Settlers’ impunity as elections loom
Last week saw arguably one of the most intense bouts of Israeli army and settler violence against Palestinians since the height of the Second Intifada. It is a moment to contemplate how what used to be a few thousand settlers on the margins now find themselves at the heart of the Israeli establishment.
Settlement pioneers would be astounded at the sheer scale of the settlement industry in 2022. With a population of more than 700,000 all over the West Bank, their leadership is now planning for a population of a million.
They are armed, powerful and unaccountable. Settlers continue to mount attacks on Palestinians at Hawara near Nablus, the northern Jordan Valley, around Ramallah, in East Jerusalem and also in the South Hebron Hills. All of this is more than the usual settler harassment of olive farmers at this time of year. Settlers last week set fire to a Palestinianowned farm near the city of Nablus in the occupied West Bank, killing 30,000 chickens.
It is all part of quotidian life under occupation. Settlers block roads, throw stones at cars and houses, raid villages and farmland, set fields and olive groves alight, rip up crops and subject property to physical assault. Some are happy to hurl Molotov cocktails or use live fire. Even Palestinian children can be targets, especially en route to school.
One reason for settler exuberance is that settlers and their supporters are no longer on the periphery; they are truly welded into the Israeli establishment.
The Israeli army and the settlers work very much in tandem. Time and time again, video evidence shows settlers firing live rounds while the Israeli soldiers do likewise.
The last week has highlighted the climate of permissibility and impunity these settlers enjoy. This has been the case since the Israeli occupation began in 1967, but the settlers of 2022 bask in the extraordinary confidence that, in today’s Israel, they are no longer on the outside but are represented in all major institutions, including the Supreme Court. If the far right forms a major part of the next Israeli coalition government after the Nov. 1 elections, then the settlers will see it as an even greater opportunity for a land grab and further unrelenting violence against their Palestinian neighbors.
The complicity of the Israeli army and police in settler violence is alarming. Anyone who has spent time with Palestinian communities near settlements will have witnessed this time and time again. Israeli soldiers are there to protect the settlers, not the Palestinians. It is worse as the army increasingly facilitates settler attacks, as can be seen in the pogrom-like settler violence at Hawara in recent days.
In the run-up to the Israeli elections, the settlers clearly feel they have the green light to escalate. Israeli soldiers have chalked up an alarming Palestinian fatality count, highlighting that they too have full clearance to shoot and kill. As ever, Palestinians have every reason to hate Israeli election season.