REPEATED ATTACKS AGAINST THE PALESTINIAN POPULATION
Starting on Friday, April 12, attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinian villages in the West Bank intensified and continued until Sunday. To date, settlers have shot and killed two Palestinians, including a child, and dozens of people have been injured during these attacks. Nearly half of them suffered injuries from live ammunition. In addition, settlers set fire to several homes and vehicles across the West Bank.
According to reports in the media, thousands of armed Israeli settlers, escorted by the Israeli army, invaded villages in the West Bank, including Al-Mughayyir, Khirbet Abu Falah, As-Sawiya, Deir Dibwan, and other villages in the area north of Ramallah and southwest of Nablus. During these attacks, the Israeli army protected the settlers, barricaded village entrances, and prevented Palestinian Red Crescent ambulances from reaching the injured. According to Israeli media, the settlers retaliated against Palestinian communities following the death of a 14-year-old Israeli teenager living in Malachei Hashalom, an illegal outpost. However, the identity of the perpetrators remains unknown.
THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY MUST PUT AN END TO THIS
These reprehensible attacks are carried out by groups claiming to take justice into their own hands and target entire Palestinian communities. They must be condemned without reservation. The international community must respond firmly and without delay by urging the Israeli government to put an end to these attacks and to urgently defuse the situation. Palestinian communities located near settlements are completely vulnerable to these violent attacks.
The Israeli government, as the occupying power, has an obligation to protect the Palestinian population, including ensuring that private property is respected. However, the government has allowed these large-scale attacks by self-proclaimed militias to become commonplace. In 2023, similar raids took place in Huwara, Turmus Ayya, and many other Palestinian communities, often with near-total impunity for the Israeli perpetrators.
While the international community focuses its attention on Gaza, the Israeli government has not only allowed settler violence to escalate but has also continued the expansion of Israeli settlements built on Palestinian land and illegally seized Palestinian territories by declaring them “state lands of the State of Israel,” which constitutes a flagrant violation of international law.
Despite the adoption by some states of sanctions targeting violent settlers and Israeli outposts, these measures have proven insufficient to deter the Israeli government from transferring its citizens into the occupied Palestinian territory in violation of international law, arming them, enlisting them in reserves serving in the West Bank, and supporting settlement expansion through land expropriation and illegal construction in existing settlements. The scale and intensity of settler attacks have only increased. States have an obligation, under international humanitarian law, to ensure respect for the Geneva Conventions. States have several options at their disposal, such as implementing measures like arms trade restrictions.
700 SETTLER ATTACKS SINCE OCTOBER 7, 2023
The UN has recorded over 700 settler attacks since October 7, 2023, with an average of four attacks per day in 2024. These figures include only attacks that resulted in injuries or material damage and exclude cases of threats with firearms, harassment, and intimidation. The UN estimates that the Israeli army was present or involved in half of the settler attacks over the past year. The Israeli government has consistently failed to hold settlers and the Israeli army accountable for these attacks: only 3% of investigations into settler violence have resulted in partial or full convictions. Furthermore, in 2023 alone, over 1,500 Palestinians were forced to flee their homes due to settler violence and have since been barred from returning to their lands.
AIDA calls on the international community to take decisive action against the Israeli government for its failure to prevent settler attacks, prosecute violent Israeli settlers, and deter its armed forces from endorsing, participating in, or enabling such attacks in any way. Immediate measures must be put in place to protect Palestinian communities living near illegal settlements. Furthermore, action must be taken against the Israeli government, which is committing a serious violation of international law by continuing to transfer its population into occupied Palestinian territory.
In addition, concerted efforts are needed to address the root problem of settler violence by permanently dismantling settlement outposts and ensuring the safe return of displaced Palestinians. Forced transfer constitutes a serious violation of international humanitarian law and a war crime. Those involved in designing and implementing such policies are criminally liable.
AIDA MEMBERS CALL ON THIRD STATES TO:
- Demand that the Israeli government immediately prevent, halt, and reverse all settlement construction and expansion, including the creation of outposts, provide guarantees of non-repetition, and offer full reparations for any damage caused.
- Demand that the Israeli government take all necessary legal action against Israeli settlers for inciting and initiating acts of violence and proceed with their removal from the occupied territory.
- Expand measures targeting settlers to also apply to Israeli government bodies, officials, settler associations, and any other entity actively contributing to encouraging violations of international humanitarian law, including through settlement expansion, obstruction of humanitarian aid, and the forced transfer of Palestinians.
- Demand that the Israeli government immediately reverse the designation of occupied territory as “state land.”
- Demand that the Israeli government take all necessary measures to put an end to the highly coercive environment it has created for Palestinians in the West Bank.
- Demand that the Israeli government facilitate the immediate return of all displaced Palestinian communities.
- Actively work to replace the discriminatory planning regime imposed by the Israeli government in Area C (the area fully under Israeli control and the only contiguous territory in the West Bank) with an autonomous, rights-based, and Palestinian-led construction process.
The signatory members are:
ActionAid
Alianza
American Friends Service Committee
AM Qattan Foundation
Anera
Asamblea de Cooperación por la Paz- ACPP
The Carter Center
Churches for Middle East Peace
DanChurchAid
Doctors of the World / Médecins du Monde
HEKS/EPER (Swiss Church Aid)
Islamic Relief Worldwide
Mennonite Central Committee
Middle East Children’s Alliance (MECA)
Movement for Peace MPDL
Norwegian ChurchAid
Norwegian Refugee Council
Oxfam
Première Urgence Internationale
Terre Des Hommes Italia
War Child Alliance
WeWorld
WeEffect