This screen grab from a video shows a Palestinian youth right before he was run over by an Israeli settler. The video circulated on X
In the video, the Palestinian man falls and lies on the ground as the settler, with a rifle slung over his back, climbs off the tractor, yells at him to leave, then threatens a nearby taxi driver before returning to the ATV and driving away.
The video went viral on social media, with many noting that the settler would not have acted so brazenly without the protection and impunity Israeli settlers enjoy while carrying out attacks in the occupied West Bank.
The attacks in Deir Jarir are part of a broader pattern of increasing Israeli occupation army and settler violence against nearly three million Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Earlier in the day, masked settlers raided the same village, firing live ammunition and throwing stones at villagers grazing cattle, wounding a young Palestinian man.
The incidents followed an overnight assault by Israeli settlers in Sa’er, near Hebron, involving arson, vandalism, and stone-throwing that injured an eight-month-old Palestinian baby. Israeli police arrested five settlers, blaming the attack on “extremist violence.”
However, successive Israeli governments across political lines have legalised outposts built on stolen Palestinian land, provided settlers with military protection, infrastructure, and budgets, and created regulatory shields that prevent accountability, as well as integrated the settler leadership into senior policymaking roles.
On Tuesday, five Israeli citizens were arrested for raiding a home in as-Samu, a village southwest of Hebron. They sprayed a mother and her three children with pepper spray, beat them, and damaged property. The family was hospitalized for their serious injuries.
Israeli occupation soldiers routinely join settlers in assaults on Palestinian towns and villages. Settlers arrested for attacks on Palestinians, if any, are often released without charges, and some perpetrators have even received public acclaim upon release.
Since the start of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, Israeli forces and settlers across the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, have killed at least 1,103 Palestinians, injured nearly 11,000, and arrested more than 21,000 people.
In tandem, the Israeli army carried out the forced displacement of more than 40,000 Palestinians and destroyed hundreds of homes in the northern West Bank since the start of 2025.
Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967 and has been expanding Jewish settlements in defiance of international law. More than 750,000 Israeli settlers live in European-style settlements/compounds, and armed settlers terrorize the native Palestinian population in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem daily.
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