Israeli settlers attack Palestinians, smash cars, set fires during Eid in West Bank

Israeli settlers rampaged through at least six Palestinian villages in the occupied West Bank overnight Saturday, setting homes and vehicles ablaze, beating residents, and spreading destruction across communities already living under intense pressure, during Eid al-Fitr celebrations marking the end of Ramadan.

The attacks, which struck Silat al-Dahr, Fandaqumiya, Jalud, Salfit, Masafer Yatta, and the Jordan Valley, were reportedly triggered after an Israeli settler was killed in a collision with a Palestinian vehicle. At least five Palestinians were injured. Three men in Jalud suffered serious head injuries after being beaten and were rushed to hospital.

The violence unfolded against a charged backdrop: Israel and the United States are currently engaged in an active military conflict with Iran , and Israel has imposed a total closure on the West Bank since that war began, restricting Palestinian movement while settlers move freely. In Masafer Yatta, Israeli forces arrested an elderly Palestinian, a foreign activist, and several residents while firing tear gas, even as settlers attacked nearby. Not a single settler was arrested.

Israeli human rights group B'Tselem accuses the government of actively facilitating settler violence to entrench control over Palestinian land. Even former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett has condemned the lawlessness, warning that violent gangs have no place in a Jewish state.

The scale of violence tells its own story. Since the Gaza war began in 2023, Israeli settlers and soldiers have killed at least 1,050 Palestinians in the West Bank. In one particularly disturbing incident this year, Amnesty International documented an Israeli undercover unit killing a couple and their two young children, aged five and seven. Over 36,000 Palestinians were displaced in the West Bank last year alone.

More than half a million settlers now live alongside 2.7 million Palestinians in territory most of the world considers illegally occupied. UN officials warn that relentless displacement and violence are extinguishing any realistic prospect of a Palestinian state.