The Media Line: In Judea and Samaria’s War of Narratives, Whose Story Will Win? 

In Judea and Samaria’s War of Narratives, Whose Story Will Win? 

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s coalition is pushing US President Donald Trump for a sovereignty nod, but the American president is signaling caution on annexation 

By Maayan Hoffman/The Media Line 

Two narratives compete for legitimacy and attention. 

In one, violent Jewish extremists attack innocent Palestinians on land they claim as their own. In the other, violent Palestinians attack Jews and murder them simply for existing. Both stories are told with conviction. Both contain elements of truth. Both are used to justify policies, positions, and political pressure at the highest levels. 

That tension is now playing out not only on the ground but also in the corridors of power. 

In Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, figures including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir are pressing him to urge President Donald Trump to recognize Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria. They argue that the territory is the biblical heartland of the Jewish people, promised in the Torah and essential to Israel’s security. 

The territory is also widely known internationally as the West Bank. Many Israelis and supporters of Israel use “Judea and Samaria,” a biblical-historical name for the area, to emphasize Jewish historical ties and, in some cases, political claims. Many Palestinians, international bodies, and foreign governments prefer “the West Bank,” a term that became common after Jordan controlled the territory following the 1948 war, and which is widely used in diplomacy and international reporting. 

For his part, President Trump has so far resisted those calls. Despite strong backing from his evangelical base, he has said he is not yet ready to support annexation of the West Bank. 

Last week at Mar-a-Lago, the gap between the two leaders was evident. Yet the divide between how Israelis and Palestinians view the land, the violence surrounding it, and the future it holds is far sharper—and far more consequential. 

Numbers frame the debate. 

A United Nations official told The Media Line that UN records used to guide humanitarian planning show a sharp rise in violence in the West Bank. 

In October 2025 alone, the UN recorded more than 264 settler-related incidents that resulted in casualties, property damage, or both. That averages more than eight incidents per day and represents the highest monthly figure in nearly two decades of UN record-keeping. 

Since 2006, the UN has documented more than 9,600 such incidents. Roughly 1,500 occurred in 2025 alone, about 15% of the total, as of the end of October. Beyond those figures, UN officials say there are daily reports of intimidation, trespassing, threats, and harassment that do not appear in the published data but contribute to what the organization describes as a coercive environment that pushes Palestinians off farmland and out of their homes. 

By the UN’s account, more than 3,200 Palestinians have been displaced since October 2023 due to settler violence and related access restrictions. Entire herding communities have been abandoned, with people killed or injured, including by live fire, and many losing access to their livelihoods. The damage often includes vandalized trees, vehicles, homes, and infrastructure. 

Still, the Israeli NGO Regavim argues that the UN figures paint a distorted picture. 

In a report published in April 2025 analyzing UN data from the previous year, Regavim said a significant portion of the incidents classified as settler violence did not take place in the West Bank at all. Of the 6,285 incidents included in the UN dataset, 1,704, or about 20%, occurred within Jerusalem or Israel proper, meaning they had no inherent connection to what is commonly defined as settler activity. 

Additionally, 1,361 incidents, roughly 16%, involved Jewish visits to the Temple Mount or Muslim riots there that led to clashes with security forces—events Regavim said are unrelated to settler violence. 

“It should be emphasized: every ascent to the Temple Mount is counted in the list as ‘settler violence,’” the Regavim report stated. 

The organization further found that 1,613 incidents, about 19% of those reported in the West Bank, were general complaints such as entry onto land during tours or hikes, with no assault or property damage. An additional 96 cases involved land use by the Israeli government or its contractors for infrastructure projects carried out on state land. 

Another 2,039 incidents, about 24% of the West Bank total, involved claims of assault or property damage without bodily harm. Regavim argued that these cases should not appear in a database that purports to track incidents involving physical injury and said many stemmed from disputes over agricultural land near Jewish communities. 

After excluding those categories, Regavim said only 833 incidents remained that could be classified as settler violence in Judea and Samaria involving bodily harm and, in some cases, property damage. 

“This constitutes only 10% of the original list, which sought to reflect alarming levels of severe violence by settlers against Palestinians in the Judea and Samaria,” Regavim wrote. “Not only did this review cut 90% of the events, undermining the foundation of the UN’s arguments and their consequences, but the remaining cases suffer not only from a lack of credibility but also from a disgusting level of false accusation against the real victims.” 

