Israeli warning of the increasing attacks by settlers and the repetition of the Ibrahimi Mosque massacre

Recently, there has been a rising Israeli behavior in the West Bank, particularly from extremist settlers, who exploit the security forces' turning a blind eye to their ongoing aggression against Palestinians. This carries serious warnings of the potential outbreak of violence, or, in reality, significant Jewish terrorism.

Former legal advisor to the Israel Security Agency "Shabak," Eli Bakhar, stated that "the last two weeks have witnessed important developments in the State of Israel, the most significant of which was the cessation of the war in Gaza under blatant American pressure, and with it, the option of the mass deportation of Palestinians living in the sector to other countries has finally collapsed, while President Donald Trump's plan explicitly acknowledges the role of the Palestinian Authority in controlling it, contingent upon the reforms it will implement, and thus the policy of separation between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank has also fallen apart."

Bakhar added in an article published by "Yedioth Ahronoth," translated by "Arabi21," that "Trump's plan also explicitly states that Israelis and Palestinians must engage in a dialogue about the political horizon, aimed at recognizing the Palestinian aspiration to establish a state, while at the same time, the president responded decisively and firmly to the bill for applying annexation in the West Bank, clearly stating that there will be no annexation."

He emphasized that "these developments have turned all the plans of the extreme Jewish right upside down, which are summarized by Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, in expelling Palestinians from the sector, and perhaps later from the West Bank, annexing Palestinian lands to the State of Israel, and establishing more settlements there. In fact, the new reality that has begun to take shape after the war presents opposing data, supported by the entire world, which dictates the Palestinians' remaining on their land, and the return of Gaza and the West Bank to a single political entity, with the two-state solution being the inevitable political goal."

He pointed out that "the long war on Gaza and the immense destruction there have brought back to global awareness the need for a political solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and this must be added to the continuously increasing daily violence of settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank, which occurs in the face of the complete impotence of the army and law enforcement authorities, often in front of the eyes of soldiers. This reality knocks forcefully on the door of a government that refuses to acknowledge it."

He clarified that "the rise in settler violence in the West Bank coincides with the government's policy of avoiding any political process with the Palestinian Authority, which means continuing to strengthen Hamas and harming Israeli interests in reaching a stable settlement with the only legitimate Palestinian partner, which is the Authority, despite the reality confirming that the government's efforts to evade this obligation will fail."

He added that "those who understand the predicament the government is facing the most are the extreme right-wing factions, whose ultimate goal is to prevent any progress towards a settlement with the Palestinians. The escalation of settlers' violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, which has been ongoing for a long time, represents the first symptoms of that, even though we are facing unbearable violence, not to mention its inherent racism, and its goals are to strip Palestinians of more and more land, expelling them from vast areas for the purpose of seizing them, and preventing any opportunity for establishing a Palestinian state."

The writer called on "Israeli security agencies to view the accelerating violent settlement activity as a serious warning of the outbreak of violence, or significant Jewish terrorism, because we have seen this situation in the past before the massacre at the Ibrahimi Mosque in 1994, and there is no reason to assume that under Benjamin Netanyahu's government, with the rising power of the paralyzed police to its position, under a minister who violates the law, and an army that has lost control over some of its units, there will be anyone to prevent the outbreak of Jewish violence, or capable of thwarting serious Jewish terrorist incidents."

He explained that "the primary responsibility for security in the West Bank lies with the army, police, and Shabak, and although it is their duty to thwart Jewish violence and terrorism there, their behavior has become completely impotent, even though they are required to act decisively to fulfill their mission and responsibilities, and to understand that their failure so far in dealing with Jewish violence and terrorism is unacceptable under any circumstances, and calls for escalation, and to consider the increasing movements of settlers as a blatant intelligence warning of the danger of serious terrorist acts on their part."