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Life in the old Palestinian village of Battir, which is irrigated by water from natural springs, has been peaceful for hundreds of years.
Battir, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is known for its olive groves and vineyards. But it is currently in the news for settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Israel has recognized new Jewish settlements in this area. But privately owned land of Palestinians has been seized for new Jewish settlements here without Israel’s permission and military posts have been built there.
Ghassan Olyan is one of those whose land has been seized. Olyan says, “They are taking away our land from us to build their dreams on our tragedy.”
UNESCO says it is concerned about new settlements and people around Battir. All settlements are illegal according to international laws, although Israel does not agree with this.
Olyan says of the new settlers, “They don’t care about international laws, local laws and even God’s laws.”
Israel’s intelligence chief Ronen Bar wrote a letter to ministers last week warning that Jewish extremists in the West Bank region are carrying out terrorist activities against Palestinians and harming the country.
Since the war in Gaza began, the number of new Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank has been increasing.
The hardliners in the Israeli government believe that such changes will reduce the possibility of an independent Palestinian nation.
There is also a fear that to achieve their objectives, they may prolong the ongoing war in Gaza.
Yonatan Mizrahi of Peace Now, an Israeli organization that monitors the growing number of Jewish settlements, says that Israeli extremists in the West Bank are further aggravating the already tense situation and making it difficult for the Israel-Palestine conflict to end.
He believes that after the attack on October 7, the people of Israel are “both angry and afraid”. 1200 people were killed in the Hamas attack. According to him, this is also the reason why people are occupying more land and very few people are questioning them on this issue.
According to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center in June, 40 percent of Jews believe that new settlements have made the country safe. In 2013, the number of people who believed this was 27 percent. On the other hand, 35 percent of people believe that these settlements have harmed Israel’s security. Earlier, the number of people who believed this was 42 percent.
Mizrahi worries that radical Jews in the West Bank are further aggravating an already tense and volatile situation. He says, “This is very dangerous” and is further fuelling hatred between the two sides.
Since the war began, there has been an increase in cases of violence by new settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank.
However, violence was increasing earlier as well. But in the last 10 months, the UN has recorded 1270 cases of violence, while a total of 856 attacks were reported in 2022.
According to Israel’s humanitarian organization B’Tselem, Palestinians have been forced to leave at least 18 villages in the West Bank due to harassment by new Israeli settlers during the same period.
Israel occupied the Palestinian territory between Israel and Jordan during the war in the Middle East in 1967. Since then, this area is under Israeli occupation.
According to the UN, 589 Palestinian civilians have been killed in the West Bank from October 7 to August 2024. Of these, at least 570 people have been killed by Israeli soldiers and 11 by people living in Israeli settlements. During this period, Palestinians have killed 11 Israeli settlers and 9 people associated with the Israeli security forces.
This week, a 40-year-old Palestinian civilian was allegedly shot dead after Israeli security forces and Israeli settlers entered Wadi el Rachel near Bethlehem. The Israeli army claims that stones were first thrown at the Israeli vehicle.
Last month, a 22-year-old Palestinian youth was killed when Israelis entered and vandalized a village named Jit. This incident was criticized internationally. Israeli security forces arrested four people and described this incident as a “serious terrorist incident”.
But when such cases are seen, there is a lack of punishment. Israeli civil rights group Yesh Din has found that only 3 percent of the cases of violence committed by Israeli immigrants from 2005 to 2023 have resulted in punishment in official investigations.
A warning letter written by Israel’s intelligence chief Ronen Bar was leaked to the Israeli media. In this, he said that radical Israeli settlers were encouraged in a way by laxity in the law.
‘Extremely dangerous’
New settlers have been settled in specially created Jewish communities in parts of the West Bank.
Most of these settlements get legal help from the Israeli government. Other settlements are known as outposts which are built in the form of tents and houses built in vehicles. These settlements are invalid according to Israeli law. But the extremists keep building these settlements to capture more land.
In July, when the UN’s highest court first found out that Israel was illegally occupying the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, the court said that Israel must stop the process of building new settlements and withdraw as soon as possible.
