"Once a society behaves this way that society is doomed": The New York Times published an extensive article Monday on the rise in violence by extremist settlers in the West Bank, focusing on particularly harsh criticism in recent months from former senior Israeli security officials. The newspaper opened the article with remarks by Maj. Gen. (res.) Eyal Ben-Reuven, who previously commanded a division in the West Bank and Israel's ground forces during the Second Lebanon War and now says the phenomenon has become one of the most serious threats to Israel in his view.
Ben-Reuven has joined tours in recent months organized by former Israeli officers and senior officials to Palestinian villages. In the article, which was also reported by ynet and Yedioth Ahronoth journalist Ronen Bergman, Ben-Reuven is described as having visited a Palestinian school that had been looted and destroyed and heard testimony from Palestinian shepherds and farmers about attacks, livestock theft and land seizures.
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Violent clashes between settlers and Palestinians in the West Bank
(Photo: Maavak Al Kol Dunam)
"This, what the settlers are doing here, is the real threat to Israel," he told the newspaper, with tears in his eyes. "This is more concerning to me than Iran, Gaza or Lebanon."
The newspaper also prominently featured even more extraordinary remarks from former senior officials. Brig. Gen. (res.) and former minister Ephraim Sneh said of attacks on Palestinians by settlers: "This is ethnic cleansing, to put it simply."
Brig. Gen. (res.) Asaf Agmon, a former senior Air Force officer, compared what is happening to what some Israelis' parents experienced during the Holocaust. He stressed that he was not comparing the scale of the violence, but rather what he described as an attempt to erase the Palestinian presence from large parts of the West Bank.
“Once a society behaves this way,” he said, “that society is doomed.”
According to The New York Times, such criticism is no longer coming only from left-wing organizations and anti-settlement activists. The newspaper described a "small but rapidly expanding array" of influential Israelis, many of them from the former military and intelligence leadership, who warn that the lack of enforcement and violence in the West Bank threaten Israel's democratic character.
Eyal Ben-Reuven: Maj. Gen. (res.) Eyal Ben-Reuven. 'This is more concerning to me than Iran, Gaza or Lebanon'
(Photo: Yair Sagi)
According to The New York Times, more than 200 prominent Israelis signed a letter in June calling on the government to stop harming Palestinian civilians. The signatories included, according to the newspaper, two former prime ministers, more than 30 former IDF and Air Force major generals and brigadier generals, former heads of the Mossad and Shin Bet, rabbis, a Nobel laureate and one of Israel's leading authors. Some of the signatories have historically been identified with hawkish positions on security issues.
The letter used the terms "Jewish terrorism" and "ethnic cleansing" and argued that the issue goes beyond the government's failure to enforce the law. The signatories said there is a "deliberate government policy" under which the security establishment — including the IDF, Shin Bet and police — knowingly cooperates with what is happening. They pointed, among other things, to tens of millions of dollars in public funds invested in illegal outposts and farms through roads, water, electricity, vehicles and weapons.
Asaf Agmon: Brig. Gen. (res.) Asaf Agmon. 'I am ashamed of what our people are doing here'
(Photo: From Facebook)
The newspaper emphasized to its international readership how unusual the criticism is given the identities of those making it. "accusations of ethnic cleansing from such a large group of former prime ministers, generals and other top Israeli officials — the same people who once led their nation’s security forces — are virtually unheard of," it wrote.
Some of those officials, the newspaper noted, were themselves involved during their service in approving targeted killings, airstrikes and operations in which Palestinians were killed. They argue that the difference is that those actions were carried out for Israel's security, under a chain of command and legal oversight, whereas what is happening now, they say, is indiscriminate violence against civilians intended to drive Palestinians from their lands.
The newspaper also recalled comments made about two months ago by former Defense Minister and IDF chief of staff Moshe "Bogie" Ya'alon, who compared the ideology of the extremist settler movement to that of Nazi Germany. In that interview, Ya'alon said: "What is Jewish supremacy? Eighty years after the Holocaust, ‘Mein Kampf’ in reverse. The master race is us."
The tours bringing former Israeli officials to Palestinian villages
A major part of the article focuses on tours organized by Maj. Gen. (res.) Yaakov (Mendy) Or, who served for years in the West Bank and later oversaw audits of the security establishment at the State Comptroller's Office. Over the past year, he says, he has brought more than 250 participants — former senior officers, intelligence officials, lawyers, economists and diplomats — to see what is happening on the ground for themselves.
Before the tours begin, Or routinely warns participants about what they are about to see. "When I take you to see what is happening in the West Bank, you will have two choices," he said during one tour: "You can stay silent, and be complicit,” he told them, “or you can speak out, and tell everyone you know about what is happening." He then offered anyone who did not want to find themselves in that position the opportunity to leave before the tour began.
