Between Gaza and Iran, Israel's Hidden War in the West Bank Is Flaring Up

Newsweek

6 hours ago

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While much of the world's attention is fixated on Israel's ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip and its unprecedented direct confrontation with Iran, another front has been quietly boiling over.
Violence is surging in the West Bank, undermining hopes for future Israeli-Palestinian peace and tearing at the already frayed fabrics of Israeli society.
Unrest in this roughly 2,200-square mile territory that includes the disputed holy city of Jerusalem predates the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas. Like Gaza, the West Bank has long been a flashpoint in the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict still serving as the primary catalyst for the region's current crisis.
But an intensification of Israel Defense Forces (IDF) incursions, Palestinian militant activity and violence perpetrated by Israeli settlers seeking to expand territorial holdings considered illegal under international—and sometimes Israeli—law threatens to push the tense situation beyond the brink.
In recent days, Israeli settlers have torched Palestinian villages and even clashed with Israeli security forces in the West Bank, drawing rare criticism from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and far-right allies otherwise largely supportive of settler activity.
Mounting violence in the West Bank adds to a growing death toll in the worst episode of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and undermine hopes for peace.
Mounting violence in the West Bank adds to a growing death toll in the worst episode of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and undermine hopes for peace.
Newsweek Illustration/Getty/Associated Press
Among the organizations tracking the spike in violence in this theater is the Armed Conflict and Location Event Data (ACLED) monitor. ACLED's Middle East senior analyst, Ameneh Mehvar, paints an ominous picture of what lies ahead.
"Long-term, even in the optimistic scenario of peace talks being revived at some unknown point in the future—which at this stage appears increasingly unlikely—current developments suggest that the Israeli government would face serious challenges in disengaging and evacuating the roughly 200,000 ideological settlers living deep inside the West Bank," Mehvar told Newsweek.
"An increasingly powerful and well-armed settler movement will, in all likelihood, resist such efforts," she added, "and even the prospect of civil war cannot be ruled out."
Roots of Violence
The reality of the West Bank today is in some ways even more complex than Gaza. The two territories initially came under Arab rule following the 1948 war that erupted upon Israel's declaration of independence from collapsing British colonial rule, with Gaza being administered by Egypt and the West Bank annexed by Jordan — until both lands were seized by Israel during a second war fought in 1967.
The fate of the West Bank was among the central issues discussed during the Oslo Accords of the 1990s, which also established the Palestinian National Authority (PA). The agreements divided the territory into three zones—A, B and C—to fall under full PA control, joint Israeli-PA control and full Israeli control, respectively.
Yet Oslo was met with fierce opposition from hard-liners on both sides, ultimately leading to the eruption of the Second Intifada, a mass uprising in which over 1,000 Israelis and 3,000 Palestinians were killed around the dawn of the 21st century.
The end of the conflict paved the way for Israel's withdrawal from Gaza in 2005—and Hamas' eventual 2007 takeover—but the PA's control over the West Bank would gradually decline in the face of Israeli expansion. Area C, the majority of the West Bank, has witnessed an explosion of Israeli settlers, now exceeding half a million people.
The PA, once hoped to be the vanguard of a future Palestinian state, is now viewed by many in the West Bank as corrupt and ineffective. Its sharp decrease in popularity has left many to turn to a variety of militant groups, including the Islamist Hamas, the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and its splinters, breakaway groups from the PA's leading Fatah faction as well as independent outfits such as the Nablus-based Lion's Den.
"Violence in the West Bank has been steadily increasing since 2021, a trend that accelerated significantly after the events of 7 October," Mehver said. "This escalation stems from three interconnected dynamics: the intensification of settler violence; the revival of armed Palestinian activity—particularly in the northern West Bank; and Israel's counter-militancy operations."
Friends and family mourn during the funeral of 37-year-old Israeli woman, Tzeela Gez, who was killed in a shooting attack in the centre of the occupied West Bank the previous day, in Jerusalem on May...
