Louis Theroux explains why he made his new film about Israeli settlements in the West Bank

The Journal

28-04-2025

DOCUMENTARIAN AND JOURNALIST Louis Theroux has explained why he returned to the occupied West Bank in Palestine for his new film 'The Settlers'.
The documentary aired for the first time on BBC last night. It is the second time that Theroux has met with Israeli settlers in the region, as he said in the subsequent
explanatory video 'Why I Made Louis Theroux: The Settlers
'
.
Portions of the film highlight the treatment of Palestinians, as well as settlers' plans to occupy areas of the West Bank and Gaza.
The West Bank, named for its location by the River Jordan, is the largest section of Palestine and is home to more than three million people. It is territorially isolated from the much smaller Gaza Strip.
Dealing with divisive nature of the subject
In February, the BBC was criticised for airing and subsequently pulling a documentary about the ongoing conflict in Gaza after it emerged that the child who narrated the film was the young son of a Hamas deputy minister.
The British broadcaster then
apologised for 'serious flaws' in the making of Gaza: How The Survive A Warzone
.
Many activists criticised the BBC for removing the film, however, and claimed that the documentary still showed the real impacts and effects of life in the territory amid the war between Hamas and Israel.
Theroux, in his video explaining the film, recognised that the subject of his new documentary gets 'heavily scrutinised' and that there are cohorts of people, on both sides of the 'divisive' argument, that 'feel very strongly' about the topic.
'Going into this [film], that was on my mind. If I'm honest, it was on my mind but I didn't find it, like, incapacitating,' the filmmaker said. 'And I have to emphasise that the frame is: 'What is happening in the West Bank under a military occupation?'
'You could say, 'Well, that's an arbitrary framing.' I don't think so. That's the frame and what is taking place is – I would think by any reasonable person's assessment – deeply troubling.
'So that's what I hold onto [in this film]. It's not a polemic. It's an attempt to document what is happening. And I, maybe naively, think that most people would see it and see it for what is was,' he added.
'Fly on the wall and challenger'
Settlements, which are the establishment of Israeli towns in regions the West Bank,
are considered illegal under international law
but have grown significantly in the last number of decades.
More than 200 settlements have been constructed in the occupied West Bank since 1967, covering more than 10% of its territory. More than 100 of these have legal status under Israeli law.
Theroux, in his explanatory video, said: 'There is always this balance between attempting to be a fly on the wall, not intervening, seeing how things are going to unfold, letting people feel they can express themselves unselfconsciously, but at the same time challenging them enough to bring out the contradictions or the parts of it that don't make sense.
'I'm also allowing the viewer to feel safe so that it's not a case of uncritically platforming highly divisive or questionable beliefs,' he added.
According to Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits the transfer of people from an occupying power – in this case Israel – into occupied territory, settlements are considered illegal.
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The takeover of land by settlers deprives Palestinians of property rights and freedom of movement and impacts their ability to live and sustain their livelihoods by denying them access to water needed for things like livestock, irrigation and domestic consumption.
Speaking about why he decided to revisit the topic, Theroux said: 'I've heard that since 7 October, with the world's attention on Gaza, these religious nationalist settlers have felt emboldened to go further, to push harder, to harass their Palestinian neighbours and to attempt to drive them out.
'So, I decided to go back and find out who was doing it, to meet the people who were the ideological standard-bearers of the settlers and also to see, first-hand, what the consequences were of what they were doing.'
Violence by settlers and the Israeli military in the West Bank has
ramped up since the war in Gaza began
. During a ceasefire period between Israel and Hamas earlier this year, the UN reported that
up to 40,000 people were displaced in the region
.
Some pro-settler members of the Israeli government have also voiced support for
the annexation of the West Bank
in recent months.
The official boundaries of settlements are off limits to Palestinians because they are declared by Israel as 'closed military areas', even though they are home to more than 600,000 people.
A clip from the film, shown during Theroux's six-minute long explanation, depicts a Palestinian interviewee being turned away while speaking to the journalist after they were stopped by members of the Israeli security forces in the region.
A Palestinian interviewee being turned away from a street inside an Israeli settlement in the West Bank during an interview with Theroux.
BBC
BBC
Asked why their interviewee was not allowed to join them, the security force member said that Palestinians are not allowed to pass a particular point further up the street they are standing on. Another man then interrupted the conversation and said they will explain nothing further in front of cameras.
A chance to 'experience the extremes'
In the film, which Theroux says was a chance for him to 'experience the extremes of religious zealotry, nationalism and a militarised support infrastructure', the journalist spoke to a well-known leader of the Israeli settler movement Daniella Weiss.
The woman, who Theroux refers to as a 'godmother of the settler movement', told the broadcaster that she has been involved in the establishment of 'almost every' settlement in the West Bank.
Theroux speaking to Daniella Weiss, a leader in the Israeli settler movement.
BBC
BBC
The video includes a clip of an exchange between Theroux and Weiss, in which he challenges her involvement in the establishment of Israeli settlements as 'war crimes'.
Weiss responded by telling Theroux he then is 'cooperating' by interviewing her and laughs at the accusation levelled against her. She then described her actions as a 'minor felony'.
With reporting by David MacRedmond and Stephen McDermott
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