There have never been so many deaths among Palestinians in twenty years, and there are fears that violence could escalate
Since October 7, the day Hamas attacked Israeli civilians, 158 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli soldiers or settlers. The Israeli government and army’s response to the October 7 attacks focused on the Gaza Strip and the border with Lebanon, but military operations also increased significantly in the West Bank. More Palestinians were killed in the West Bank in one month than last year, which was already the worst of the last twenty.
Violence was already on the rise before the war with Hamas broke out, but it has continued to grow steadily since then: Palestinians were largely killed by soldiers, but increasing incidents of violence were caused by armed civilians, who are among the most extremist groups of Israeli settlers. Since October 7, some have sought revenge for Hamas’ attacks on civilians, while others have simply taken advantage of the situation and the significant indifference – and in some cases support – of the Israeli army. Eight Palestinians, including a child, were killed, according to the UN, by the settlers, who carried out 200 separate attacks: dozens of people were injured and over 150 properties were damaged or destroyed.
Yonatan Kanonich of Yesh Din, an independent Israeli organization that monitors Israeli settlements in the West Bank, told the Economist: “If the soldiers did nothing to protect Palestinians from attacks before, they are now joining the settlers in carrying them out. “It is no longer even possible to distinguish between soldiers and settlers: civilians now wear military uniforms or clothing, and everyone is armed, they are now the same.”
Tulakrem refugee camp in the West Bank (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)
How the West Bank is governed
The West Bank region lies between Israel, Jordan and the Dead Sea and was occupied militarily by Israel in the Six-Day War in 1967. Today, on paper, it is controlled by the Palestinian Authority and therefore by Fatah, the party of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, but in reality Israel exercises almost complete power over the territory: Palestinian citizens are subject to Israeli military law and extensive Control, with frequent checkpoints and military blockades.
Since 1967, many Israeli colonies have been established in the West Bank, that is, settlements of Israeli citizens on Palestinian territory, which are considered illegal by the vast majority of the international community. Over the years, right-wing governments under Netanyahu have gradually expanded it. Today there are almost 300 colonies in which around 700,000 Israelis live: 200,000 are in East Jerusalem, the others in the West Bank.
The 1993 Oslo Accords (which for the first time recognized Israel and Palestine as legitimate interlocutors and which should have initiated a process to end the conflict) provided for three different, temporary jurisdictions in different areas of the West Bank: 18 percent (Area A, yellow in the map) were under the control of the Palestinian Authority, 22 percent were under joint control (Area B, orange), and the remaining 60 percent were under Israeli control (Area C, white). ). Most Palestinians live in the first two areas, which, however, have no territorial continuity but are interrupted by Israeli-controlled sectors and by roads that are inaccessible to Palestinians.
Around 600,000 Palestinians live in the Israeli-controlled areas: a third of the communities have no access to a primary school (children have to travel long distances to get there), 70 percent of the houses are not connected to the water network, half of the population is far from basic medical facilities: to reach them you have to travel long distances or pass through various checkpoints.
The Palestinian Authority independently controls a very small part of the West Bank and acts in cooperation with the Israeli army for the rest. In many areas, the security forces, estimated to number around 10,000 soldiers and agents, have no jurisdiction or freedom of movement, which is why they are largely unpopular among Palestinians. It is seen as incapable of defending the population, cooperative with Israel and largely corrupt. The Palestinian Authority is an expression of Fatah, the main secular and moderate party in the Palestinian political scene, led by 87-year-old Mahmoud Abbas, also known as Abu Mazen.
The United States, through Secretary of State Antony Blinken, expressed hope on Wednesday that at the end of the war the Gaza Strip government will be united with that of the West Bank under the control of the Palestinian Authority. The project also appears complex due to the great unpopularity of Fatah, which has not organized elections since 2006 in order to prevent Hamas’s likely success in the West Bank.
The impact of a settler raid on Turmus Ayya (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
The settlers’ weapons
In this already extremely unbalanced context, the installation of the most right-wing government in Israel’s history has given new impetus and ambition to Israeli settlers in the West Bank. The Netanyahu government has converted large parts of the Israeli army into a kind of “private militia” to defend the settlers, and ultranationalist or far-right figures such as Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich have been given broad powers and delegations over the West Bank. NGOs and Palestinian residents are increasingly denouncing indiscriminate raids by settlers and soldiers, which they say represent a coordinated plan to intimidate and displace Palestinians: 13 Palestinian settlements near Hebron were abandoned after repeated violence and were never prosecuted by authorities .
Last month, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir launched a program to provide Israeli settlers with weapons to “protect settlements and cities.” The project has also worried the United States: the Israeli government has actually turned to American companies to purchase 24,000 automatic and semi-automatic weapons: a total order worth $34 million that requires State Department approval. Israel announced that the weapons would be used by police, but the U.S. government carried out further inspections amid concerns that the weapons would instead be distributed to settlers.
The pastoral village of al-Baqa was abandoned by residents in July (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo, File)
The land of the shepherds
Over the years, Israel’s colonies have grown larger thanks to continued population growth and the continued construction of houses. In recent years, international NGOs and media have identified a new method of gaining faster control over large areas of land linked to pastoralism. Large parts of the West Bank are actually occupied by fields and hills used by Palestinian shepherds with their flocks.
Pastoralists often live in small isolated communities and these small villages are increasingly under attack by armed settlers who intimidate and set fire to houses and buildings, forcing residents to leave the areas. In other cases, Palestinian herders are denied access to fields or water and these areas are occupied by Israeli herders. Last year alone, the settlers used this method to occupy 110 square kilometers of land thanks to the “shepherd outposts”: The original settlements of the Israeli settlers in 1967 covered a total of 80 square kilometers. Kerem Navot, an NGO that monitors settler activity in the West Bank, estimates that in five years settlers have taken control of areas equivalent to six percent of the entire West Bank.
A check in Qalqilya (Photo by Uriel Sinai/Getty Images)
The increase in voltage
Thanks to a 700-kilometer-long barrier separating the West Bank from its territory and nearly 150 fixed checkpoints on internal roads, Israel maintains control over the area. Since the start of the war, Israeli forces have arrested around 1,500 people in the West Bank, where arms trafficking from Jordan has also increased. In recent days, various governments, including the US and British, have called on Israel to take concrete measures to limit settler violence, citing the danger of a “new intifada,” i.e.
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