Israeli Occupation: A Land Uprooted, A Narrative Engineered
In the Jordan Valley’s Ras ‘Ein Al-‘Auja, the theft of 1,500 sheep in March was not just a crime — it was a declaration. Backed by Israeli soldiers and police, settlers descended on the Palestinian community like a swarm, stripping away decades of livelihood in mere minutes. “I spent 27 years building up my flock,” said Ahmed, a local farmer. “It disappeared in 20 minutes.” That theft was only the beginning.
Since then, settler violence has metastasized. Irrigation systems have been torn from the earth. The ancient Al-Auja spring, once a lifeline for generations, now flows not to the Palestinian villages it sustained for centuries, but to the illegal Israeli settlement of Yitav and the Zohar outpost. Water, the most basic human necessity, has become a weapon of control.
The Israeli government, under the direction of Bezalel Smotrich, has transferred West Bank authority from military to civilian hands — his hands — while greenlighting thousands of new settler homes and legalizing previously unauthorized outposts. The result? Since October 2023, 47 Palestinian communities — 1,762 people — have been forcibly displaced. Their pastures are now off-limits, their mountains declared military zones. “They are trying to starve us out of our homes,” Mariam, a shepherd, said. “So they can take our land.”
The olive harvest, a sacred season of labor and tradition, has become a blood-soaked battleground. In village after village — Jabal al-Baten, al-Mughayyir, Jurish, Duma, Burqa, Silwad — Palestinian farmers have been attacked, their trees uprooted, their olives stolen, their bodies beaten, shot, and broken. Soldiers stand by — or join in. Journalists are assaulted. Ambulances are vandalized. Activists are arrested. The land bleeds sap and blood in equal measure.
But the war is not only waged with bullets and bulldozers. It is also fought with pixels and propaganda.
Thousands of miles away, in the pews of American churches, a different kind of campaign is underway. An 86-page federal filing reveals a coordinated Israeli government-backed effort to infiltrate over 200 churches in Texas and beyond. The goal? To flood Christian congregations with pro-Israel messaging, counter pro-Palestinian narratives, and reframe the occupation as divine destiny.
Through geofencing, digital surveillance, and targeted ads, worshippers are tracked and fed curated content. Mobile museums, influencer outreach, and “pastoral resource packages” are deployed to shape hearts and minds. Even historic Black churches are singled out for tailored messaging. “Places of worship have historically been protected spaces,” warned John Litzler of the Texas Baptists’ Christian Life Commission. “This undermines that sacred trust.”
Meanwhile, a parallel campaign — signed by Brad Parscale, former Trump campaign manager — seeks to saturate Gen Z’s social media feeds with state-sponsored narratives, cloaked in the language of anti-antisemitism but aimed squarely at silencing dissent.
And all the while, the death toll in Gaza climbs — 68,234 Palestinians killed in two years of bombardment, according to the UN. The olive trees fall. The sheep are gone. The water is stolen. The land is fenced off. The truth is geofenced.
This is not a conflict. It is a conquest. And it is being livestreamed, sanitized, and sold — one stolen grove, one stolen narrative, one stolen soul at a time.
In the Jordan Valley’s Ras ‘Ein Al-‘Auja, the theft of 1,500 sheep in March was not just a crime — it was a declaration. Backed by Israeli soldiers and police, settlers descended on the Palestinian community like a swarm, stripping away decades of livelihood in mere minutes. “I spent 27 years building up my flock,” said Ahmed, a local farmer. “It disappeared in 20 minutes.” That theft was only the beginning.
Since then, settler violence has metastasized. Irrigation systems have been torn from the earth. The ancient Al-Auja spring, once a lifeline for generations, now flows not to the Palestinian villages it sustained for centuries, but to the illegal Israeli settlement of Yitav and the Zohar outpost. Water, the most basic human necessity, has become a weapon of control.
The Israeli government, under the direction of Bezalel Smotrich, has transferred West Bank authority from military to civilian hands — his hands — while greenlighting thousands of new settler homes and legalizing previously unauthorized outposts. The result? Since October 2023, 47 Palestinian communities — 1,762 people — have been forcibly displaced. Their pastures are now off-limits, their mountains declared military zones. “They are trying to starve us out of our homes,” Mariam, a shepherd, said. “So they can take our land.”
The olive harvest, a sacred season of labor and tradition, has become a blood-soaked battleground. In village after village — Jabal al-Baten, al-Mughayyir, Jurish, Duma, Burqa, Silwad — Palestinian farmers have been attacked, their trees uprooted, their olives stolen, their bodies beaten, shot, and broken. Soldiers stand by — or join in. Journalists are assaulted. Ambulances are vandalized. Activists are arrested. The land bleeds sap and blood in equal measure.
But the war is not only waged with bullets and bulldozers. It is also fought with pixels and propaganda.
Thousands of miles away, in the pews of American churches, a different kind of campaign is underway. An 86-page federal filing reveals a coordinated Israeli government-backed effort to infiltrate over 200 churches in Texas and beyond. The goal? To flood Christian congregations with pro-Israel messaging, counter pro-Palestinian narratives, and reframe the occupation as divine destiny.
Through geofencing, digital surveillance, and targeted ads, worshippers are tracked and fed curated content. Mobile museums, influencer outreach, and “pastoral resource packages” are deployed to shape hearts and minds. Even historic Black churches are singled out for tailored messaging. “Places of worship have historically been protected spaces,” warned John Litzler of the Texas Baptists’ Christian Life Commission. “This undermines that sacred trust.”
Meanwhile, a parallel campaign — signed by Brad Parscale, former Trump campaign manager — seeks to saturate Gen Z’s social media feeds with state-sponsored narratives, cloaked in the language of anti-antisemitism but aimed squarely at silencing dissent.
And all the while, the death toll in Gaza climbs — 68,234 Palestinians killed in two years of bombardment, according to the UN. The olive trees fall. The sheep are gone. The water is stolen. The land is fenced off. The truth is geofenced.
This is not a conflict. It is a conquest. And it is being livestreamed, sanitized, and sold — one stolen grove, one stolen narrative, one stolen soul at a time.