Yaakov (Mandi) Or: 'You can stay silent, and be complicit or you can speak out, and tell everyone you know about what is happening'
(Photo: Rami Zarnagar)
The newspaper's team joined one of the tours in June, which included former generals, a former minister, a military secretary who served under four prime ministers, an intelligence official, a state prosecutor and an ambassador. Or pointed out new fences erected by settlers and outposts built on hills. He said the overall goal is "widen areas of control and narrow the places where Palestinian communities can live."
Among the participants was Brig. Gen. (res.) Azriel Nevo, who served as military secretary to four prime ministers. He described what he saw on the tour as "shocking" and said the prime ministers he had previously worked for "would have never allowed this to occur.."
In one village, participants met Bashar Eid, a Palestinian farmer who said he had been injured in a settler attack and was no longer able to work his land. He described repeated attacks from outposts in the area and said that he now spends most of his time watching from the roof of his home, trying to spot approaching settlers.
“I don’t know what to do,” he said. “They want to take my house.”
Former Ambassador Raphael Schutz, who served in Spain, Norway and the Vatican, said his mother fled Nazi Germany at age 9. He said that when she watches videos today of settlers setting cars on fire and shooting Palestinian farmers, she is ashamed.
"To her, it is inconceivable that Jews can behave this way," he said, adding: "I’m glad I left the foreign service. It would be impossible for me to explain this."
In the Palestinian community of Hamamat al-Maleh in the Jordan Valley, several Palestinian families were still living there in February, although many residents had already left following violent nighttime raids. One resident told The New York Times at the time: "We don’t even sleep an hour. If they come and you’re asleep, you won’t survive it."
By March, following a series of raids, thefts and attacks, the remaining families had also left. Shortly afterward, according to residents and activists, settlers arrived with a bulldozer and demolished the local school. They later circulated a video showing themselves celebrating Passover among the ruins.
When the group of generals and senior officials arrived at the site in late June, the Palestinian community was already deserted.
Raphael Schutz: Rafael Schutz. 'It would be impossible for me to explain this.'
Brig. Gen. (res.) Nehemia Dagan, one of the founders of the Air Force's helicopter fleet and a former chief education officer, reacted angrily to what he saw.
When you are burning books, when you are destroying knowledge and attacking children, you’re like the Germans. “We have lost ourselves, and we have lost this fight," he said.
Dagan called for separation from the Palestinians and the establishment of two states: "Not for their sake, but for our own."
Thousands of attacks, more than 3,200 Palestinians displaced this year
According to U.N. figures cited in the article, settlers have carried out thousands of attacks in the West Bank since the Oct. 7 attack, injuring thousands of Palestinians. More than 3,200 Palestinians have been displaced from their homes because of settler violence since the beginning of the year — twice the rate recorded last year.
The number of Palestinians injured in settler attacks has also risen from an average of one person every three days in 2020 to more than three people a day in 2026, according to the figures cited by the newspaper.
At the same time, the newspaper noted that more than 1,100 Palestinians, including militants, have been killed in the West Bank since Oct. 7, with the vast majority killed by Israeli forces. According to the United Nations, that is roughly equivalent to the total number of Palestinians killed in the territory between 2005 and 2022. The newspaper added that "since 2023, 67 Israelis have been killed by Palestinians in the West Bank."
The violent clashes in Qosra over the weekend
Benjamin Netanyahu: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. 'handful of kids'
(Photo: Alex Kolomoisky)
Gal Levertov, the former director of the International Department at Israel's Justice Ministry who represented Israel before the International Criminal Court in The Hague, described the distinction as he sees it in stark terms.
"If I had to, I could make a legal defense of what the Israel Defense Forces have done in Gaza," he said. "But what is happening today in the West Bank? It’s indefensible."
Warnings about the violence have also recently come from rabbis associated with the settlement movement. Rabbi Elyakim Levanon urged supporters of the settlements to refrain from violence, saying that critics of the settlement enterprise are using such incidents to damage its "reputation both in Israel, the U.S. and worldwide."
The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not respond to questions submitted by the newspaper about the former officials' allegations. The newspaper noted that Netanyahu has previously dismissed settler violence as illegal acts committed by a "handful of kids."
Following weekend attacks on Palestinian homes in the village of Qusra, including the home of an American citizen, however, Netanyahu issued an unusually strong statement saying that such criminal acts cause "immense harm" to law-abiding settlers and "damage Israel’s standing in the world."
The IDF rejected to the newspaper any claim that it supports "the actions of violent groups" in the West Bank. The military said its mission is "to protect all residents" and that a soldier who participates in an attack by settlers or stands by while one takes place is acting in "direct contradiction" to his orders.
The article concluded with another quote from Asaf Agmon, who said settler violence does not make Israel safer but rather the opposite.
"When you ruin the image of Israel, the diplomatic value of Israel and the core values that hold the military together, you achieve nothing," he said.
Agmon, whose grandson, Staff Sgt. Gur Kehati, was killed in Lebanon last year, added: "I’ve earned the right to speak. My family and I paid the highest price for this country. I am ashamed of what our people are doing here."