Friends and family mourn during the funeral of 37-year-old Israeli woman, Tzeela Gez, who was killed in a shooting attack in the centre of the occupied West Bank the previous day, in Jerusalem on May 15, 2025. More
JOHN WESSELS/AFP via Getty Images
"The IDF's campaign following the launch of Operation Iron Wall has ultimately succeeded in curbing militant activity—though at the cost of displacing around 40,000 Palestinians," she added. "Isolated attacks by Palestinian militants, however, are likely to continue, as was the case last month when a pregnant settler was killed."
Mehver was referring to Tzeela Gez, a 37-year-old Israeli mother of three who was shot near her home home in the settlement of Bruchinin in May, as she drove with her husband to the hospital to deliver her baby. Gez died but the baby survived. Israel has called the shooting a terrorist attack.
Shaul Arieli, a retired IDF colonel who previously headed the administration for the interim agreement for the West Bank in the 1990s, saw two primary factors are driving the unrest in the West Bank.
"First, Israeli military operations against various terrorist organizations, primarily Hamas. Israel saw the war in Gaza as both a necessity and an opportunity to strike Hamas wherever it is found, particularly in the West Bank in addition to Gaza," Shauli, who is today head of the T-Politography research group dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, told Newsweek.
"Second is settler violence against Palestinians, manifested in arson attacks, property damage, physical harm, and more," he added. "The purpose of this violence is twofold: to incite unrest that would compel the IDF to take action against Palestinians, and to drive communities away from areas considered strategically important by settlers for future annexation."
He, too, felt that the cycle of violence would likely persist in the absence of a new agreement.
"In my opinion," Shauli said, "if there is no political solution acceptable to both sides, violence in the West Bank will continue at various levels."
Israeli military forces conduct a raid on June 28, 2025, in the center of Hebron, in the West Bank, forcing Palestinian shop owners to close their shops and expel them from the area.
Israeli military forces conduct a raid on June 28, 2025, in the center of Hebron, in the West Bank, forcing Palestinian shop owners to close their shops and expel them from the area.
MOSAB SHAWER/Middle East Images/AFP/Getty Images
The Human Cost
The scale of death and destruction inflicted by the ongoing war outweighs all previous Israeli-Palestinian flare-ups, with the vast majority of fatalities occurring in Gaza. The Hamas-run Palestinian Health Ministry counts more than 57,000 killed throughout the conflict.
The situation in the West Bank is in some ways more opaque. Israeli-Palestinian violence had already reached record-breaking levels in the leadup to the October 2023 attack led by Hamas from Gaza, which killed around 1,200 people in Israel, according to Israeli estimates.
The Shireen Monitor, a local organization named after Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Akleh, who was slain by Israeli forces amid a May 2022 clash in East Jerusalem, counts more than 1,000 killed in the West Bank since the war in Gaza began. The figure roughly aligns with the latest available data shared with Newsweek by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs regarding Palestinian casualties during this period.
Newsweek reached out to the IDF, the State Department and the spokesperson for the Hebron settler community for comment.
The most recent casualties appear to be two young Palestinians, one of them 16 years old, who were shot dead Tuesday by Israeli soldiers during raids in Ramallah and Hebron, according to the PA-run Palestinian Health Ministry.
Last week, three more Palestinians were reported by local authorities to have been killed in a settler attack against the village of Kafr Malik, part of a spate of fresh violence that's on course to become one of the bloodiest for the West Bank in recent memory.
A boy stands behind the burned-out frame of a car destroyed in the settler attacks in Kafr Malik, occupied West Bank, on June 30, 2025.
A boy stands behind the burned-out frame of a car destroyed in the settler attacks in Kafr Malik, occupied West Bank, on June 30, 2025.
MOHAMMAD NAZAL/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images
ACLED recorded "over 820 violent incidents involving settlers in the first six months of 2025—a more than 20 percent increase compared to the same period last year," according to Mehvar. "As a result," she said, this year is "likely to become one of the most violent years for settler attacks since ACLED began its coverage in Palestine in 2016."
Issa Amro, a Palestinian activist and Nobel Peace Prize nominee, is one of the roughly 3.3 million people residents in the West Bank who are forced to deal with the situation firsthand.
