Sightseers touring the mounts and hills of West Bank cities and villages will be captivated by all kinds of natural beauty in olive groves especially the eye-catching colors of olive fruits including the rare white olive.
The various colors of olive fruits hanging down from tree branches make visitors feel tempted to use their cellphones or cameras to take pictures of such fascinating natural moments.
A reporter for the Palestinian Information Center (PIC) recently visited olive groves in mountainous rural areas of the central and northern West Bank and photographed the staggering beauty of olives and trees.
Farmer Ahmed Mustafa from Salfit says that Palestinian wild olive fruits have many colors most outstandingly the rare white olive which can be found in Salfit groves in few quantities.
There are different types of olive trees and each one has its unique fruits with dissimilar shapes sizes and colors but regardless of how they look this fruit has many health medicinal and nutritional benefits making it the world’s healthiest food.
Great benefits of olives
Olives are a powerful and delicious fruit that can provide the human body with a range of health benefits including their ability to protect against heart diseases prevent bone loss and various cancers reduce inflammation and arthritis and improve digestion. They help to soothe allergic reactions improve blood circulation boost cognitive function defend against infections and lower blood pressure.
The health and medicinal benefits of Palestinian olives come mainly from its nutrients vitamins minerals and organic compounds including iron fiber copper vitamin E phenolic compounds oleic acid and a variety of antioxidants.
Olive harvest season in Palestine
The Palestinians call the olive harvest season “a wedding” that is marked in October every year although such occasion is disturbed by the Israeli separation wall restrictions on farmers’ access to their lands and Jewish settlers’ assaults and their acts of sabotage which they commit under military protection.
Local researcher Khaled Maali says that Israel’s settlement activities and separation wall devoured vast tracts of olive land in Salfit and other areas of the West Bank but Israel’s violations can never dissuade the Palestinian farmer from celebrating and enjoying the olive harvest season.
According to Maali the olive season is a festival for Palestinian farmers who “enjoy seeing the view of olive fruits hanging down from trees as well as collecting and pressing them.”
Olive crops are considered a major source of income for West Bank farmers but they incur heavy losses every year as a result of the repeated acts of sabotage in their groves by Jewish settlers and the movement restrictions imposed on them by the Israeli army especially during the harvest season the researcher affirms.
