A BBC team was interviewing a Palestinian farmer when masked men charged towards them.
www.bbc.com
Israeli forces on Monday detained Palestinian Culture Minister Imad Hamdan and members of his delegation during a visit to Kafr Ni’ma, west of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, local media said. …
www.middleeastmonitor.com
Israel has given final approval for a controversial settlement project that would effectively cut the occupied West Bank in two.
apnews.com
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www.timesofisrael.com
Yes, the settlers have stepped up their activities on the west bank.
Settlement expansion has been going on for decades. It’s not just an uptick in activity—it’s part of a long-standing state policy that began after 1967* and has accelerated under right-wing governments. *Or one could argue it started in 1949**. ** Or the 15th century BCE. etc etc.
No, it's not. Israel is a democracy. There's a multitude of factors involved. A major problem is that the Jewish settlers are mavericks doing their own thing, cleverly abusing the intent if the law.
Its one of those situations where its easier to get forgiveness than permission.
Netanyahu has been allied to the religious nutcases who promote the settlers. Which have allowed the settlers to be more brazen.
But he's heading a coalition government. Netanyahu can't just do what he wants. He's got to get a majority of the parliament/Knesset with him. Which is difficult for him when trying to give land to the settlers. But sometimes it happens
This misrepresents reality. Settlement construction requires state permits, planning approvals, and infrastructure (roads, electricity, water, security). These are provided by the Israeli state. Even so-called “illegal outposts” are often retroactively legalized by the government. If settlers were merely “rogue actors,” the state could dismantle settlements (as Israel did in Gaza in 2005). Instead, successive governments have expanded them.
They're doing it while the Israeli government are busy elsewhere.
The government is not “too busy to notice”—it actively approves, funds, and protects settlements. The latest cabinet decision (see the AP and Times of Israel links above) shows that Netanyahu’s coalition explicitly supports settlement growth, not just as a side effect, but as a central policy goal.
You are conflating the different parts of Israels policy. As Israeli citizens they need to be protected. Even when they behave like cunts.
Yes, Netanyahu's party. Not all Jews. Netanyahu is at he head of a coalition. Most Israelis do not support settler expansion
Those are misleading weasley words. A plurality of Israelis are not anti-settlement. Instead, a plurality are pro-settlement. As already cited, 40% pro, 35% against. The rest undecided. You ought not then oversimplify that into most do not support in order to make it look like most are against. That’s why pro-settlement parties consistently win enough seats to form governments.* Saying “most don’t support” ignores how parliamentary politics works: a large enough minority (30–40%) can dominate policy if they hold coalition leverage or, as in this case, there are also many undecideds.
* that and the fact that the last best popular opposition was assassinated.
They're not good people. I won't defend them.
But earlier you defended them as Jews pushed out of urban centers, not as religious extremists. That inconsistency matters—because the settlement movement isn’t just a handful of radicals. It has state sanction and broad political support.
I didn't defend them. Someone doing a bad thing for economic reasons, is still doing a bad thing.
It doesn't have broad political support. It has had support by the sitting prime minister. Which is nice. But most Israelis are smart enough to understand the policy will only lead to more conflict
see above.
Almost all other Jews hate them.
That’s not borne out by the data. Surveys consistently show a divided public: for example, a 2023 Israel Democracy Institute poll found
40% of Jewish Israelis support settlement expansion, 35% oppose, and the rest are neutral or unsure. Unsurprisingly, support is strongest among the religious and nationalist right—the very parties in Netanyahu’s government. That’s not “almost all Jews hate them”; it’s a society deeply split.
That depends completely how those questions are posed.
Another big reason the settlers are hated is because they often smell. They often have dumb religious rules about washing and wear wool suits in the desert heat. And are poor, so they have to travel on crowded busses.
Was that in your survey data?
That is an irrelevant distraction.
Because they’re the source of so much friction with the Palestinians.