"The settlers see it as the best time now to take revenge on any Palestinian, and I am one of them, many other Palestinians are the same," Amro, whose non-violent activism against settlements was the subject of a recent BBC documentary, told Newsweek. "They are suffering over a political dispute, not a security dispute, because security is mutual for everybody, and certainly for a political agenda for taking more land."
He objects to the phrase "settler violence," arguing that a better word for it is "settler terror," citing sanctions issued last year by the European Union and U.S. on settlers accused of inciting violence against Palestinians in the West Bank.
"Every day and every night there is settler terror and organized terror pogroms toward Palestinian villages, Palestinian cities, Palestinian compounds," Amro told Newsweek. "It's really bad what's going on and what is new is that Israeli settlers attack with their guns."
While the IDF has recently moved to crack down on some unauthorized outposts amid direct attacks from settlers, Amro argued that Israeli troops have more often than not facilitated settler hostilities, allowing them to don military uniforms and bear arms.
Israeli soldiers stand guard as Israeli settlers tour in the old city-centre and market of the Palestinian city of Hebron in West Bank on June 28, 2025.
Israeli soldiers stand guard as Israeli settlers tour in the old city-centre and market of the Palestinian city of Hebron in West Bank on June 28, 2025.
HAZEM BADER/AFP/Getty Images
Arieli, for his part, also noted that the IDF "relies, among other things, on reserve soldiers among the settlers who are happy to carry out this activity," despite the recent attacks directed by settlers against Israeli military personnel.
Arieli spoke of a "division in Israeli society" as it relates to the fate of the West Bank that has "existed for years," an issue he has tracked closely via his T-Politography project.
"Half support separation through an agreement or unilaterally, and half support continuing the current situation (creeping annexation) or annexation," Shauli said. "Since 2018, we have witnessed the strengthening of the half that refuses a political arrangement."
He warned it "appears that continued violence of this kind could lead to reservists refusing to serve in the West Bank and possibly to more violent incidents that could cost human lives."
Political Ties
Amro, the Palestinian activist, also saw members of the Israeli government as being directly complicit in the rise of settler violence. In particular, he blamed Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who has openly touted handling out tens of thousands of assault rifles to settlers since the war began.
Adding further pressure, Smotrich last month ordered the cancellation of a waiver that allowed for cooperation between Israeli and Palestinian banks, a move that has strangled an already crippled economy in the West Bank.
"The Israeli banks are refusing to take the shekels, and the Palestinian economy is collapsing," Amro said. "So, they are making life harder and harder for the political agenda of Netanyahu and Ben-Gvir and Smotrich."
"From my opinion, Smotrich and Ben-Gvir can't do anything to Netanyahu if he doesn't agree," Amro added. "So, Netanyahu gets everything he wants, but he's using them as a stick, and he's using them to show that he's moderate and they are violent, and Likud is full of Itamar Ben-Gvir and Smotrich ideology."
Israel's National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir attends a convention calling for Israel to resettle Gaza Strip and the northern part of the West Bank at the International Convention Center, on January 28, 2024 in Jerusalem,...
Israel's National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir attends a convention calling for Israel to resettle Gaza Strip and the northern part of the West Bank at the International Convention Center, on January 28, 2024 in Jerusalem, Israel. MoreLikud, which is Netanyahu's conservative party, forged a coalition with Ben-Gvir's Otzma Yehudit party and Smotrich's National Religious Party–Religious Zionism party, both widely viewed as far-right, which succeeded in bringing Netanyahu back to power in 2022. The two ultranationalist ministers have frequently sought to push the government further right, including through calls for the annexation of the West Bank and opposition to any ceasefire with Hamas in Gaza.
Israeli Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich takes part in the Jerusalem Day Flag March in the Old City on June 5, 2024 in Jerusalem. The annual march typically draws thousands of nationalist Israelis who parade...
Israeli Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich takes part in the Jerusalem Day Flag March in the Old City on June 5, 2024 in Jerusalem. The annual march typically draws thousands of nationalist Israelis who parade through the city, including the Muslim Quarter of the Old City. More
Amir Levy/Getty
Nimrod Novik, fellow at the Israel Policy Forum and former senior adviser to former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres, also identified Ben-Gvir and Smotrich as central actors in the strife plaguing the West Bank.
