HUMAN Rights Watch accused Jewish settlers in the West Bank yesterday of using Palestinian child labour on their farms in violation of international law.

It alleged that the settlement farms, most of them in the Jordan Valley, employed children as young as 11 on low wages and in dangerous conditions.

A 74-page report by the New York-based group said that hundreds of children worked in the settlement farms, often in the blazing heat, carrying heavy loads and exposed to hazardous pesticides.

Israel captured the West Bank from Jordan in the 1967 war and has built dozens of settlements there since.

Palestinians from nearby villages often find employment there in construction and agriculture.

Human Rights Watch said that it had interviewed 38 children and 12 adults in Palestinian communities in the Jordan Valley.

According to the group, Palestinian children often drop out of school to pick, clean and pack asparagus, tomatoes, aubergines, peppers, onions and dates, among other crops.

International law — as well as Israeli and Palestinian law — sets the minimum age of employment at 15, but many interviewed said they had started at 13 or 14.

“Israel’s settlements are profiting from rights abuses against Palestinian children,” warned Human Rights Watch Middle East and North Africa director Sarah Leah Whitson.

“Children from communities impoverished by Israel’s discrimination and settlement policies are dropping out of school and taking on dangerous work because they feel that they have no alternatives, while Israel turns a blind eye.”

Israel’s Foreign Ministry said the report was being studied and that a formal reaction would be forthcoming.

But the settlers’ Jordan Valley regional council head David Elhayani rejected the findings, claiming that the alleged accounts were fraudulent.

He insisted that, although the council employed 6,000 Palestinians every day, none of them were children.

“It is a horrific lie,” Mr Elhayani claimed on Israel’s Army Radio.

“There is no justification for employing children, not just morally and legally but financially as well.”

By Our Foreign Desk