Israeli forces shield settlers during attacks on Palestinians

GENEVA: Israeli authorities are directly involved ​in settler attacks that have killed, injured and displaced Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, while Israeli security forces provide protection to settlers, a UN inquiry said on Tuesday. The report by the Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory found that Israeli authorities had enabled settler attacks through financial and military support, in a climate of impunity fostered by judicial and law-enforcement bodies. It also found that the Palestinian group Hamas had committed war crimes against both Palestinians and Israelis.
The report said Israeli settler attacks on Palestinian villages and agricultural land had surged since 2023, rising by 130 per cent, including incidents involving groups of masked assailants. Israeli ⁠security forces routinely accompanied settlers and acted as a shield for the violence, it said. The Israeli mission in Geneva rejected the report's findings accusing the body of ⁠drawing a 'false moral equivalence” between Hamas and Israeli civilians and of relying on what it called unsubstantiated allegations. It said Israeli authorities including the president and prime minister had repeatedly condemned violence against Palestinians.
Hundreds of thousands of Israeli settlers live among millions of Palestinians on land Israel captured in a 1967 war. Most countries consider ​such settlements a violation of international law, a position upheld ‌in a 2024 ruling by the UN's top court. Israel disputes this, citing historical and biblical ties to the land. At least seven Palestinians were killed and 832 injured last year, with violence continuing into 2026 in the form of near-daily attacks, according to the United ​Nations.
'The increasing participation of Israeli security forces in settler attacks amounts to a de facto collapse of the distinction between settlers and soldiers,” the report found. It said such violence has been used to advance state policy, including the unlawful occupation, displacement of Palestinians and the annexation of Palestinian territory.
The commission documented cases of assaults, abductions and abuse of Palestinian children by settlers. In one incident on April 19, 2025, a 12-year-old girl and her three-year-old brother were abducted at knifepoint, dragged to an olive grove and tied to a tree with plastic restraints until their family intervened. The ‌Commission also said settlers committed or threatened sexual violence to instil fear, and harassed Palestinian women. 'The relentless, daily assaults by Israeli settlers against Palestinians are intolerable - and ​must end,” said the commission's head, S Muralidhar, an Indian former senior judge. He urged the international community to press Israel to dismantle settlements and outposts and curb the violence.
Despite ​periodic condemnations and ‌the ⁠dismantling of some unauthorised outposts, Israeli authorities have not taken sustained measures to stop the attacks, the report said. Wassel Abu Yousef, a member of the executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, the body the UN recognises as representing Palestinians, said that the report 'reflects the extent of the violence perpetrated by settlers against our people'. He called for measures ​such as sanctions in response.
The report said it was also gravely alarmed by serious abuses it documented in the Gaza Strip. The commission found ​that Hamas-affiliated forces were involved in at least 60 of 249 documented cases of executions and severe physical violence in 2024 to 2025, including beatings with metal pipes and bone-breaking as punishment for alleged collaboration with Israel or looting aid. Eleven men were publicly executed for alleged collaboration in September and October 2025. The Commission said these acts amount to war crimes and violations of international law. — Reuters