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01/08/2006:

"Mazuz urges compensation for Arabs whose olive trees axed"

Attorney General Menachem Mazuz told the cabinet on Sunday that Israel should give monetary compensation to Palestinians whose olive trees have been cut down.

According to Mazuz, 2,400 trees were axed in a recent wave of vandalism in the West Bank, apparently by militant settlers.

"There's a pervasive feeling of lawlessness," Mazuz said, adding, "This phenomenon is part of a wider phenomenon of a lack of law enforcement against Israelis in the territories."

The attorney general said that after the state pays the Palestinians the guilty parties - presumably settlers - will, in turn, need to compensate the state.

"All security and law enforcement officials must devote themselves to a determined struggle against this grave phenomenon, and those responsible must be caught and brought to trial."
haaretz.com