According to Vikram Sura, Itamar settlers used to trade with local farmers and visit Yanun to enjoy refreshments like cardamom-spiced coffee and mint tea there. In the mid-late 1990s, Itamar began 'annexing' hills stretching out from the settlement towards Yanun. Trailer homes from Itamar began to be set up along the ridge overlooking the village. The last, Givot Olam (hills of the universe), looking down over the village of Yanun, was created by Avri Ran, who obtained the land by trespassing on Yanun-owned areas and on Israeli state land, and assaulting any Palestinians who approached his settlement. Though they felt surrounded, the Yanun villagers did not feel vulnerable. Relations changed with the outbreak of the Al-Aqsa Intifada in October 2000, when 13 Israeli Arabs were shot dead during the suppression of a riot protesting the visit of Ariel Sharon to the Temple Mount. Yanun lies far from the main areas where Palestinian militants and the IDF subsequently clashed, and till then grievances between the two communities were less than the norm. Over the next three years, Palestinian militants killed roughly 11 Itamar settlers. A Californian who made aliyah to Itamar later accused Yanun of having aided these terrorists. No member of the village has been linked to any attack on settlers. The youths on Avri Ran's hilltop outpost argue that they have a prerogative to respond with violence when they feel their Palestinian neighbours are preventing them from realizing their right, as legal heirs of God's bequest, to work the land.