LONDON: Religious leaders and heads of Jerusalem churches condemned the recent attack by Israeli settlers on Palestinian olive harvesters and a visiting European diplomatic delegation in Taybeh village, located northeast of Ramallah.

They said Saturday’s “wild and heinous” attack was not “an isolated incident.”

“(It is part of) a wide-scale terror by settlers, which is reaching a peak during this time of the olive harvest, when families go to their lands to collect what they need to live and renew their generations-long bond with their lands,” they said in a statement.

They warned about a religious ruling issued by Dov Lior, a hardline Jewish rabbi, which permitted the theft of olives from Palestinian orchards in the occupied West Bank.

“In this regard, we consider the religious ruling recently published, allowing Jews to take the olives of Palestinians, as unfounded, very worrying and dangerous, and absolutely unacceptable. We very much appreciate that several rabbis and Jewish voices have publicly rejected it,” they said.

Settlers have carried out at least 647 attacks since late September, including stealing olives, cutting down or burning trees, and seizing crops, according to the Palestine News Agency.

October traditionally marks the start of the harvest for Palestinians, many of whom regard olive trees as a national and cultural symbol. The Palestinian Ministry of Agriculture reported this month that more than 98,000 olive trees have been damaged in the West Bank over the past three years due to Israeli policies and violent actions by settlers, resulting in a financial loss for farmers of $66 million.