Right-wing settlers, with the backing of the Israeli government and Israel Defense Forces (IDF), are well on their way toward accomplishing ethnic cleansing of the West Bank — home to some 3 million Palestinians and half a million Zionist settlers. Confirmation of such an impending disaster has recently come from an unlikely source: retired IDF generals and former officers of Mossad, Israel’s main spy agency, who are touring the West Bank.
“Across Gaza, the West Bank and Israel itself, the machinery for making Palestinian life impossible is already operating, laying the groundwork for mass expulsion,” warns Amira Hass, the correspondent of the Israeli daily Haaretz for the occupied territories — Gaza and the West Bank, in this column. “Let me reiterate: The very existence of the Palestinian people between the sea and the river is now in danger.”
In this article, Amira Hass — the Haaretz correspondent for the occupied territories — documents the intensifying violence by the Israel Armed Forces (IDF) against Palestinians in the West Bank. Combined with horrific attacks by right-wing settlers, the IDF assaults have resulted in the deaths of nearly 1,000 Palestinians, while injuring more than 7,000, over the last two years. Palestinians in the West Bank have also been effectively banned from cultivating their land.