Israel’s Western allies see these new settlements as an obstacle to peace. But Israel rejects this argument. It says, “The Jewish people are not occupying it, it is their own land.”
Now it is feared that Israeli extremists are working to make the settlements permanent.
With the support of the most right-wing government in Israel’s history, these people are increasing their control in the area. These extremists are not only expanding their plan to occupy the West Bank, but are also openly talking about settling in Gaza after the war is over. They are also working in important ministries of the Israeli government.
On one hand, world leaders are stressing on the “two state solution” and are opposing the establishment of new settlements, which will pave the way for permanent peace and the formation of a separate Palestinian nation. On the other hand, religious nationalists of Israel believe that Israel has a right over all the land.
Analysts believe that perhaps this is why some leaders are refusing to accept any ceasefire agreement.
Tal Schneider, political correspondent of ‘The Times of Israel’, says that they also do not want to end the conflict or reach a hostage release agreement because they believe that Israel should fight the war until the conflict is confined to Gaza.
Tal Schneider says, “They think that their ideology is more correct in the long run. This is their own logic.”
Meanwhile, the Israeli administration has announced the establishment of five new settlements. One of these settlements will be built in the village of Batir. The settlements will be built on an area of 23 square kilometres, meaning Israel considers it its land, even though it is in the occupied territory and is private land of Palestinians.
Israeli settlers hope to settle as many Israelis as possible on this land as possible, hoping that Israel will eventually formally annex it.
Satellite images show caravans and new roads built in Al Kanoub, north of Hebron, since the war began.
We went to Al Kanoub with 50-year-old Shalalda and her 80-year-old uncle Mohammed. They said their homes were destroyed by Israeli settlers in November last year.
As we approached, an extremist blocked our path with his car.
Soon gun-wielding Israeli soldiers arrived there. Some Israeli Defense Forces were also among the group.
The security personnel of the settlement took both the Palestinian citizens out of the car and searched them. After two hours, the soldiers removed the settlers from there and allowed the BBC car to go.
After occupying the West Bank more than fifty years ago and snatching the West Bank from Jordan, Israel started settling there. Since then, the governments that came have continuously increased the expansion of the settlements.
Today, about 30 lakh Palestinians live there, excluding the Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem. Along with this, about five lakh Jews also live there in 130 settlements.
After coming to power in 2022, Israel’s right-wing government had promised to increase the number of people in these settlements to 10 lakh.
Bezalel Smotrich believes that Jews have a God-given right to this land. Smotrich is the head of one of Israel’s two right-wing parties. Prime Minister Netanyahu brought Smotrich’s party into power in 2022 by bringing him into coalition.
Smotrich is Israel’s finance minister but he also holds a position in the defense ministry, which helps him change Israel’s policies on the West Bank.
He has made a lot of government investment in building infrastructure and roads in the newly settled settlements. He has also created a new bureaucracy that is rapidly building settlements with the help of the army.
‘The purpose of my life’
For decades, people with religious nationalist ideology were on the margins of Israeli politics.
But their ideology has gradually become popular. In the 2022 elections, these parties won 13 out of 120 seats and came into the role of kingmaker in Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition government.
During the war, Bezalel Smotrich and his fellow hardliner Itamar Ben-Gvir have repeatedly made comments that inflamed social divisions and infuriated Israel’s Western allies. Both are now Israel’s national security ministers.
After the Israeli army arrested reservists who sexually abused Palestinian prisoners, Ben-Gvir said, “It is shameful to arrest our best heroes.” This month, Bezalel Smotrich said that starving Gazans could be “just and moral.”
This group of Israelis “has always been against any kind of compromise with the Palestinians and neighboring Arab countries,” says Anshel Feffer, an Israeli journalist and correspondent for The Economist.
This right-wing group sees the war in Gaza as an opportunity. Smotrich has called on Palestinians to leave to make way for Israeli settlers.
Netanyahu has ruled out establishing Jewish settlements in Gaza, but he is under pressure from far-right parties that threaten to topple his government if he signs a reckless ceasefire deal to bring the hostages home.
