Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly dismissed settler violence as the actions of a handful of young people. In a Fox News interview this week, he said the violence was the actions of “around 70 kids from broken homes.” This framing is not only factually misleading; it is also politically convenient.
By reducing organized, systematic violence to a welfare problem involving marginal youth, Netanyahu diverts attention away from the state policies that enable, protect, and even encourage these acts. When violence serves clear political objectives and is met with near-total impunity, responsibility lies with those in power.
According to Yesh Din data, law enforcement against settlers who harm Palestinians is virtually nonexistent: 94% of police investigations are closed without indictment. In many of the police investigation files, there is nothing but the victim’s complaint, with no indication that an investigation was conducted.
Interests and objectives
To understand why settler violence is so widespread and why it is not met with deterrence enforcement, we must examine whose interests it serves and what objectives it achieves.
The answer lies not only on the hilltops of the West Bank, but first and foremost in the Knesset building in Jerusalem. More precisely, it lies with the government that openly declared its intention of annexing the West Bank and applying Israeli sovereignty from the moment it was formed. Their vision of Jewish sovereignty leaves no room for Palestinians.
US President Donald Trump may have recently pushed the brakes on formal annexation, but through violence on the ground and structural and legal transformation, Israel has already annexed the West Bank, both in law and in practice.
Two coordinated arms carry out the implementation of the sovereignty vision.
The first arm is the government, which has seized key centers of power and fundamentally transformed Israel’s control over the West Bank.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, operating from within the Defense Ministry, has effectively become Israel’s minister of annexation. From his office, he is dismantling the legal framework of the occupation by transferring authorities from the military to civilian officials aligned with his ideological agenda.
Accelerated construction and legalization
The Settlement Administration he established promotes accelerated construction, infrastructure development, and the legalization of illegal outposts – all exclusively for Jews. This process is reinforced by massive budgets, land allocations, equipment, infrastructure, and legislation designed to ease dispossession and land seizure.
National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has taken control of the police, leading a policy of immunity for violent settlers, resulting in a total lack of deterrence and increased violence. Under the cover of war, he also distributed thousands of firearms to settlers, which are now used to intimidate and terrorize - and perhaps even kill.
The second arm operates on the ground. With the aim of taking over as much land as possible, many new outposts are emerging across the West Bank, and violence has increased dramatically.
Settlers’ efforts are directed at expelling communities not only in Area C [60% of the West Bank, under Israeli control], but also in Area B [22%], which is under Palestinian civilian responsibility [and Israeli security control], and sometimes even in Area A [18%], controlled by the Palestinian Authority.
As the government cannot openly and formally lead a policy of ethnic cleansing, it is carried out by outpost settlers using rifles, clubs, and arson. The sharp rise in the frequency and severity of violence is reflected in a growing number of Palestinians killed by settlers – or by soldiers in settler violence incidents. It is also reflected in an increase in organized, mass attacks on Palestinian villages, communities, and towns in which settlers have initiated raids aimed at terrorizing the defenseless population.
With the state's backing
All of this takes place with the backing of state authorities: The police do not investigate, the army does not intervene, and soldiers either protect the attackers or, in the worst cases, join them.
Attacks are intended to empty entire areas of their Palestinian presence and seize their land. Dozens of Palestinian communities have already been forcibly transferred from their homes because they could no longer endure the lethal combination of state oppression and settler attacks.
Settler violence is not spiraling out of control; it is operating exactly as designed. It reshapes the West Bank, clears Palestinians from their land, and advances annexation without a formal declaration.
The writer is the executive director of Yesh Din.