- Title: 13 years on, Palestinian pays tribute to father's legacy at bee farm
- Date: 20th November 2019
- Summary: VARIOUS OF BA'A LOOKING AT PICTURES OF FATHER AND FARM
- Embargoed: 4th December 2019 10:02
- Keywords: Palestinian beekeeper Palestinians Bee farms in Gaza Palestinians in Gaza Israel Israelis
- Location: BEIT HANOUN, GAZA
- City: BEIT HANOUN, GAZA
- Country: Palestinian Territories
- Topics: Crime/Law/Justice
- Reuters ID: LVA002B6HAMAH
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Samar al-Ba'a was only 15 when her father was killed in an Israeli offensive in Gaza in 2006. Thirteen years later, Ba'a is now walking around bee colonies at her father's farm in Gaza's Beit Hanoun, keeping his memory alive.
Due to lack of sufficient family funds, the farm was closed for the 12 years since her father's death. He died only three days before the farm itself was destroyed in the fighting between the Israeli army and Palestinian militants in the summer of 2006.
Ba'a farm is only 300 metres away from the borders with Israel. But the continuous threat of being subject to gunfire, she says, only made her more adamant on working at the farm that she reopened in 2018 after she secured funding from international donor organisations.
She is now providing for her family and getting closer to her father, whose presence she feels when she's working in the farm, she says.
She collects the honey only once a year from 45 beehives at the farm in order not to over-harvest and endanger the bees, which struggle to survive occasional tear gas bombs fired from the Israeli side of the border.
Ba'a produces nearly 130 kilograms of pure honey annually and hopes she can expand her farm to include up to 120 beehives.
She used to sell her production for 90 Shekels ($26) per kilo, but difficult economic conditions in the besieged strip forced her to reduce the price to 70 shekels ($20).
(Production: Suheir Sheikh, Fadi Shana, Nehad Khalil, Roleen Tafakji) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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