New settler outpost deepens displacement fears for West Bank families

Around 80 Palestinian families in al-Shuneh, a community in the occupied West Bank's Jordan Valley, fear displacement after Israeli settlers established an outpost on a nearby hilltop. Residents describe threats, attacks and surveillance that have disrupted life in an area where farming and livestock provide essential income.

Al-Shuneh is one of four population clusters belonging to Jiftlik, an agricultural village north of Jericho. Many residents were born there after their families were displaced by Israeli forces from other parts of Palestine decades earlier. Longstanding demolition orders already threatened their homes before the settlers arrived.

On 27 October, as Israel held parliamentary elections, settlers erected tents and Israeli flags roughly two minutes from the home of a resident identified by Middle East Eye as Mohammed, whose name was changed for his protection. The armed group connected water and electricity cables and circulated a social media video encouraging others to join. The outpost is illegal under both Israeli and international law.

Residents said settlers had warned before establishing the outpost that families would have to leave regardless of whether Benjamin Netanyahu or Gadi Eisenkot won. In the early hours of 28 October, masked settlers surrounded several homes and threatened their occupants. Settler numbers at the outpost were believed to have reached almost 20 in the following days. Mohammed said one settler told him to move to Europe or Canada because neither he nor his children had a future there.

For Osama Dueis, the threat follows an earlier displacement. He told Middle East Eye that settlers destroyed his home in a nearby village, forcing him to move with his family and livestock towards Jiftlik in October. Now living under a plastic sheet, he described restricted movement, expensive animal feed and constant monitoring by drones, even as his family prepared for a wedding.

Villagers have photographed settlers watching the community through binoculars and reported attempts to steal sheep, stone throwing, violent confrontations and livestock poisoning. Children have also encountered threatening settlers during their two-kilometre walk home from school. Families have organised rotating overnight watches. Dueis said settlers beat one of his cousins, and no arrests had been made.

The community also faces restrictions associated with its location in Area C, where Israel exercises security and administrative control under the Oslo Accords. Palestinian construction is heavily restricted, leaving even basic home and infrastructure improvements vulnerable to enforcement. After recent rain blocked roads, residents feared penalties if they used tractors to remove debris.

Medical Aid for Palestinians, a British organisation supporting Jiftlik, said checkpoints and road closures had delayed its mobile clinics, while security risks sometimes prevented deployment altogether. Its deputy communications director, Aseel Baidoun, described unequal access to utilities and the threat of displacement as apartheid, saying these conditions damaged residents' health and obstructed care.

Across the West Bank, the Colonisation and Wall Resistance Commission recorded 1,369 settler attacks and attempts to establish 28 outposts in October. Thousands of Palestinians have been displaced amid a broader rise in settler attacks since October 2023. The UK expanded sanction powers targeting those enabling illegal outposts in October, while a United Nations inquiry found Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity in occupied Palestinian territories.

Eisenkot, tasked with forming a government, supports West Bank settlements but has criticised unauthorised outposts and violence against Palestinian communities. Whether the outpost near Jiftlik will be contained remains uncertain. Dueis said experiences in other communities left him expecting further aggression, restrictions and violence.