Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu moved today to deepen Israel’s settler footprint in the occupied West Bank, ordering new outposts after a deadly confrontation that killed four Palestinians and two Israelis.
The violence broke out near the Havat Gilad settlement and the adjacent Palestinian village of Tell, an area within territory Israel has occupied since 1967.
More than 500,000 Israelis live in West Bank settlements, not including east Jerusalem, alongside a Palestinian population of roughly three million.
The West Bank has seen a sharp escalation in violence since the war in Gaza was triggered by Hamas’s 7 October, 2023 attack on Israel.
Netanyahu set out a package of measures that included raids in Palestinian villages suspected of sheltering militants and “accelerating the legalisation of farm outposts and establishment of new ones” in the West Bank.
Under international law, all Israeli settlements are considered illegal, while outposts are typically smaller communities built without formal government authorisation and are therefore also illegal under Israeli law.
Often planted on hilltops, they commonly begin as a handful of mobile homes erected overnight by small settler groups seeking eventual recognition as an official settlement.
Israeli soldiers use tear gas to disperse Palestinians who gathered as fire blazed near the Israeli settlement of Havat Gilad, west of Nablus in the occupied West Bank, last weekend
Havat Gilad was the scene of attacks last weekend.
Walid Zidan, who heads the Tell village council, said today’s clashes began when about 20 settlers entered the village.
“Villagers came out to defend their homes and property. Clashes and physical altercations broke out between the residents and the settlers,” Mr Zidan told AFP.
“Israeli soldiers were present and together with the settlers began opening fire … it was the settlers who stormed the village, with the intention of killing, vandalising and setting property on fire.”
Arrests
The Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah said four Palestinians were killed and four others wounded in the confrontation.
At two hospitals in nearby Nablus, grieving Palestinian relatives gathered around the bodies of the victims, an AFP journalist reported.
Not long afterwards, Israeli troops arrived at one hospital and took away a man injured in the clash, along with his brother.
An AFP journalist at the scene saw soldiers remove at least one handcuffed man from the hospital.
The Israeli military said troops arrested two men from the Nablus hospital who had participated in the clashes.
According to the military, Friday’s violence in Tell involved dozens of Palestinians and Israeli civilians.
Palestinian security personnel arrive at the site of clashes on the outskirts of Tell in the occupied West Bank today
A military official said soldiers and an emergency response security team from Havat Gilad were dispatched to the area.
“During the confrontation, shots were fired on both sides and a weapon belonging to a member of the emergency response security team was stolen by a Palestinian terrorist,” the official said.
“One member of the security team was killed during the incident and additional security members were injured,” he said.
The official said the clashes in Tell later subsided.
‘Extensive’ operation
Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency service said a man in his thirties was declared dead near Havat Gilad.
Two other people, both in their twenties, were airlifted by helicopter with gunshot wounds, including one who was seriously injured.
The military later said a second Israeli, an officer, had also been killed in the violence.
AFP journalists could not reach the scene because Israeli forces had blocked roads throughout the area.
The Israeli military said it was preparing an “extensive counterterrorism operational activity” in the West Bank and had suspended soldiers’ leave in the territory.
“We are pursuing every terrorist involved in the attack,” military chief Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir said during a visit to Tell, according to a statement.
Palestinians also reported further episodes of settler-related violence in the northern West Bank.
In Farata, another village near Havat Gilad, settlers attacked the community, according to local council head Abdel Moneim Shanneh.
“The settlers set fire to the olive groves… The army prevented young men from the village from extinguishing fires and opened fire on them,” he said.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said its crews transported eight people wounded in the attack, six of them hit by live fire.
The Palestinian Red Crescent also said two men were injured in a separate settler attack in Sarra, a village near Nablus.
Israeli figures indicate that at least 48 Israelis, among them civilians and members of the security forces, have been killed in Palestinian attacks or during Israeli military operations since the Gaza war began.
An AFP tally based on Palestinian health ministry data shows that Israeli soldiers or settlers have killed at least 1,094 Palestinians, including militants and civilians, during the same period.