Lt. Col. (res.) Maurice Hirsch, director of the Initiative for Palestinian Authority Accountability and Reform at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, said only a tiny fraction of the more than 550,000 Jews living in Judea and Samaria have been involved in settler violence. 

“So-called violent settlers are no more than a few hundred, yet every settler is then painted as a violent settler, which just isn’t the case,” Hirsch stressed. “Settlers are the most law-abiding population in the country. There are fewer drug offenses, fewer alcohol offenses, fewer break-ins.” 

Joshua Hasten, who lives in the territories and served as the former spokesperson for the Etzion bloc of settlements south of Jerusalem, echoed Hirsch’s assessment. He estimated that roughly 0.001% of settlers are responsible for violent incidents, “usually as a result of being provoked or the increase in Arab terrorism.” 

“The entire world is focused on these incidents,” Hasten said. “When it is about Jews, it makes the news.” 

In his view, there are “some hot heads,” “anarchists,” or “extremists” living in the area, but they are not representative of the broader population. In his daily reality, he said, the primary threat comes from Palestinian terrorism. 

“These guys want to murder Jews and use settler violence as an excuse,” Hasten said. He added that the Israel Defense Forces thwarted more than 90% of planned attacks and warned that without that intervention, far more Jews would be killed. 

Hasten argued that while Israeli security forces regularly prevent attacks, Israel’s leadership must strengthen deterrence so that would-be attackers decide the cost is not worth it. Measures such as house demolitions, he said, are not enough if terrorists continue to believe they have little to lose. 

Figures from the Israel Security Agency, published in February 2025, support his claim of widespread terror activity. 

In the previous year, the agency recorded 6,828 Palestinian terror incidents in the West Bank, including Molotov cocktails and stone-throwing, acts that can be deadly even if often categorized as minor. There were also 231 “significant attacks,” including shootings, stabbings, and car-rammings. That amounts to more than 18 incidents per day and one major attack roughly every day and a half. 

During the same period, Israeli security forces thwarted 1,040 significant attacks, including 689 involving firearms and 326 involving explosive devices. 

“Thank God, the IDF stops most of these events,” Hasten said. “Unfortunately, some get through.” 

He also pushed back against what he described as a widespread international misconception that Hamas and other terror groups operate only in Gaza. 

“This is not true,” he said. “Hamas is alive and well and very popular in Judea and Samaria.” 

Hasten accused the Palestinian Authority and terror supporters in the area of actively glorifying terrorism. A report by Hirsch’s JCFA examining the Palestinian Authority’s official news outlet, WAFA, found that 99.9% of its English-language articles about Israel in July 2025 were explicitly negative and promoted false and dangerous narratives. According to the report, WAFA’s Arabic-language coverage was no better. 

For Hirsch, if violence were to escalate into something resembling a third intifada, it would not originate from the Jewish side. 

He argued that many Palestinians are “terrorists in their nature” and that it “doesn’t really require so much more to push them into terrorism.” In his view, the threshold for violence is already low. 

Hirsch accused Palestinians of portraying themselves internationally as “innocent victims at the hands of the Israeli soldiers,” when, he said, Israeli forces are in fact responding to violent incidents or attempts to carry them out. 

“They see that violence works,” Hirsch said. “They saw the results of October 7. They saw that whilst they lost financially, they were politically rewarded with Britain, France, and all these great powers recognizing the State of Palestine.” 

Palestinians, however, tell a very different story. 

Mo’tza Tawafsha, the mayor of the village of Sinjil, told The Media Line that settlers are trying to drive his community off its land. He claimed that settlers attack residents and intimidate them in an effort to force families to leave their homes. At times, Palestinians fight back, he said, to protect their families, houses, and land. 

“We have proof that they [the settlers] are not telling the truth and they’re just faking the whole story,” Tawafsha claimed. 

Yaser Alkam, a Palestinian American who represents the community of Turmus Aya, 10 miles northeast of Ramallah, told The Media Line that “settlers attack constantly, and when I say constantly, I mean sometimes daily attacks are being carried out.” 

