Settlers, protected by the Israeli occupying army, through violence, mobility restrictions, and coercive measures, have displaced about 1,390 Palestinians, including 660 children in the occupied West Bank, since October 7, 2023.

This data was reported by a United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) report.

According to the report, settlers carried out 1,084 attacks in various parts of the West Bank targeting the Palestinian presence, resulting in 107 casualties among the dead and injured, while 859 attacks caused property damage, during the period from October 7, 2023, to July 8, 2024.

Displacement of 5 Bedouin communities
A report from the "Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission" indicates that the actions of Israeli authorities and settler encroachments "contributed to the displacement of 5 Palestinian Bedouin communities, consisting of 18 families and comprising 118 individuals, during the first half of 2024."

During the same period, 17 new settlement outposts were established on occupied Palestinian lands, bringing the total to 95 outposts controlling an area estimated at about 412,000 dunams, in addition to 190 settlements housing around 740,000 settlers.

According to the report, researchers and specialists agree that settler terrorism, alongside the genocidal war on the Gaza Strip, has transformed into a nearly daily activity that cannot be separated from the state's policy aimed at entrenching the occupation, its plan for ethnic cleansing, and enabling the expansion of settlements.

Incubators for breeding terrorist ideology
In this context, the "National Office for the Defense of Land and Resistance to Settlement" points out that "the criminal acts of settler groups, which Israeli Minister Itamar Ben Gvir facilitated their arming and provided them with security and legal cover, have entered a more advanced stage of organized terrorism; while settlements have turned into incubators for breeding terrorist ideology and forming armed extremist organizations.

The violence is perpetrated by ordinary individuals, not the state
A report from the Israeli information center for human rights in the occupied territories, "B'Tselem," indicates that settler violence is part of the policy of the occupying state, which allows it and facilitates its implementation as part of the apartheid system's strategy aimed at completing the land seizure process."

The report clarifies that what settlers do in terms of terrorist acts enables Israel to claim that the violence is perpetrated by ordinary individuals and not by the state or its security apparatuses, while it strategically benefits from this abnormal situation without being subjected to international criticism.

It continues: "On the surface, it seems as if there are two separate tracks: the state seizes Palestinian lands in open and official ways, while settlers can also seize lands to achieve their goals, using violence against Palestinians on their initiative and for reasons related to them.

The Israeli authorities, in addition to neglecting Palestinian legal complaints regarding their exposure to settler terrorism, do not compel settlers to abandon lands they seized by force, but rather support them in establishing "random outposts" and later work to legalize their status.

New settlement outposts
For its part, the Israeli "Peace Now" movement pointed out that the government of Benjamin Netanyahu is exploiting the war to create new settlement realities on the ground, as it has approved the establishment of 25 additional settlement outposts, authorized the construction of 8,721 settlement units in existing settlements, and agreed to legitimize 5 new settlements, and attached 3 outposts as neighborhoods belonging to adjacent settlements, recognizing 70 "illegal" settlement outposts.

40,000 dunams since 2024
Additionally, in this context, data from the "Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission" and the "Jerusalem Center for Legal Aid and Human Rights" state that the Israeli occupation authorities announced the seizure of 40,000 dunams since the beginning of 2024. This is aimed at achieving geographical connectivity between existing settlements or expanding the boundaries of other settlements or legalizing settlement outposts, ultimately leading to the isolation of Palestinian communities and severing communication between them.

One million settlers in the West Bank
The report cites Palestinian Center for Israeli Studies (Madar) researcher Walid Habas as saying that "the far-right government in Israel, led by Benjamin Netanyahu, began its work at the beginning of 2023 with rapid practices to achieve the vision of Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich from the Religious Zionism Party, to raise the number of settlers in the West Bank to one million by 2030, in line with the coalition agreement, which stipulates that settlement in the West Bank is an inalienable right of the Jews."

He clarifies that the most prominent of these practices consists of legalizing settlement outposts and transforming them into independent settlements, and transferring the powers of using "state lands" from the so-called civil administration affiliated with the occupation army to civilian ministries led by settlers.