🔗 Share this article

Last Monday, during a combined speech by American leader Donald Trump and Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu at the Knesset, fellow parliamentarian Ayman Odeh and I raised a sign urging the acknowledgment of Palestine. We were violently ejected from the parliamentary assembly, revealing the weak state of what's frequently described as the "sole democracy in the region". How can officials speak about regional peace while refusing to acknowledge a people denied of basic freedoms and rights under long-standing occupation?

The Reality in the Occupied West Bank

Nowhere is the deceit more apparent than in the controlled West Bank. There, talk of peace sound remote and faint, while the frightening sounds of settler violence and terror persist strongly. More than 30 occurrences of settler aggression against Palestinian civilians have been documented since the unveiling of the Trump administration's 20-point plan in late September, including attacks, theft of agricultural produce, and burning of vehicles and belongings.

Systematic Violence During Harvest Season

The increase in settler terrorism is deliberate. This time signals the beginning of agricultural harvesting. Beyond a vital economic event, it represents an significant social and cultural moment that demonstrates resilience under military rule. Exactly for these reasons, annually colonists target Palestinians during this precious time. During the 2024 harvest period, human rights organizations documented 113 separate cases of violence, harassment, preventing harvesting, or destruction to olive trees and produce involving Israeli civilians and soldiers, which took place on territories belonging to 51 Palestinian-owned communities, towns, and communities.

Israel's military seemed to have played a larger role in obstructing the harvesting season

Yesh Din also found that "Israeli military seemed to have played a larger role in hindering the olive harvest". In about 70% of instances where entry to farmland was forcibly prevented, troops, border guards, and settler civilian security coordinators were physically present. They either personally prevented Palestinians from reaching and gathering their own lands, or failed to stop settlers who harassed or assaulted them.

Government Support for Settler Activities

This comes as no shock, as the leader of the colonists' political movement, Bezalel Smotrich, was appointed as an extra minister in the Defense Ministry in charge of the territorial coordination unit. In one village, for instance, a special military coordination team uprooted personally-owned olive trees of local residents, claiming missing documentation, but ignored violations by an unauthorized adjacent settler outpost. Last week, the Jerusalem district court decided to halt all construction in the outpost, which was built on lands taken by Israel and unlawfully given to colonists.

Takeover Ambitions and International Response

In the occupied West Bank, colonist violence is simply a instrument used by the government to pursue de-facto incorporation. Earlier this month, Smotrich headed a march of thousands of colonists in support of taking over the West Bank. He was reported as saying, "We persist to take hold with our feet of the territory with numerous pioneers, numerous heroes, and hundreds of thousands of colonists who live in this part of the territory ... we must to normalise it and make it eternal."

The colonists and their backers in the Knesset are explicit about their motives and goals. Why, then, do political leaders in the west hesitate from substantial sanctions and diplomatic measures? Smotrich was sanctioned by the United Kingdom in the summer, but the effect of the sanction has been minimal. He may not be able to travel to the United Kingdom and visit the West End, but he still maintains the ministerial power to seize territories in the West Bank. Even in the announcement of penalties, the British government emphasized they take place "in his personal capacity" only.

Global Recognition and Actual Situation

If the UK government acknowledges the truth of settler violence and its grave implications on Palestinian existence, why does it still permit settlement produce to be sold in markets and outlets in Britain? If the British leader is serious about acknowledging Palestinian statehood as a sovereign entity, how come he allow the Israeli administration to breach its independence with such aggressive methods? Or was the recognition an empty tactic to silence opposition in the United Kingdom, a hollow act only to be realised in the relabeling of some cartographic representations?

Route Toward Genuine Resolution

A fair resolution must respect the fundamental rights of the Palestinian people for self-recognition, independence, and freedom from occupation and siege. Only when each person's dignity between the river and sea is honored can we genuinely declare peace has been attained.

Genuine peace demands an independent Palestinian state next to the Israeli state: this is the only formula that has consensus among the global community, the Palestinian national movement, and the Israeli peace camp.

Trump may have applied pressure on Netanyahu to halt the genocide, but he likely only did so because the strain of his relationship with the pariah regime of Netanyahu had become too great. The mass protests across the globe for the freedom of Palestine, and the unwavering opposition protests within Israel, are the real factors behind this pressure.

It is due to this enormous civil movement that a truce has been agreed, the hostages freed, and the people of Gaza can experience safeguard from destruction. Following the truce arrangement has been finalized, it is crucial to keep applying this pressure. The international community has ignored to the violence in Gaza for many years; it must not make the same error in the West Bank.