Siyada Network unequivocally condemns the recent assault carried out by the Zionist occupation forces against the offices of the Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC) in Al-Bireh and Hebron, Palestine, on 1 December 2025. The assault involved the forcible raid and closure of the offices, the destruction of property and equipment, the confiscation of devices and documents, and the arbitrary arrest of some individuals present. These actions constitute grave breaches of international humanitarian law, including the protections afforded to civilian objects and to development and humanitarian institutions.
This attack comes as a continuation of the occupation’s ongoing practices targeting Palestinian civil society organizations and their staff, with the aim of undermining the foundations of the Palestinian economy and eroding the people’s ability to remain resilient.
The assault further targeted the Local Seed Bank, destroying its reservoir of indigenous seeds, an invaluable component of Palestine’s agricultural genetic heritage and an essential pillar of food sovereignty. This follows the destruction and bulldozing earlier this year of a seed propagation unit affiliated with the Seed Bank in southern Hebron, underscoring a systematic policy aimed at depriving Palestinians of the means to produce their own food and to exercise sovereignty over their land and resources.
The obstruction of the work of agricultural civil society and developmental organizations, that support farmers, strengthen their resilience on the land, and sustain food production, constitutes a direct hit to the Palestinian agricultural sector, a fundamental violation of the Palestinian people’s right to food sovereignty, and a deliberate weakening of farmers’ ability to remain steadfast.
Siyada Network calls for the following urgent actions:
- The immediate release of all detainees, and the reopening and unhindered functioning of all local institutions’ offices.
- The boycott of Israeli agricultural corporations that appropriate Palestinian heirloom seeds, subject them to genetic modification and intellectual property claims, and commercialize them in ways that deepen structural dependency and dispossess communities of their inherent right to reproduce and exchange their own seeds.
- Social movements, peasant organizations, agricultural unions, and international human rights and development institutions to adopt a clear and uncompromising stance against this aggression, and to recognize the targeting of Palestinian agricultural institutions as an attack on the global struggle for food sovereignty and social justice.
- Global peasant movements and organizations, as well as activists worldwide, to develop all possible means and tools to protect Palestinian local seeds from theft and destruction.
Siyada Network reaffirms its unwavering solidarity with the Palestinian people and their right to sovereignty over their land, resources, and food.
Siyada Network
03-12-2025
- Read the statement in Arabic from: The Link
