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Masked settlers are seen descending from the direction of Yitzhar toward Palestinian olive growers on the lands of Burin, October 20, 2013. (Photo: Munir Qadus / Yesh Din)

A man’s face is bloodied after being attacked by Jewish extremists who descended from the direction of Yitzhar toward Palestinians and Israeli volunteers picking olives in Burin, October 20, 2013. (Photo: Munir Qadus / Yesh Din)

Palestinian farmers from the West Bank village of Qaryut assess the damage done to their olive trees the day before by Israeli settlers, October 20, 2013. (Photo: Ryan Rodrick Beiler/Activestills.org)

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NABLUS (Ma'an) -- Settlers on Sunday attacked a group of Palestinians and international volunteers harvesting olives in the Nablus village of Burin, a Palestinian Authority official said.

Ghassan Daghlas, who monitors settlement activity in the northern West Bank, told Ma'an that settlers from the notorious Yizhar settlement raided the neighboring Palestinian village of Burin and attacked the group with iron rods.

Nemr Issa al-Tirawi, 29, and his brother Qusai, 27, were lightly injured in the attack together with two international volunteers from the Israeli rights group Yesh Din.

According to a 2012 report on Israeli settler violence released by the Palestine Center, a Washington-based nonprofit, every year the olive harvest period sees the highest peak in attacks on Palestinian civilians and property.

In 2012, there were 353 incidents of settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Over 7,500 olive trees were damaged or destroyed by settlers between January and mid-October in 2012, according to OCHA.

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By Michael Omer-Man for 972Mag

Palestinian olive growers and their trees were attacked across the northern West Bank on Sunday, resulting in at least four injuries and the destruction of dozens of trees at the height of the yearly olive harvest.

In the village of Burin on Sunday, Palestinian olive pickers and Israeli volunteers were attacked by masked settlers, who arrived from the direction of the nearby settlement of Yitzhar, notorious for being violent.

Two Palestinians and two Israelis were injured by the settlers who attacked them with stones and iron bars, according to Rabbis for Human Rights, whose volunteers were attacked. The Israelis, aged 71 and 18, were both injured in their faces.

Close to 2,000 Palestinian olive trees have been either uprooted or burned in recent months in areas the Israeli army knows to be flash points, where it should be providing protection for the Palestinian olive pickers, Rabbis for Human Rights wrote in a statement.

Elsewhere in the northern West Bank, Palestinian olive growers from the village of Qaryut on Sunday discovered that settlers damaged their trees the day before. Officials from the Palestinian Ministry of Agriculture who arrived at the scene counted 60 damaged trees belonging to 12 different farmers.

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