Palestinian child wounded amid raid of Jordan Valley village

‘Doing the minimum:’ IDF said angry at Shin Bet for not taking settler violence seriously

Army official tells Israeli TV that the security agency is ‘not providing us with intelligence or early warnings,’ suggests political leaders ‘prefer the current situation continues’

By ToI Staff 5 September 2026, 2:23 am
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Palestinians inspect burned-out cars after an attack by settlers, where they also spray-painted Hebrew graffiti on the walls of a house in Beita, south of Nablus in the West Bank, September 2, 2026. (Nasser Ishtayeh/Flash90)
Palestinians inspect burned-out cars after an attack by settlers, where they also spray-painted Hebrew graffiti on the walls of a house in Beita, south of Nablus in the West Bank, September 2, 2026. (Nasser Ishtayeh/Flash90)

The Shin Bet is failing to take settler violence seriously, a senior Israeli military official complained to Israeli television on Friday, as attacks across the West Bank continue on a daily basis with almost complete impunity.

There is a dedicated department within the Shin Bet whose job is to thwart such violence, but the military official speaking with Channel 12 news said the Jewish Division had been “doing very little — the minimum.”

“Someone wants the Jewish Division to be weak. They’re not providing us with intelligence or early warnings,” the military official said.

The official reiterated warnings that the situation in the West Bank was on the verge of spiraling out of control, with more and more illegal outposts being established by settlers.

Five new outposts were established in the central West Bank just in the last week, with the Israel Defense Forces struggling to secure all of these different communities and prevent confrontations between settlers and Palestinians.

Each outpost that is demolished is rebuilt immediately afterward. Just in the last year, outposts were demolished only to be quickly rebuilt 160 different times, the military official told Channel 12.

Israeli settlers at a newly established outpost at the site of the deadly attack in which Benayahu Mellet and IDF Major Yuval Ezra were killed, near the Israeli settlement of Havat Gilad in the West Bank, August 4, 2026. (Hilel Ben Or/Flash90)

The official noted the upcoming olive harvest season, which regularly sees settlers trying to prevent Palestinians from accessing their lands.

“It seems that there are those who prefer that the current situation continues,” the official said, lamenting efforts by far-right politicians to negatively influence the situation on the ground.

The official said ultra-nationalist rabbis were also issuing directives allowing settlers to drive on Shabbat to participate in raids of Palestinian villages, as was seen last week in the northern West Bank town of Qusra.

Soldiers who were supposed to be resting or training are instead being deployed to the West Bank to try and prevent clashes between extremist settlers and Palestinians, the official added.

The television report came as settler violence has surged in recent months, with near-daily, sometimes deadly attacks taking place throughout the West Bank, though few suspects arrested and charged. Critics accuse the government of condoning or even encouraging the attacks.

Shin Bet chief David Zini, a self-described “messianic” former general affiliated with the ultraconservative Har HaMor yeshiva, has cut the Jewish Department’s resources since taking over as head of the security agency last year, downplayed settler violence as cases of “friction” and recommended the use of electronic monitor bracelets, rather than administrative detention, to rein in culprits, according to Hebrew media reports.

Shin Bet chief David Zini is seen at Mount Herzl Military Cemetery in Jerusalem during Memorial Day, April 21, 2026. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

Shin Bet figures from earlier this year found that three times more Palestinians were victims of nationalist attacks in the West Bank than Jews.

Palestinian child wounded during settler raids

Several settler attacks were reported around the West Bank on Friday, including the Jordan Valley village of Umm al-Khair, which settlers and soldiers were filmed raiding.

A Palestinian child was injured by an object thrown at him by one of the invading settlers.

The Mothers Against Violence group of Israeli solidarity activists said settlers raided the village first and harassed Palestinian children playing on the village’s soccer field.

The settlers also cut a fence that the Palestinians had installed around the village to try and prevent such raids, which have been taking place on a regular basis, as some were also filmed doing Friday in the West Bank village of Burqa.