"Since early 2023, two of the most extreme leaders of the annexationist and Jewish supremacist minority in Israel have been entrusted by PM Netanyahu with portfolios directly relevant to West Bank policies," Novik told Newsweek.
"One, Itamar Ben-Gvir, controls the national police, demands a 'hands off' policy concerning Jewish terrorists," Novik said, "The other, Bezalel Smotrich, employs his dual position as minister of finance and as a minister in the ministry of defense in the service of his three related, publicly declared objectives: rapid expansion of Jewish settlements, increase pressure on Palestinians to encourage emigration, and choking the Palestinian Authority financially to bring about it collapse."
Novik also pointed to Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz, who he said has "signaled his support for Jewish violence by removing a critical measure in the toolkit of the Shin Bet (internal security): the authority to apply administrative detention to Jewish settlers."
"Emboldened by their leaders' serving in such powerful positions and regularly signaling tolerance if not support for violence against innocent Palestinians, those extremist settlers—by now organized and armed—have made the most of national, regional and international attention focused elsewhere," Novik said. "With all eyes on Gaza, Lebanon and more recently Iran, the intensity of their violence over the past year has been unprecedented."
'Gaza-ization'
With further conflagration all but guaranteed in the short term, what's left uncertain is what comes next. Questions over the fate of the West Bank are often sidelined over the quest to find a post-war plan for Gaza, an endeavor Israeli officials have yet to finalize.
The election of President Donald Trump, who has floated asserting U.S. control over Gaza and the voluntary resettlement of its population, and his choice of hard-liner Mike Huckabee as ambassador to Israel, were welcomed by settler groups who hoped the administration might greenlight the annexation of the West Bank.
The White House yet to voice a definitive policy on the issue, but has also declined to take action against settler expansion while appearing open to Israeli control over the West Bank. Just days into office, Trump in January lifted the sanctions imposed by Biden on Israeli settlers accused of violence and, asked about potential Israeli annexation of the West Bank in February, the president simply spoke of how Israel is "a small country in terms of land."
More recently, on Wednesday, State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce only reiterated the administration's support for Israel when asked about a letter issued by 14 ministers and shared by Smotrich on X urging Netanyahu to move forward with the annexation of the West Bank.
A fighter raises his rifle as Palestinian paramedics carry the body of their colleague Tamer Saqer, 21, who succumbed to his injuries after being seriously wounded on July 27 by reported Israeli fire in the...
A fighter raises his rifle as Palestinian paramedics carry the body of their colleague Tamer Saqer, 21, who succumbed to his injuries after being seriously wounded on July 27 by reported Israeli fire in the Balata refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, during his funeral on August 3, 2024. More
ZAIN JAAFAR/AFP/Getty Images
"Our position regarding Israel, the choices it makes, is that we stand with Israel and its decisions and how it views its own internal security," Bruce told reporters.
Novik, however, argued that Israel's choice moving forward would be at least partially defined by internal boundaries already being tested by its longest war.
"With IDF manpower—regular conscripts and reservists—stretched to the limit, and the top brass consumed by tending to challenges from several fronts simultaneously," Novik said, "commanders of units deployed to the West Bank proved reluctant to confront the settlers, not the least given the back wind they enjoy from senior government circles."
And then, he added, there's the intractable situation faced by Palestinian youth, plagued by constant settler attacks while caught between the IDF and the PA, both largely unwilling to intervene.
"Thus, Israeli extremists and radicalized Palestinian youth feed on each other, justifying violence, and killing innocents in the process," Novik said.
If there is "a ray of hope in this dark trajectory," he argued it would lie in Netanyahu's willingness to condemn the settlers' latest "chaos, lawlessness and attacks on the troops." But whether the West Bank's chaos may come to resemble the situation in Gaza, where Hamas' rule remains relatively popular despite the costs of war, remains to be seen.
"Time will tell whether this wakeup call triggers effective measures," Novik said, "or the cycle of violence will see the Gaza-ization of the West Bank."