Cheered by Prie Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank have been carrying out a campaign of violence and intimidation unmatched in recent memory, attacking and displacing Palestinian communities and establishing scores of government-backed settlements and illegal outposts that are drastically reshaping the long-disputed map.

 

Having built an expansionist footprint far beyond what seemed possible just a few years ago, the extremist settlers are racing to lock down gains ahead of this month’s Israeli election, while their supporters, some at the highest levels of government, are eager to shore up votes and secure their agenda.

 

The goal is to create facts on the ground that would be difficult to reverse even if a less supportive government wins power.

 

The sweeping shift in occupied West Bank settlements has unfolded over the past three years, amid Israel’s war in Gaza in response to the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack, as well as the US -Israeli war against Iran, which diverted attention away from the plight of Palestinians losing their homes and land.

 

Over the past year most of all, Israel has taken accelerated action to cement its control over the occupied West Bank, with a surge of new settlements and outposts, expanded land registration and purchasing avenues for Israelis, increased demolition of Palestinian homes, checkpoint and road restrictions that fragment communities, and a sharp rise in settler violence that the government has shown little willingness to control .

 

Between January and August 2026 , the United Nations documented more than 1,600 settler attacks causing injury or property damage, an average of more than six a day, up from last year’s already heightened level.

 

At least 80 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed by gunfire from Israeli forces and settlers since February 2026 according to the UN humanitarian office.

 

Some small Palestinian towns such as Deir Jarir and Al-Mughayyir, northeast of Ramallah, outside of which settlers have set up outposts, have seen repeated killings.

 

With a cabinet that includes far-right patrons of settlement such as Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, whose portfolio includes settlement policy, and Itamar Ben Gvir as National security minister— both settlement dwellers themselves — constraints have evaporated on a movement dedicated to establishing Israeli control over territory it occupied in the 1967 war — which many Israelis see as part of an ancient homeland while much of the world sees as illegally settled Palestinian land.

 

Between 2013 and 2022, the Israeli government approved only three settlements, according to Peace Now, an Israeli anti-settlement watchdog group.

 

Today , there are at least 148 illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank and 15 in occupied East Jerusalem, 163 in total, now home to some 750,000 Israelis, roughly 10 percent of the country’s Jewish population.

 

As of mid-2026 ,there are approximately 350 to 400 illegal outposts ( including pastoral and farm outposts) in the occupied West Bank .

 

Palestinian communities report that settlers from outposts attack and terrorize them in towns up and down the West Bank, casting a pall of violence and fear over daily life.

 

At least 4,300 Palestinians have been displaced across the West Bank this year, with settler attacks accounting for about 60 percent of displacement, according to the UN .

 

With the olive harvest under way across the West Bank, Israeli settlers have been mobilizing to intimidate and obstruct Palestinian farmers, who rely on the crop as a crucial source of revenue.

 

Settlers have carried out attacks and pogroms disrupting the olive harvest, while Israeli forces separately detained many Palestinians across the occupied territory.

 

The incidents included attacks on Palestinian olive harvesters, the burning and uprooting of olive trees, and the theft of crops and livestock.

 

Settlers set fire to Palestinian-owned groves and stole olives in what is considered the most important season for harvesting the single-seeded stone fruit. Settlers responsible for attacks operate with the financial, material, and legal backing of the Israeli state.

 

Israeli authorities are arming, funding, and granting impunity to the violent settlers responsible for these escalating deadly abuses while attacks by armed settlers often occur alongside Israeli army units or with soldiers standing by according to Human Rights Watch.

 

Israel was set to proceed with a tender process for part of a long-stalled development project known as E1 — a plan to build thousands of settlement housing units in a strategic corridor that could separate East Jerusalem from the rest of the occupied West Bank but Israel’s attorney general has ordered on 27 September a one-month postponement of the tender to avoid it being used for electioneering.

 

The deadline for submitting the construction bids was pushed from October 19 to after October 27 Knesset election.

 

Smotrich said the point of the project is to “bury the idea” of a Palestinian statehood.

 

International reactions to escalating Israeli settler violence and displacement in the West Bank created an emergency debate at the UN Security Council and sharp criticism from international bodies and partner nations.

 

UN officials and member states on 15 October warned that the West Bank settler violence and land expansion had reached historic highs , sounding the alarm over unchecked attacks targeting Palestinian olive harvesters , burning of property , and the forced displacement of thousands of residents.

 

EU Foreign ministers expressed deep concern over the deteriorating situation in the West Bank , condemning ongoing settlement expansion , forced displacement , and the sharp spike in civilian violence during the olive harvest.

 

Besides , several European nations and regional partners continued or expanded economic and diplomatic push back – including plans by the UK and other Western states to restrict or ban the import of goods produced in illegal West Bank settlements , citing that continuous violence and the E1 settlement project imperil the two- state solution.

 

Last month, Britain banned goods made in Israeli settlements, with British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband saying settler violence amounted to “ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.”

 

In the face of international condemnation, Israeli leaders have issued rare rebukes of violent settlers but the settlement boom continues apace.

 

 

Najla M. Shahwan is a prominent Palestinian author, researcher , and freelance journalist.