Every season, volunteers approach the village council to offer support during the harvest. However, this year there are simply no olives to harvest. Akram Kamal, the owner of Mughayyir’s olive press was one of the villagers directly affected by the destruction of the trees.

“They uprooted 1,600 of my trees, and there are thousands of others that I can no longer access,” Kamal expressed in frustration. Shrugging under the sun, he adds that, “Today, we need to buy olives from other villages if we want to operate the press, even though we used to produce 40,000 litres of oil each year.”

Kamal’s olive press used to employ more than 30 people during the harvest season. But as thousands of trees have been uprooted, and many of the village’s land are inaccessible, his olive press is not capable of hiring many workers. This year, he can only afford one.