Some 15 Palestinians, including two children, have been trapped in three houses in Qusra for almost a week as settlers block access to the area. The White House is pressuring Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to publicly condemn a wave of settler violence in the West Bank, according to a U.S. official and an Israeli official who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity. The pressure follows public criticism from the U.S. ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, a strong supporter of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, who on Thursday described The two officials said Washington’s concern increased after learning that one of the homes attacked belonged to a Palestinian American. Settler violence in the West Bank has increased in the three years since the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, and Netanyahu’s government, the most right-wing in Israel’s history, has rapidly expanded settlements since 2022. A Netanyahu conviction, months away from an election, may alienate voters, especially given that parts of his right-wing coalition depend on settler support. Israeli forces prevent activists from reaching besieged families in Qusra. Israeli forces have prevented Israeli and foreign activists from reaching Palestinian families whose homes have been surrounded by settlers for almost a week in the occupied West Bank city of Qusra, south of Nablus. The activists were trying to deliver food and water to three houses in Ras al-Ain. area on Friday, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa. Al Jazeera’s Laith Jaar, reporting from Qusra, said Israeli forces brought in reinforcements and prevented members of the Israeli group Peace Now from reaching the families after declaring the area a closed military zone. Qusra Mayor Abdel Azim Wadi told Wafa that Israeli forces had also forced Italian activists who managed to reach the homes earlier in the week to leave. Families cut off from basic supplies Settlers began surrounding homes earlier this week, blocking About 15 Palestinians, including two children, live in the three houses and have struggled to obtain basic supplies, according to the United Nations. The UN said they were “trapped inside their homes in a state of terror, unable to meet their basic needs and without access to water or electricity.” Israeli forces entered the area a day earlier and ordered families to temporarily leave their homes. The residents refused to leave the area and instead gathered at one of the three houses, fearing that their houses could be taken over if they were abandoned. Jaar reported that settlers tried again on Friday to pitch a tent and set up an outpost near the houses before Israeli forces removed it. Qusra has become a flashpoint for settler violence in the northern occupied West Bank, and the UN said earlier this year that it had recorded more settler attacks there than in any other occupied West Bank community. A mosque was burned during an early morning attack by Israeli settlers in the West Bank village of Qusra on Sunday, July 26, 2026, while graffiti in Hebrew on its wall reads “Revenge Benayahu.” [Leo Correa/AP]Katz’s move raises questions about law enforcement The developments come as Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz has ordered preparations to transfer responsibility for civil law enforcement involving settlers in the occupied West Bank from the military to the Israeli police. Political scientist Ibrahim Rabaia told Al Jazeera that the proposed measure appeared to be driven by political considerations and questioned how widely it could be implemented. He said the army remains responsible for the occupied West Bank under the existing system, while coordination between the army and the police is already taking place. Rabaia argued that transferring responsibilities is unlikely to result in police preventing settlers from attacking Palestinian homes. “The police are controlled by the Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who arms these settlers and supports them in the West Bank,” he said. Israel’s Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir attends an event to hand over weapons to members of the local volunteer security group in Ashkelon, Israel, on October 27, 2023. [Tsafrir Abayov/AP]Rabaia, a political science academic and former editor-in-chief of Palestinian Affairs magazine, said settlement expansion had reached an advanced stage, with infrastructure, financing and planning underway to create what he described as “a reality that cannot be reversed,” including new areas capable of hosting larger numbers of settlers in the future.
