizens amounts to 7,000 trees, as follows: Rajab Khalil “2000 olive trees”, Ismat Khalil “2000 olive trees”, Muhammad Othman “2000 olive trees” and Jamal Muhammad “1000 olive trees.”.
With regard to the health status of the elderly after the accident, the reporter pointed out the poor condition of the elderly Muhammad and Rajab, and that they have been in bed since the day of the accident, due to the cruelty and barbarity of the attacks on them.
While the people are prevented from harvesting the season, kidnappings take place in the fields, as the Muslim Brotherhood militia gunmen who call themselves the “Syrian National Army / Free Army” provoke the original Kurdish people, and bring hundreds of settlers from the camps to steal the season.
In a related context, Abu Talal, a leader in the Suqour al-Shamal militia, established working groups of about 100 settlers to steal the olive season in the villages (Qizilbasha, Bele and Kutana) of the Bulbul district in the countryside of Afrin.
Militants of the “al-Nukhbah Army” militia also stole the harvest of 2,200 olive trees belonging to Kurdish citizens in the village of Shekhutka, earlier this month, before the olives were fully ripened.
In the village of Deir Sawan, which belongs to the “Shara / Sharan” sub-district, an armed group affiliated with the “Sultan Murad Division” militia led by Abu Ali, is stealing the olive harvest of the forcibly displaced Kurdish citizens on the pretext that their owners were dealing with the previous “Autonomous Administration”.
Large groups of settlers have been formed from the neighboring villages to work in olive harvest, and their number sometimes exceeds 200 settlers, while the crops of the Kurdish citizens in the village are stolen at night by these groups.
Olive theft has increased this season, and is approaching the entire season in the region, whether by imposing prior royalties, or seizing the fields and preventing harvesting, or imposing a hefty post-season tax of oil .
