Israeli settlers defaced and set fire to a mosque in the occupied West Bank on Monday during Ramadan, as violence against Palestinians escalates.
The Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that settlers defaced the Abu Bakr Al Siddiq Mosque in the village of Tell, south-west of Nablus, wrote racist slogans “hostile to Arabs and Muslims” on its walls, and then set the main entrance on fire.
The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the incident, which it described as a “deliberate provocation of the Palestinian people and the entire Arab and Islamic nations” and “an attack on the sanctity of places of worship during the holy month of Ramadan, in flagrant violation of all norms, laws and humanitarian principles”.
Settlers are often protected by Israeli security troops when committing violence in the West Bank. As such, the ministry held the Israeli government “fully and directly responsible”.
On the same day, Israeli troops entered the city of Nablus with settlers and forcibly displaced a family, Wafa reported. The army entered “with more than 50 vehicles, accompanied by a bulldozer … to secure the entry of settlers to Joseph’s Tomb to perform Talmudic rituals”.
Israeli troops and settlers attacked at least 45 mosques last year, Palestine's Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs said.
Settler attacks have become a near-daily occurrence over the past two years, since October 7, 2023. In the northern Jordan Valley, at least 112 communities were forcibly displaced and 4,037 Palestinians were displaced because of settler violence in the West Bank, the UN said last month.
Israeli rights group B’Tselem has documented 45 cases in which entire communities were expelled, with at least 3,330 people forcibly displaced by settler and military attacks. “Backed by the state, settlers have established dozens of herding outposts around these communities in recent years,” the group said. It said the primary goal of the attacks was to drive Palestinians away and seize their land.
The UN has accused Israel of carrying out actions that could amount to ethnic cleansing in Gaza and the West Bank. Israel's “intensified attacks, the methodical destruction of entire neighbourhoods and the denial of humanitarian assistance appeared to aim at a permanent demographic shift in Gaza”, the UN Human Rights Office said in a report released on Thursday.
“This, together with forcible transfers, which appear to aim at a permanent displacement, raises concerns over ethnic cleansing in Gaza and the West Bank,” added the report, which covers the period from November 1, 2024, to October 31 last year.
The Israeli government approved a plan to allow land registration in the West Bank for the first time since 1967, a move that opponents say paves the way for annexation of the occupied Palestinian territory.
About 20 countries condemned Israel over the move in a new joint statement on Monday, including Brazil, France, Spain, Denmark, Norway and Ireland. Other countries and organisations to sign the statement included Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Qatar, as well as the heads of the Arab League and Organisation of Islamic Co-operation.
The joint statement said the settlements, and decisions designed to further them, are “a flagrant violation of international law” and a step towards “unacceptable de facto annexation”.
It came a week after a statement by the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Qatar, Indonesia, Pakistan, Egypt and Turkey condemning Israel's move, warning of the escalation it poses.
