The following is based on a report
entitled "Striking Roots" by the Regavim Association, an NGO working to
ensure the protection of Israel's national lands.
The Palestinian Authority has a plan: to take over broad swathes of Area C - Israeli territory in Judea and Samaria - and include them in the PA-controlled areas that it hopes to turn into a full-fledged state. To this end, its UAWC – Union of Agricultural Work Committees – is its major tool.
Headquartered in Ramallah, the UAWC has more than 65 local chapters of agricultural work committees throughout Judea, Samaria, and Gaza. It employs over 100 people, and its annual budget surpasses 5 million Euros – paid mainly by foreign organizations and sources such as the European Union, the United Nations, France, Norway and Holland. The funding is supplied both directly and indirectly.
The UAWC is connected, both openly and clandestinely, to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terrorist organization. In coordination with PA security forces and legal organizations, it works mainly to take control of Area C lands, under the guise of humanitarian activity for Arab farmers.
Although the UAWC is not a governmental organization, it has a respected national status in the Palestinian Authority. It is in fact the only PA organization with sufficient professional knowledge, practical capabilities, and public standing to successfully execute such broad-ranging projects.
As the main body active in this matter, the UAWC works not only to ensure no redundancies or waste of resources, but mainly to integrate all related activities into the PA's strategic plan to take over and occupy as many key areas as possible in Area C.
The UAWC and the PA work in tandem, administratively and militarily, to advance their common interests of the struggle against Israel. The UAWC still manages to define itself as an apolitical organization, duly registered as an independent body under PA regulations, with no ideological or financial obligations to the PA.
The UAWC also utilizes legal, media and diplomatic channels to prevent the IDF from taking action against their illegal activities.
In a 2017 interview with Alice Rothchild, co-chair of American Jews for a Just Peace-Boston, UAWC Director Fuad Abu Sayyef explained one of his guiding principles: "The PA's consent to cede more than 60% of the West Bank [i.e., the areas defined in the Oslo Agreements as Area C] was a great mistake."
The focus of his organization's activities in Area C clearly shows his intent to rectify this "mistake" and other geographical derivatives of the Oslo Accords.
Our own field trips, aerial photographs and other documentation indicate clearly that these and other declarations, including by senior EU officials, are being carried out apace.
It must be stated clearly: The UAWC activities in Area C are a blatant violation of Israeli sovereignty, and are certainly not coordinated with the IDF, the sovereign body there.
In addition, the UAWC has long openly supported the anti-Israel BDS organization. The 2015 summation of UAWC activities cites the resolution by its Board of Directors to "continue its support of all activities to boycott and reject any type of normalization with Israel… All chapters of the UAWC, both locally and abroad, support absolutely the national campaign to boycott the Israeli occupation and emplace sanctions upon Israel."
The modus operandi of the UAWC in its efforts to take over Israeli territory generally follows the same pattern. It begins by preparing and renovating access roads to the area designated for takeover, and by establishing a water supply system, including piping and reservoirs. The second stage includes agricultural guidance and subsidies to local Arabs who are encouraged to work the lands.
The primary methods of UAWC activities are these:
Breakthrough of Roads: The paving of hundreds of kilometers of agricultural roads that allow access to cultivable land in Area C, including in the Jordan Valley, Gush Etzion, near Ariel and other Samaria areas, Mt. Hevron, eastern Binyamin, and more.
Takeover of Water Sources, such as wells and springs in the vicinity of Israeli communities. This also involves the digging of water cistern networks in desert areas, the construction of drainage basins while diverting existing streams, the laying of hundreds of kilometers of water pipes, water-reservoir construction, and more.
Seizure of land through agricultural activity: This includes planting trees, plowing land, digging and moving earth, building terraces, fencing off areas, and the like.
The various agricultural works are carried out in different frameworks, the most important and wide-ranging of which is a program called Shorashim, Roots. This program is an initiative that began in 2014, and involves thousands of dunams (quarter-acres) in Area C. Shorashim began with farming activities on the eastern slopes of the mountain ridge between southeast Beit Lechem and northern Hevron, much of which is Area C. From there it continued its efforts to create irreversible facts in the rest of Area C.
Such activities don't come cheap. The EU allocated 3.6 million Euros to the Shorashim cause in 2014 – 90% of the overall Shorashim budget for that year. A representative of the EU has visited the area for a briefing and update on the progress of the activities in the area, and on UAWC work in general.
The European Union showed its warm support of these anti-Israel policies at the launching of the Shorashim program in the city of Bethlehem in March 2015. Attending the inauguration conference was then-EU Ambassador to the PA John Rotter, who said, "The projects carried out by the EU for citizens in Area C are essential, especially in the agriculture sector, which is an essential part of the economy ... This initiative will contribute to helping the Palestinian farmers ... and to establishing Palestinian facts on the ground in light of Israel's settlement policy… The UAWC has demonstrated its ability to implement agricultural projects in many Palestinian areas, and relations with the EU are linked to the UAWC's successes."