He said the attacks are usually directed at farmland and olive groves and are often intended to intimidate. At times, he added, they escalate into more serious incidents, including burning cars, torching olive trees and fields, cutting down trees, and even bulldozing entire olive groves. Occasionally, he said, homes on the outskirts of villages are also targeted, particularly farmhouses used as weekend residences. 

Alkam said olive groves are targeted for two main reasons. First, many are located near settlements and outposts, making them vulnerable to what he described as attempts to seize land and expand areas of control. Second, he said, olive trees carry deep symbolic meaning for Palestinians and are tied to their national and cultural identity. 

These attacks, Alkam said, have created deep fear within Palestinian communities. 

“We are not only scared, but we are also frightened,” he said. “We are talking about people who are willing to beat up a Palestinian to death with their clubs and gang up on one single person… A lot of young people were shot. A lot of young people were clubbed, beaten, and tortured.” 

Alkam rejected the idea that there is another side to the story. 

“All these attacks that are documented by the settlers against the Palestinians. I haven’t seen one single attack that is documented by a Palestinian against a settler,” he said. 

That claim stands in contrast to documented cases of Israelis killed in Palestinian terror attacks in recent years. According to the US Department of State’s 2024 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, citing Israel Security Agency data, 45 Israelis were killed in terror attacks across Israel, Jerusalem, and the West Bank during 2024, not including those killed during the Swords of Iron war. Thirty-seven of the victims were civilians. 

At the same time, Alkam said he does not believe Israelis who engage in violence in the territories represent Israeli society as a whole. 

“They do not represent an average Israeli citizen,” Alkam said. “They do not represent the majority of Israeli society, but they are certainly large groups organized to terrorize the Palestinians and drive them out of their land.” 

“We just want to live in peace,” Alkam added. “We just want to be left alone, enjoy our homes and our lands. We just want basic human rights.” 

Regavim said that Alkam’s account reflects the narrative Palestinians want the world to accept. 

According to the organization, “a generously funded, carefully planned and well-organized campaign created a false perception of a widespread phenomenon of violence by settlers in Judea and Samaria against Arab residents in the area.” 

Regavim argues that left-leaning Israeli activists and Palestinians use photos and videos of isolated incidents of settler attacks and amplify them to make the phenomenon appear mainstream. The campaign, the group said, “was designed to imprint the idea that this was a widespread phenomenon, and that the violent behavior was that of an entire segment of the population, a community of violent, lawbreaking settlers.” 

“This has been in the works for 15 years,” Naomi Kahn, director of Regavim’s International Division, told The Media Line. She pointed to organizations such as Peace Now and Breaking the Silence, accusing them of sending activists with cameras into the field and paying Arabs to initiate confrontations that can then be documented. 

“This is not something new. It’s been exposed,” Kahn said. “There is even footage of some of the Arabs who say they’ve been paid to be there. They are essentially being used as pawns by anti-settlement forces.” 

Kahn said that many incidents, even after being widely publicized by the media, are later debunked, with evidence showing that the confrontations were provoked. 

Like Hasten, Kahn stressed that acknowledging this does not mean that settler violence does not exist and said it should not be ignored. She argued, though, that context matters. 

“When people’s lives are threatened, when they believe their life is threatened, when they feel they are in danger and no one is protecting them, unfortunately, they often take the law into their own hands, or they respond a lot more violently or aggressively than they would if they felt that they had the support of law enforcement authorities and that someone was going to come and save them before it was too late,” she said. 

Kahn added, “Violence begets violence in a lot of these situations.” 

So what happens next? 

Hirsch said that even though settler violence represents a small minority of cases, it must be addressed forcefully by Israel itself. 

“This isn’t just another ideological crime that the Israelis are committing,” Hirsch said. “It is something that fundamentally undermines, and could potentially fundamentally undermine, the entire Jewish presence in Judea and Samaria.” 

At the heart of the issue, he said, is not only security but narrative. Hirsch warned that the loudest story often prevails, regardless of whether it reflects reality. 

Even if the violence involves only a small group, he said, it dominates international discourse. “The whole world is talking about it,” he said, adding that Israel must ensure that “these few bad apples are dealt with to the full extent of the law.” 

If Israel fails to do so, Hirsch argued, it becomes far easier for critics to portray settler violence as widespread and systematic. That framing, he said, serves the Palestinian narrative better than any diplomatic or legal victory they could achieve on their own.