Israel-Hamas conflict: Deadly settler attack was 'not an isolated incident'

One Palestinian was killed and several injured by a group of Israeli settlers in the West Bank village of Jit last night. 

Residents said around 100 masked settlers entered the village, fired live ammunition and set fire to homes and cars.

Videos of the attack, verified by Sky News, show groups of masked individuals attacking properties in the south of Jit.

One video captured by a security camera, and timestamped 7.49pm, shows three settlers dressed in dark clothes smash the windows of a car parked outside a house before setting it alight and running off.

A number of settlers then returned, with some throwing objects and carrying a chair.

A later video, taken from the same location, shows at least eight Israeli settlers climbing a hill less than 1km from the house. Residents watch from the balcony as the car continues to burn.

But the chaos wasn't limited to the streets. One video shows two settlers in a veranda dousing a sofa in liquid.

Seconds later, one of them sets the sofa on fire.

The attack has been condemned by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said he is treating it with the "utmost severity". An IDF spokesperson told Sky News that they had apprehended an Israeli for questioning over the incident.

There are multiple conflicting accounts of when the incident began, and how long it took for the IDF to arrive. The attacks took place just 2km from an Israeli military base in the nearby settlement of Kdumim.

The IDF says the attack began at around 8pm, and that its forces entered the village "within minutes" of hearing about it.

Sky News spoke to the owner of the burning car, Dr Ibrahim Sedi.

Ibrahim, 55, also says that the attack began at 8pm, but says the soldiers only arrived after an hour. Once they arrived, he says, the situation was quickly resolved.

"They pushed the settlers away, even shot in the air to frighten them. They helped us - they tried to put out the fire on the two cars.

"The soldiers are different people, they are friendly, they tried to help us."

Local resident Sufian Jit, however, says that the attack began at 6pm - and that residents were left without military assistance for two hours.

"What can I say? It was like a war launched against us. There were more than 100 settlers."

Footage of the aftermath of the attack shows the charred remains of a living room in a Palestinian home.

Dr Ibrahim Sedi identified the man killed as a 23-year old relative, who was outside the family home defending it from the attackers.

"We were about 18 people in the house. My family, we are eight, and ten of my relatives were with me. I was making a meal for them.

"The people who were close to him told us that one of the settlers shot him from about 15 metres only. They [the settlers] were hiding between trees."

An IDF spokesperson said the military has opened an investigation into the incident.

"The IDF condemns incidents of this type and the rioters, who harm security, law and order, and divert the IDF and the security forces from their main mission of thwarting terrorism and protecting the security of civilians," the spokesperson said.

'Not an isolated attack'

There have been at least 27 reported settler attacks in Jit since 2018, according to the conflict monitoring organisation ACLED.

UN human rights spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani said that the incident was "not an isolated attack".

"This was a direct consequence of Israel's settlement policy and the prevailing climate of impunity," she said.

Tensions have risen in the West Bank since 7 October last year, when a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel killed 1,200 Israelis.

Israel's subsequent invasion of Gaza has killed more than 40,000 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.

This year is set to be the deadliest on record for Palestinians in the West Bank. As of 11 August, 268 Palestinians have been killed, compared to 173 at the same point last year.

Violence against Palestinians has increasingly come not just from Israeli soldiers, however, but also from civilian settlers.

Since the war began, the UN has recorded around 12,500 attacks by extremist Israeli settlers targeting West Bank Palestinians or their property.

That's an average of four attacks every day - compared to three per day before the war started. More than seven Palestinians are being injured or killed in these attacks each week.

Since 7 October, around 1,500 Palestinians - half of them children - have been displaced by a mixture of access restrictions and increased settler violence, according to the UN.

On Friday, Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that 100 Palestinians had fled their homes in the West Bank community of Umm Jamal due to threats and harassment from nearby settlers.

"This needs to stop, and the key would be accountability for perpetrators," according to Ms Shamdasani.

"There had been very few investigations, and even those had not concluded with justice for victims and their families. There was clearly a state responsibility in this regard."

Israeli human rights group Yesh Din has tracked the progress of 1,535 complaints related to settler violence since 2005. Of those, just 12 have led to full convictions.

Around 500,000 Israeli citizens live in the West Bank, with a further 220,000 in East Jerusalem.

Israel has long claimed historic rights over parts of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and says Jewish settlements have existed in the area for centuries.

However, under international law, these territories are considered occupied Palestinian land, and the construction of settlements is prohibited - a position affirmed by the governments of the UK, EU, and US. Despite this, they have continued to expand.

Read more from Sky News:
'We may have something' on ceasefire deal, says Biden
Turkish parliament descends into fistfight

Hagit Ofran, co-director of Settlement Watch, a project of Israeli NGO Peace Now, says that settlement construction has increased "dramatically" since 7 October.

"We are seeing 30 new settlements already. And a lot of Palestinian communities being evicted or running away from settler violence."

Following its win in the December 2022 election, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government made the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank a top priority.

The coalition agreement was led by a commitment to "advance and develop a settlement in all parts of the land of Israel" including "Judea and Samaria" - the biblical names for the West Bank.

In 1987, there were just 60,000 Israeli settlers living in the West Bank (excluding East Jerusalem). By 2005, this had quadrupled to 247,300, and by 2021 it had reached 465,400.

Further expansion is planned. Last year, Israel advanced plans for a record 12,349 new settlement housing units.

This year, Israel has declared a record 2,419 hectares of the West Bank "state land" - a designation which allows for the construction of settlements. That is more than all state land declared in the previous two decades.

"This is how the government of Israel is taking over land in the West Bank," says Hagit Ofran, of Settlement Watch.

"They want to, on the one hand, prevent Palestinians from using land and on the other hand allow the establishment of settlements. So, they need to take over the land. And the legal acrobatics that Israel is doing in order to take land is this declaration of state land."

At the same time, Israeli authorities are demolishing Palestinian buildings at the highest rate in recent history. Data from the UN shows that 963 structures have been demolished this year, displacing 2,001 people (including 876 children). At this point last year, 644 structures had been demolished.

Several government ministers are settlers themselves, including National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir.

In a statement on a fatal settler attack in August, Ben Gvir said of the alleged killer: "My policy is clear. Anyone who defends himself against rock-throwing should get a medal of honour."

The other assailant in that case was later sanctioned by the UK for his role in fomenting settler violence. More than a dozen Israeli settlers have been sanctioned by countries including the US and UK in recent months.

Last night's attack in Jit prompted an unusually strong condemnation from far-right figures within Israel's government.

Finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, who has previously defended violent settlers and railed against US sanctions, described the attacks as an "anarchist criminal violence".

"I think it has to do with the international sanctions and the ICJ case," says Mr Ofran. "So, maybe they are now starting to try and show as if they are doing something. But I don't see that it's a big dramatic change in policy."

For Palestinians, such words are likely to be little comfort as the violence continues to escalate.

"We never did anything wrong to the settlers or the soldiers - the people in my village are friendly people," says Dr Ibrahim Sedi, whose cars were burned in the attack on Jit this Thursday.

"In the past the settlers came, but they used to push people away from their land - that's all. This time, they were very frightening."

The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open source information. Through multimedia storytelling we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.