Bedouin families flee central West Bank amid rising settler intimidation

• A Bedouin family in the central West Bank fled after escalating settler harassment.
• UN agencies report thousands displaced amid a sharp rise in settler attacks.
• 'Israeli' activists say outposts operate with little to no enforcement from authorities.
• Bedouin families fear further displacement even after relocating.

What was once a long-standing Bedouin community in the central occupied West Bank has emptied out, as persistent settler intimidation pushed yet another family from their ancestral land.

For 45-year-old Ahmed Kaabneh, the decision to leave came only after the harassment reached his children.

Kaabneh had resisted relocating even after his brothers abandoned the area due to what they described as unrelenting threats. But once young settlers erected a makeshift structure just 100 metres above his home and began confronting his family, he said remaining was no longer possible.

“It is very difficult... because you leave an area where you lived for 45 years. Not a day or two or three, but nearly a lifetime,” he said from the family’s new improvised dwelling north of Jericho. “But what can you do? They are the strong ones and we are the weak, and we have no power.”

Their departure mirrors a wider pattern across the occupied West Bank, where Bedouin encampments have faced heightened pressure amid a surge in settler activity since the Gaza war erupted in October 2023. According to the UN humanitarian office OCHA, roughly 3,200 Palestinians from herding and Bedouin communities have been displaced by settler violence and movement restrictions since then, with October marking the most violent month recorded since 2006.

Even so, accountability remains rare. Rights groups say almost none of the perpetrators have faced consequences.

- A community emptied -

Kaabneh and several of his brothers now live some 13 kilometres northeast of their former homes in al-Hathrura. Children play outside their newly built tin structures, but Kaabneh says the family feels uprooted.

“We are in a place we have never lived in before, and life here is hard,” he explained.

The landscape around their former village has transformed in recent months, with new settler outposts, illegal under both international and 'Israeli' law, appearing across the hills. Many of these outposts, rights groups warn, later receive retroactive authorization from the government.

During an earlier Agence France-Presse (AFP) visit, caravans bearing 'Israeli' flags stood on a ridge overlooking the Bedouin homes. Nearby lay the debris of another community that had recently evacuated. In Kaabneh’s area, reporters witnessed settlers driving up to high vantage points to monitor the Palestinian families below.

“The situation is terrifying,” he said at the time, describing how daily threats and restricted grazing land made life nearly impossible.

Less than a month later, his cluster of homes stood silent.

Kaabneh recalled how settlers “would shout all night, throw stones, and walk through the middle of the houses. They didn't allow us to sleep at night, nor move freely during the day.”

- Activists say lawlessness enables expansion -

Today, only scattered belongings remain in the abandoned compound. Israeli activist Sahar Kan-Tor, 29, from the joint Israeli-Palestinian group Standing Together, said she visits to protect the site from looting.

“We are here to keep an eye on the property... because a lot of places that are abandoned are usually looted by the settlements,” she said.

Nearby, settlers were tearing down their previous shack and replacing it with furniture. “They thrive on chaos,” Kan-Tor added. “It is, in a way, a land without laws. There (are) authorities roaming around, but nothing is enforced, or very rarely enforced.”

A report published by Peace Now and Kerem Navot last year found that shepherding outposts alone had enabled settlers to take control of around 14 percent of the West Bank. The groups say this expansion is backed, directly or indirectly, by 'Israeli' government and military policies. Several members of 'Israel’s' governing coalition are settlers and have openly supported annexing the territory.

Kan-Tor believes the region where the Kaabneh family once lived is being targeted due to its geographic importance for any future Palestinian state.

Yet even after relocating, Kaabneh worries the threats will follow.

He said settlers had already appeared near their new homes, observing from the hills above.

“Even this area, which should be considered safe, is not truly safe,” he said. “They pursue us everywhere.”