Israeli settler violence
are the target of violence by Israeli settlers and their supporters, predominantly in the West Bank. In November 2021, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz discussed the steep rise in the number of incidents between settlers and Palestinians in the West Bank, many of which result from attacks by residents of illegal settler outposts on Palestinians from neighboring villages. Settler violence also includes acts known as price tag attacks that are in response to actions by the Israeli government, usually against Palestinian targets and occasionally against Israeli security forces in the West Bank.
Palestinian police are forbidden from reacting to acts of violence by Israeli settlers, a fact which diminishes their credibility among Palestinians. Between January and November 2008, 515 criminal suits were opened by Israel against settlers for violence against Arabs or Israeli security forces; 502 of these involved "right wing radicals" while 13 involved "left wing anarchists". In 2008, the senior Israeli commander in the West Bank said that a hard core of a few hundred activists were involved in violence against the Palestinians and Israeli soldiers. Some prominent Jewish religious figures living in the occupied territories, as well as Israeli government officials, have condemned and expressed outrage over such behavior, while religious justifications for settler killings have also been given. Israeli media said the defense establishment began taking a harder line against unruly settlers starting in 2008. In 2011 the BBC reported that "vast majority of settlers are non-violent but some within the Israeli government acknowledge a growing problem with extremists." UN figures from 2011 showed that 90% of complaints filed against settlers by Palestinians with the Israeli police never led to indictment.
In the 21st century, there has been a steady increase in violence and terror perpetrated by Israeli settlers against Palestinians. In 2012, an EU heads of mission report found that settler violence had more than tripled in the three years up to 2011. United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs figures state that the annual rate of settler attacks has almost quadrupled between 2006 and 2014. In 2021, there was yet another wave of settler violence which erupted after a 16-year-old settler died in a car chase with Israeli police after having hurled rocks at Palestinians. So far it has resulted in 44 incidents in the span of a few weeks, injuring two Palestinian children. In the latter parts of 2021, there has been a marked increase in settler violence toward Palestinians, condemned at the United Nations Security Council.
This violence increased further following the election of a far-right government in 2022 which proposed to expand Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories, as well as the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel on 7 October 2023. In October 2024 Al Jazeera reported that there were 1,423 recorded incidents of settler violence in the west bank since 7 October, with 321 incidents, Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate, 319 incidents in Nablus Governorate and 298 in Hebron Governorate.
History
Physical violence by settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank started in a systematic manner in 1980, as some religious settlers created a secret organization later referred to as "the Jewish Underground". This group was captured by Israeli law enforcement authorities in 1984. Settler violence received a new boost following the Oslo agreement in 1993. In late 2022, far-right leaders of the Israeli settlement movement were elected into the government of Israel and appointed as prominent ministers; in early 2023, Israeli settler violence increased, which included the Huwara rampage of February 2023. In October 2023, the outbreak of the Gaza war was accompanied by a further escalation in Israeli settler violence in the West Bank. After the war began, the settlers "have acted with near-impunity", wrote BBC News in May 2024.In April 2024, Israeli settlers rampaged through Palestinian villages in the West Bank after the disappearance of Israeli teenager Benjamin Achimeir on 12 April 2024, whose dead body was found a day later. In total, 11 Palestinian villages were attacked, four Palestinians were shot dead and thousands of animals were killed, while a dozen homes and over 100 cars were burned. BBC News, citing messages from Israeli settlers' WhatsApp groups and testimony from Palestinian villagers and officials, described the rampage as appearing to be an "organised campaign of revenge … carried out by co-ordinated groups on the ground, and targeted against ordinary Palestinians with no apparent connection to the murder of Benjamin Achimeir other than the bad luck of living nearby."
The 2025 Israel–Hamas war ceasefire was agreed upon in January, which included the release of Palestinian prisoners; on 17 January 2025, Defense Minister Israel Katz revealed the release of all seven Jewish Israelis detained for allegedly committing settler violence, with the rationale: "It is better for the families of Jewish settlers to be happy than the families of released terrorists". On 19 January, Israelis burned homes and vehicles in the villages of Turmus Ayya, Sinjil and Ein Siniya in the West Bank; the Israeli military said that it "broke up the riots and violence" and arrested two suspects. Israeli ultranationalist group 'Fighting for Life' had called for an "offensive initiative" in the West Bank "to destroy their celebrations with an attack", declaring that Israelis "if needed will come to spoil the celebration of the enemy by themselves". On 20 January, Israeli settlers attacked the West Bank villages of Jinsafut and al-Funduq, with no one arrested by 22 January; the Israeli military reported that the settlers first "set fire to property", and later "threw stones and attacked the security forces".
