By Henriette Chacar and Ali Sawafta
BURQA, West Bank (Reuters) – Palestinian farmer Salim Mas’oud was home in the occupied West Bank village of Burqa when neighbours alerted him that his barn was in flames.
Dozens of Jewish settlers had set the barn alight one late May afternoon, damaging the metal structure and burning hundreds of bales of hay and agricultural equipment, he said.
Days later, his neighbour Mohammad al-Bazzari watched on the news as settlers cut the fence around his house, shattered windows and damaged the citrus trees in his garden.
“My heart stopped,” said the 44-year-old father of two who works at a chicken farm in the city of Ramallah. “Windows can be replaced, plants can be repotted, but if we were to lose a soul, nothing would make up for that.”
U.S. and European officials have repeatedly expressed concern about settler violence, which reached record levels last year and has continued to increase since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s religious-nationalist government took office in January and accelerated settlement expansion.
Among its decisions was a move in March to allow settlers to return to four settlements evacuated in 2005, including Homesh, which lies on a hilltop overlooking Burqa.
Palestinians say the move has put lives and property at risk and is meant to intimidate them into fleeing their homes. They say soldiers stand by during attacks and often shoot or fire tear gas at them when they try to fend settlers off.
“They (settlers) feel emboldened. There is noone to deter them,” said 60-year-old Mas’oud as he surveyed the torched shed.
As tensions have risen, violence has spread and Jewish settlers in the West Bank have also faced drive-by shootings and stone throwing from Palestinians, with at least six killed this year.
The military said that while there have been confrontations between settlers and Palestinians near Burqa, soldiers operate to prevent violence or damage to property.
Israel cites biblical, historical and political ties to the West Bank to develop settlements that are deemed illegal by most countries. It first built Homesh in 1978 on privately owned Palestinian land in territory it captured in the 1967 Middle East war before dozens of Israeli families who lived there were removed in 2005 under a disengagement plan.
Following the evacuation, it was a criminal offence for Israelis to enter the area, said Shlomi Zakri, a lawyer with Israeli rights group Yesh Din, which represents some Burqa families.
With permission to return, a prefabricated shack that now serves as a seminary has been rebuilt and while there are only a few dozen settlers, their presence has severely restricted movement for Burqa’s 6,000 residents, said Nasser Hijja, a Burqa council member.
Hijja said the outpost prevents residents from reaching their farms. Two thirds of the village’s land has either been expropriated or turned into a closed military zone, he said, severely crippling Burqa’s economy.
The consequences go beyond the village, said Hijja. Burqa’s location splits the northern West Bank from the south at the intersection of three big Palestinian cities.
If Homesh expands further, it threatens to cut off more than half a million Palestinians from their homes, land and jobs, “establishing facts on the ground,” he said.
RAMPAGE
Settler leader Yossi Dagan has said that Palestinians from Burqa hurl rocks at settlers and cars driving toward Homesh, but says settlements will expand.
“Terror will not deter us. We will continue to build the settlements and Samaria,” he said in a statement, using the biblical name of the area.
As expansion has continued, violence has risen. The United Nations recorded 475 settler-related incidents that led to Palestinian casualties or property damage in the first five months of 2023, the highest daily average since 2006.
In the last month, Burqa’s residents said armed settlers, accompanied by Israeli forces, shot at them, set trees on fire and vandalised homes and cars. In one case, they tried to break into a school while classes were in session, residents said.
Last month, the Palestinian Ein Samiya herding community of 178 people said they were forced to leave their West Bank homes due to settler violence.
In February, a settler rampage through the West Bank town of Huwara, in which settlers burned cars and homes while people were inside, drew worldwide condemnation. The incident occurred after two brothers from a nearby settlement were shot dead by a Palestinian gunman.
As in other areas of the West Bank, Burqa’s residents said they rely on themselves for protection. Some have installed metal bars on windows. Others have formed a night watch.
“We will confront them with whatever we have, stones, our hands, our bodies,” said Burqa resident Nafee Salah as he piled rocks on his rooftop. “We refuse to leave.”
Netanyahu said last week Israeli settlements in the West Bank were not an obstacle to peace, even though their expansion has for decades been among the most contentious issues between Israel, the international community and the Palestinians, who say settlements undermine hopes of a viable Palestinian state.
In an interview with Sky News, he denied the return of settlers to Homesh violated commitments made to the Biden administration.
But as Israel grows its 700,000 West Bank settler population, Palestinians pay the price, said Ghassan Daghlas, a Burqa resident and Palestinian Authority official.
“The price we pay is, if I don’t defend myself, I will be burned alive in my home.”
(Additional reporting by Emily Rose and Ammar Awad; Writing by Henriette Chacar; Editing by James Mackenzie and Angus MacSwan)
