Herzog says Israeli politicians have not done all they can to halt settler violence

President Isaac Herzog on Wednesday charged that the political echelon has not done everything it can to halt attacks by extremist Israeli settlers on Palestinians in the West Bank, adding that the phenomenon “can be stopped.”

Herzog’s visit came after more than 100 Israeli settlers rioted in the West Bank village of Jalud overnight Monday-Tuesday, preventing Israeli forces from enabling the displaced Palestinian Tubasi family to return to their home.

“We are seeing very serious phenomena of nationalist crime,” the president said during a visit to the IDF Judea and Samaria Division headquarters, “phenomena that go to the root of our ability to function as a state, and undermine our ability to exercise sovereignty and Israel’s rule of law.”

“Israel is a democracy, a state governed by the rule of law,” he stressed. “No one can take the law into their own hands. This does great damage to Israel’s good name. It is a stain on its face, and moreover, it first and foremost harms the settlement enterprise.”

“This cannot continue,” the president said. “We must give all the tools, and the political echelon must give all the tools, so that this phenomenon stops. There are legal and other means that can be applied so that this phenomenon is halted and curbed, because it is not ours, it does not belong to us, and it is neither Jewish nor Israeli.”

Herzog also thanked the IDF and security services for their “relentless war [against terrorism] in Judea and Samaria, a stubborn and determined war.”

The president’s comments came a day after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for the perpetrators of the massive overnight attack to be prosecuted “to the fullest extent of the law,” while downplaying the attack as being perpetrated by a “small number” of people.

Netanyahu and other ministers have regularly downplayed settler violence as a marginal concern, claiming that nearly all incidents are the work of a few hundred wayward youths, despite attacks taking place on a near-daily basis and occurring in hundreds of villages and towns across the West Bank.

The army said the attackers in Jalud overnight Monday-Tuesday were “blocking roads, setting tires on fire, and throwing stones at security forces,” injuring three Border Police officers and causing widespread property damage in Jalud. Three suspects had been arrested as of Tuesday afternoon.

Settler violence in the West Bank has risen sharply since the Hamas-led onslaught of October 7, 2023, that sparked the war in Gaza.

Critics accuse the government of condoning and even encouraging the violence, which has led to the displacement of dozens of Palestinian families.

Additionally, 67 civilians and Israeli security personnel have been killed in terror attacks in Israel and the West Bank since October 7. Another eight members of the Israeli security forces were killed in clashes during raids in Palestinian cities in the West Bank.

During the same period, more than 1,100 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli forces or settlers, according to the PA health ministry. The IDF says the vast majority of them were gunmen killed in exchanges of fire, rioters who clashed with troops, or terrorists carrying out attacks.