In March 2025, dozens of Israeli settlers attacked Palestinians and property in Jinba, close to Masafer Yatta, reportedly injuring 6 Palestinians, with Israel security forces reporting that this came after reports of attacks against Jews/Israelis south of Masafer Yatta and near Mitzpe Yair; The Times of Israel reported that the Israeli security forces arrested 22 Palestinians from Jinba, and did not arrest any Israeli settlers due to the incident. In April 2025, around 50 Israelis attacked residences and residents of Duma, setting fires, reportedly injuring three Palestinians; Israel security forces said that they conducted efforts to "disperse the violent confrontation" between Israeli civilians and Palestinians, but no arrests were announced. Following the June 2025 settler killing of Audah Hadhaleen, In September 2025 another pogrom was perpetrated in the neighboring Khallit al-Dabe' village.
Israel's settlement policy
Israel has justified its civilian settlements by stating the territories in question are not occupied, but disputed, and that a temporary use of land and buildings for various purposes appears permissible under a plea of military necessity and that the settlements fulfilled security needs. The United Nations affirmed the principle of international law that the continuation of colonialism in all its forms and manifestations is a crime and that colonial peoples have the inherent right to struggle by all necessary means at their disposal against colonial powers and alien domination in exercise of their right of self-determination. National liberation struggles are categorized as international armed conflicts by Article 1 of the Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 to which the majority of states are parties. The International Court of Justice concluded that Israel had breached its obligations under international law by establishing settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and that Israel cannot rely on a right of self-defence or on a state of necessity in order to preclude the wrongfulness of imposing a régime, which is contrary to international law. The Court also concluded that the Israeli régime violates the basic human rights of the Palestinians by impeding the liberty of movement of the inhabitants of the Occupied Palestinian Territory and their exercise of the right to work, to health, to education and to an adequate standard of living.In Hebron, where 500–600 settlers live among 167,000 Palestinians, B'Tselem argues that there have been "grave violations" of Palestinian human rights because of the "presence of the settlers within the city". The organization cites regular incidents of "almost daily physical violence and property damage by settlers in the city", curfews and restrictions of movement that are "among the harshest in the Occupied Territories", and violence by Israeli border policemen and the IDF against Palestinians who live in the city's H2 sector.
Human Rights Watch reports on physical violence against Palestinians by settlers, including, "frequent stoning and shooting at Palestinian cars. In many cases, settlers abuse Palestinians in front of Israeli soldiers or police with little interference from the authorities."
B'Tselem also says that settler actions include "blocking roadways, so as to impede Palestinian life and commerce. The settlers also shoot solar panels on roofs of buildings, torch automobiles, shatter windowpanes and windshields, destroy crops, uproot trees, abuse merchants and owners of stalls in the market. Some of these actions are intended to force Palestinians to leave their homes and farmland, and thereby enable the settlers to gain control of them."
Causes of violence
When an 11-year-old Palestinian girl from Nablus was killed by settlers in 1983, in their defense, the chief rabbi of the Sephardic community reportedly cited a Talmudic text justifying killing an enemy on occasions when one may see from a child's perspective that he or she will grow up to become your enemy. Rabbis have been asked by settler militants to provide rulings to justify acts that are aimed to block peace with, or the return of land to, Palestinians. The theft of Palestinian olive harvests has been justified by some rabbis. Former chief rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu stated that: "Since the land is the inheritance of the People of Israel, planting on this land by gentiles is planting on land that does not belong to them. If someone puts a tree on my land, both the tree and the fruit it yields belongs to me." Some rabbinical extremists cite the biblical edict to exterminate the Amalekites to justify both expelling Palestinians from the land and killing Arab civilians in wartime.One of the causes of violence is settler vigilante action in response to, usually unrelated, acts of Palestinian violence.
Human rights group B'Tselem says that the violence is "a means to harass and intimidate Palestinians" and that the evacuations are a necessary part of the peace process. According to B'Tselem, when a building is evacuated by the Israeli government, settlers lash out at Palestinians because they're "easy victims" and as a means to widen the area under settler control.
Ghassan Daghlas, a Palestinian Authority official who deals with the settlements issue in the northern West Bank, said, "These groups of settlers are organised and support each other...If there's an outpost evacuation, they call people from Hebron to Jenin to stop the Palestinians working on their lands". Michael Sfard, a lawyer with Yesh Din, an Israeli human rights group which monitors the violation of human rights in the Palestinian territories, stated that there are between a few dozen and a few hundred extremist settlers using a tactic called price-tagging: if the government sends police or soldiers to dismantle an outpost that is being built, the settlers make the Palestinian population pay the price. While people in the outpost are confronting the security forces, others start harassing Palestinians, forcing commanders to divert men from the outpost and making them think twice about launching future operations. It's such a big headache that many of the relevant authorities give up without trying and the outposts are quickly rebuilt once the army gives up and leaves.