Bombed relentlessly by the Israeli Army after the attacks carried out by Hamas on October 7, the Gaza Strip has been the center of attention of the international community. However, another wave of violence, less visible, also affects Palestinians in the West Bank, who are targets of Israeli settlers, who have the support of their Army.
Threats, intimidations, robberies, murders, villages stripped of their inhabitants… The number of incidents involving Israeli settlers has increased in the occupied West Bank since the Hamas attack on October 7, while the Army carries out deadly attacks in the Gaza Strip.
This wave of violence has led several European capitals to send alerts in recent hours. Berlin urged Israel, on Monday, October 30, to “protect” Palestinians from “extremist settlers”, while France condemned, the day before, the “inadmissible violence” perpetrated against Palestinian civilians.
“France strongly condemns the settler attacks that led to the deaths of several Palestinian civilians in recent days in Qusra and El-Sawiya, as well as the forced departure of several communities,” reads a statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The Foreign Office is referring here to the deadly October 11 attack on the village of Qusra and the murder of Bilal Abou Salah, 40, a Palestinian killed on Saturday by an Israeli settler in the village of El-Sawiya.
According to the city’s mayor, contacted by AFP, Bilal Abou Salah was murdered while picking olives with other members of his family on their land, near the security fence of an Israeli colony.
“They were attacked by four settlers, and one of them, armed with an M16 rifle, fired without warning. Abou Salah was shot in the chest and died in front of his family and children,” explained the leader of this small town. south of Nablus.
An acceleration of colonization
To escape this wave of violence fueled by the desire for revenge, on the part of a part of the Israeli population, since the Hamas attack on October 7, some Palestinians no longer have any option but to pack their bags.
Several human rights NGOs have reported in recent days numerous cases of villages stripped of their inhabitants under pressure from settlers, such as in Susya, Khirbet Zanuta or A’nizan, near Hebron.
Another example in Wadi al-Seeq, where dozens of settlers accompanied by Israeli soldiers expelled its 200 inhabitants from the Bedouin community in less than an hour.
“We can’t sleep anymore, it’s a nightmare,” Alia Mlihat, a resident of Mu’arrajat, another Bedouin village between Ramallah and Jericho, tells AFP, who fears she will be next on the list. “With the war, we see that the settlers have more weapons. It is very difficult, we wonder what will happen.”
A few days after the Hamas attacks, far-right Israeli Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir launched a campaign to distribute thousands of assault rifles to civilian “security units,” especially in the colonies, which has fear an increase in violence in the West Bank.
Yes ok tensions are not new between the three million Palestinians and the more than 490,000 Israeli settlers, whose presence is illegal under international law, Observers note a desire to accelerate colonization since the Hamas attacks.
“The settlers know that all the attention is focused on Gaza, so they take advantage of it,” says Dror Sadot, spokesperson for B’Tselem, the Israeli human rights information center in the Occupied Territories. “It is impossible to record all attacks, but since October 7, at least 13 communities have been forced to flee. Additionally, we estimate that seven people have been killed by Israeli settlers.”
“A new front”
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), 607 people have had to abandon their lands in the West Bank since the Hamas attacks. In many cases, these eviction operations are carried out with the approval of the Israeli military, which allows them to occur or provides support to the settlers.
“It is often difficult to distinguish between settlers and the Army, as many settlers are partially dressed in uniforms. There are also soldiers on leave who are settlers. They do not necessarily have uniforms, but they carry military weapons,” says Dror Sadot.
The villages attacked since October 7 are all in Area C of the West Bank, under exclusive security and administrative control of the State of Israel according to the 1993 Oslo Accords. The Israeli far right has dreamed for many years of annexing this area , which represents 60% of the West Bank territory divided into three sectors, since it concentrates most of the fertile lands and natural resources.
This strategy of expulsion of populations living in the areas of the West Bank under Army control dates back to 2017. The stated objective of the settlers is to seize land and pastures and prevent any new Palestinian construction, most of which is financed by the European Union.
The rise to power of Jewish supremacists within the coalition formed last year by Benjamin Netanyahu has allowed the settlers to gain unexpected political support. The attacks of October 7 have only reinforced their determination to continue this de facto annexation of Zone C.
“Many Israelis are furious about what the settlers are currently doing. While everyone has their eyes on Gaza and the hostages, and while people are mourning, it seems that they are trying to open a new front in the West Bank,” Dror laments. Sadot.
120 Palestinians killed in West Bank
In parallel with the attacks carried out by settlers, the Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip has been accompanied by a tightening of the restrictions imposed on Palestinians in the occupied West Bank: closure of the main checkpoints, increased security checks, waves of arrests…
Travel between cities and towns has become increasingly dangerous according to Al-Jazeera, which reports the testimony of a Palestinian driver beaten “for no reason” by Israeli soldiers along with two passengers from Gaza.
The situation was already very tense before the war with Hamas, and appears to be becoming increasingly explosive in the West Bank. Four Palestinians were killed at dawn on Monday in an attack by the Israeli Army in Jenin, according to the Palestinian Authority Ministry of Health.
According to the same source, another five people were killed on Sunday in “anti-terrorist” operations in Nablus, Beit Rima (northwest of Ramallah), Bethlehem and Tamoun, north of Jenin.
In total, nearly 120 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by gunfire by Israeli soldiers or settlers since the start of the war between Hamas and Israel.
This article was adapted from its original in French
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