Settler behavior is a major driver of friction, yes. But the real issue is systemic: for decades, Israeli governments have not only tolerated but actively enabled settlement expansion. This doesn’t excuse violence on either side—but it means the problem isn’t just a few “bad apples.” It’s a state-backed project that undermines any chance of a Palestinian state.
Its just not true. The Israeli government has managed to push through some Israeli settler expansion bills. You make it sound like a govornment policy
If expanding the settlements was official Israeli policy, they'd just take it over and get it over with. Israel controls the west bank.
False dichotomy. Israel has pursued a policy of “creeping annexation”: building settlements, expanding jurisdiction, and fragmenting Palestinian areas while stopping short of formal annexation (to avoid global backlash and maintain U.S. aid). Just because Israel hasn’t annexed everything doesn’t mean it isn’t official policy. It means the policy is incremental, balancing domestic goals with international pressure.
There's nothing to stop them. And they did win the Six day war fair and square. They have every right to take it over permanently.
International law is clear here: military conquest does not grant sovereignty. UN Security Council Resolution 242 (1967), which the U.S. itself drafted, calls for withdrawal from occupied territories. Every U.S. administration since 1967—Republican and Democrat—has opposed settlement expansion as illegitimate. So “winning a war” is not a legal justification for colonizing territory.
How about giving Israel some credit when they are acting nice to the Palestinians?
I don’t think this is about denying that individual acts of restraint or humanitarian aid occur. The issue is systemic policy, not isolated gestures. When the state continues to authorize settlement construction, subsidize settlers, and deploy the IDF to protect them, those actions outweigh the occasional “credit.” One doesn’t erase the other.
Or to put it another way. If Jews are criticised and vilified no matter what they do, why would they bother treating the Palestinians fairly?
Israel has been extremely well behaved in the current war. But they only get shit and are accused of rediculous stuff like genocide. When the propaganda war is this skewed against them, why wouldn't they stop caring eventually?
Saying Israel is “extremely well behaved” ignores the scale of civilian casualties and displacement that the world is witnessing.
But it's not like the Palestinians on the west bank doesn't retaliate. Which is why the IDF is forced to get involved. They'd rather not. Because there's a war on elsewhere
The IDF isn’t reluctantly dragged in—it’s ordered in. Those orders come from a government whose stated policy is to “thwart a Palestinian state” (Netanyahu’s own words in the Times of Israel link). The IDF is not a monolith; like Israeli society itself, it reflects a range of political views. But as an institution, it carries out government directives. Under this government, those directives overwhelmingly support settlement expansion and suppression of Palestinian resistance. That’s not a temporary diversion from “the real war”—it’s part of a long-term strategy.
If you think Israel wants to have troops anywhere but in Gaza right now, then you don't understand how wars work. The settler stuff is NOT what Israel wants to have to divert troops to right now.
I understand your point, but this is where the logic doesn’t quite hold. If Israel truly didn’t “want” to divert troops to the West Bank right now, then the obvious solution would be to freeze settlement expansion and rein in settler violence so that those forces could be concentrated in Gaza.
But the opposite has happened: Netanyahu himself openly said in January 2024 that he is “proud” to have blocked the establishment of a Palestinian state and that Israel must “control all the territory west of the Jordan” indefinitely. That is not a reluctant diversion—it’s a stated political objective. That isn't any different than now in 2025 or way before the Gaza conflict, going back to 2000, i.e. read the Times of Israel article:
He (Netanyahu) recalls visiting 25 years ago, and saying that “we would do everything to ensure our continued hold on the Land of Israel, to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, to thwart the attempts that existed then — and unfortunately still exist — to try to uproot us from here. Thank God, what I promised — we kept.”
Emphasis added.
This was, of course, 5 years after the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin which contributed to the eventual collapse of the Oslo Accords. And it was deacdes prior to the Gaza conflict.
So yes, Israel may tactically
prefer to keep all troops focused on Gaza in the short term, but strategically the government has chosen to maintain and even expand its footprint in the West Bank. Those two things can’t both be true: you can’t claim you “don’t want” to use troops there while also advancing policies that require exactly that.
www.thefp.com
