I’m finding these days all roads are leading to Israel. I’ve been listening to Whitney Webb, from Unlimited Hangout, whose work on the surveillance state has helped me understand Israel’s pivotal role. As an occupying force in Gaza and the West Bank Israel invested in surveillance technology and techniques in order to exert control over the occupied Palestinian people. In turn the Israeli state has used their spycraft to persuade (blackmail?) politicians etc, to either look the other way or actively support Israel. Meanwhile the Israeli state marches on.

![image.png](https://images.hive.blog/DQmXMcXoWJA1RSdfgDUKPUvin2R7jirUNkRByrozGTPLoJu/image.png)


[Al Jazeera](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/5/18/mapping-israeli-occupation-gaza-palestine)



Under international law Israel has certain obligations with regard to its treatment of the Palestinian population in the West Bank and Gaza. A new report from [Breaking the Silence](https://www.breakingthesilence.org.il/), Settler Violence in the West Bank Soldiers' Testimonies 2012–2020 gives a detailed account of how the IDF as the sovereign authority in the occupied territories fails to protect the safety and security of the Palestinian population. Breaking The Silence, which was established in 2004 by IDF veterans, has collected the testimonies of over 1000 former soldiers who have served in the occupied West Bank and Gaza since the start of the Second Intifada. 

This report notes how Israeli settlers, “often use the cloak of protection provided by the IDF to promote their goals, at the forefront of which is deepening their control of the area and pushing the Palestinians off of their land’’. Violence is meted out on a daily basis by Israeli settlers against the Palestinian residents of the West Bank. 

Here are some of their voices.

### Burning the Olive Groves

>A riot usually begins with a few things: first of all, there was the issue where sometimes Jews themselves would start fires in the surrounding hills, which automatically draws Palestinians out.

 > The goal is to drive [them] out. You’re driving the Palestinians out with riot dispersal gear, which sometimes also reaches [the stage of] rubber [bullets], and rubber [bullets] are a really unpleasant tool. I really didn’t relate, so to speak. And [with] the Jews it’s just, like, more through dialogue like, really trying to be gentle with them.


![download (3).jpg](https://images.hive.blog/DQmQyAG3B9sc7nnt4tjwyKWcjvbAKcdsbuHMTS88PuQTgBm/download%20(3).jpg)
[Photo](https://thearabweekly.com/palestinians-olive-oil-harvest-threatened-settler-violence)

### Palestinian Store

>I didn't understand that they were having a demonstration in front of the store. The moment the Palestinian came and opened his store, they began to riot, began to attack. We tried to stop them and they pushed a Givati soldier to the ground. One of the soldiers tried to use his body to stop one of the settlers, whom we had been talking to about three minutes earlier, and we had a really good conversation, and it was nice, and we smiled and talked amicably, and suddenly he [the settler] had an aggressive expression: get out of here, don't get in my way.

### Stone Throwing

> Near [the settlement of] Yitzhar, there was a period when they would throw stones from the mountain on cars passing by.’

He states that the settlers were allowed to continue acts of stoning with impunity:

> We could have arrested them and we didn’t arrest them. We didn’t arrest anyone there.

> I think there was an event or two in which the operations officer told me that the settlers were caught and simply released. I remember at least one time when the operations officer said: listen, my opinions are right wing, but I think this is really wrong, what happened. That the army caught settlers who undoubtedly threw rocks, or whatever it was, and simply released them, in contrast to the Arabs who are caught and arrested or taken into custody. At that time he said it about a few other cases, that generally there’s this norm of sorts that the moment you catch settlers, you scold them and release them.


![download (1).jpg](https://images.hive.blog/DQmeDiNWX7WzuuHcb5rPvChx3k7SfTYTh6hnauBXo1X6bvH/download%20(1).jpg)
[Photo](https://soutien-palestine.blogspot.com/2017/10/israeli-settlers-throw-stones-at_25.html)

### Taking care of the farmer
 
> So they (the Givat Ronen settlers) say: These are our orchards and [the Palestinians] are not allowed to [come]…
Usually, why do they head down during the day? Because some Palestinian farmer has arrived at his orchards and then they come to scare away the farmer. That’s usually the daily dynamic. And then you tell them: Fine, fine, I’ll go take care of the farmer, you wait here.

> And the fact that you’ve done an injustice to the Palestinian person, again, truly in the sum of all of the injustices, this gets tossed in a very very low place. Like, the fact that he… Today he won’t tend to his land, from my point of view. Nothing big has happened.

### Religion

The use of violence by settlers against Palestinians is also accompanied by psychological intimidation designed to frighten and harass.

>The first waves were okay people, walking quietly until they get to the tomb and go to pray, but in the middle and up to the end, the other waves, people really started showing up with guitars, singing and yelling, and you see they’re doing it on purpose; they want to wake up the [Palestinian] village; they want to fuck with their heads; and we, me and my friends, when we were at the post where we were [stationed], we told them: listen, if something happens – it’s not you who’ll [have to] do something. It’ll fall to us. And then I like, then I asked myself, why did I get out of the house to like come here, so like this asshole can come pray? And it was also one of the moments when I saw, I'm telling you honestly, like, I saw hate. These people really wanted to disrupt the natural everyday order of the village.

### Conclusion
In the conclusion to its report  [Breaking the Silence](https://www.breakingthesilence.org.il/), settler violence is enabled by the IDF:

> The phenomenon of settler violence is an inevitable consequence of Israel’s occupation and policy of settling the West Bank. Were it not for the IDF’s continuous control over and presence in the occupied territories, this violence would not be a possibility.

It notes that there is only one solution to settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, “Ending the occupation is the only way to bring this violence to a stop.’’