Soldiers then arrived at Umm al-Khair shortly thereafter but did not apprehend the invading settlers, Mothers Against Violence said.

The soldiers subsequently declared the soccer field a closed military zone and ordered the Palestinian residents of the village invaded by settlers to enter their homes and not come out, the activists say.

Closed military zone orders are regularly used by the IDF to limit altercations in the West Bank between settlers and Palestinians.

However, the directives are often only enforced against Palestinians, while settlers are able to violate them with impunity, as has been the case in the northern West Bank village of Qusra.

While one arrest was carried out by the IDF, it was not of one of the settlers, but rather a Palestinian villager Aziz Hathaleen, whose brother Awdah was shot dead by extremist Israeli settler Yinon Levy last year.

Activists said Friday’s incident showed how Israeli authorities were working with extremist settlers to embitter the lives of vulnerable Palestinian communities in the West Bank.

An IDF source later said that its forces arrived at Umm al-Khair to break up a clash between settlers and Palestinians. The source said that one Palestinian was detained but was released several hours later.

No reason was given for why the man was detained in the first place.

Illustrative: A young boy from the Palestinian hamlet of Umm al-Khair in the West Bank plays on a soccer pitch just meters from the settlement of Carmel in the background, February 2, 2026 (Jeremy Sharon/Times of Israel)

Umm al-Khair has been targeted by settlers for years and was the subject of the 2024 Oscar-winning documentary No Other Land.

Elsewhere in the West Bank on Friday, an Israeli settler was filmed raiding the Palestinian village of Turmus Ayya, where he climbed on top of a home and declared, “You need to understand [that] this country and this land [are] Jewish. This is my land. This is my country because Allah promised [it to] me.”

The settler was filmed wearing a T-shirt with the logo of the outlawed Kach movement, which was founded by the late extremist rabbi Meir Kahane and outlawed by Israel as a terror group in 1994.

Israeli solidarity activists also paid a visit on Friday to Tarqumia, another village in the West Bank that has come under frequent settler harassment since Hamas’s October 7 onslaught.

Mickey Gitzin, the acting CEO of the New Israel Fund, photographed one of the homes recently ransacked by settlers who graffitied “Kahane lives” on one of the walls.

“It was moving to be there with a group of truly righteous Bnei Avraham activists who, with their bodies, their kindness and their moral compass, are trying to influence reality and fight this evil, while at the same time presenting other faces of Judaism and Israel,” Gitzin wrote.

Hours later, Arabic media reported that torched farmland in the central West Bank village of al-Mughayyir on Friday evening.

Reporter and activist Andrey Khrzhanovskiy reported that settlers also attacked a convoy of Palestinian vehicles traveling to al-Mughayyir earlier Friday in order to offer their condolences to the families of two teens shot dead earlier this week by Israeli forces.

The IDF and settlers raided al-Mughayyir on Wednesday after settlers reported that residents had stolen their livestock. A clash broke out, leading Israeli troops to open fire.

Khrzhanovskiy posted footage from Friday’s attack, which showed two middle-aged men with their shirts and faces bloodied and their vehicle damaged. The activist-journalist said the settlers blocked the convoy and then proceeded to hurl rocks at the cars, beat the passengers inside with clubs and pepper-spray them.

One of the vehicles was also stolen during the attack, according to Khrzhanovskiy.

Two men were evacuated to a nearby hospital for treatment, though an ambulance trying to reach the scene was blocked by the settlers, the activist claimed.

The IDF eventually arrived at the scene and fired tear gas at Palestinians from al-Mughayyir who had gathered to try and push back the attacking settlers, the activist said.

Additionally Friday, the Palestinian Authority’s official Wafa news site said several Palestinians suffered from tear gas inhalation during a raid by Israeli soldiers and settlers of the Bedouin Khallat al-Nahla hamlet.

Wafa said settlers also raided several homes in the Bedouin hamlet of Khirbet al-Hamma in the Jordan Valley.

There were no reports of any arrests made, and there was no immediate comment from the IDF on any of these incidents.

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