Statement on the Deadly Violence Near Nablus

July 24, 2026 – Today six people were killed near the village of Tell in the West Bank: four Palestinians – Farouk Adnan Ali Ramadan, Ibrahim Hussein Ali Ramadan, Jawad Hussein Ali Ramadan, and Imran Ahmed Ali Ramadan, all of the same family – and two Israelis, Benyahu Melat and Yuval Ezra. At least eight more people were wounded on both sides.

This bloodshed is the tragic – and entirely predictable – outcome of the Israeli government's decisions. For years, settlers have been building illegal outposts, harassing Palestinian communities, and attacking villages. This government chose to cheer them on, to stop administrative detentions, to fund settler militias, and to encourage the police to ignore settler violence. 

This is the context for the settlers’ presence outside the village’s mosque where today’s violence began. 

Now we must be clear about what comes next. Before the dead were buried, Minister Ben-Gvir called to raze Palestinian homes "from the air and with bulldozers" and to make West Bank villages share the "same fate" as Beit Hanoun in Gaza. Minister Smotrich called to make the villages look like impoverished refugee camps and for settlers to seize nearby land. 

We warn against exactly this. Turning a security failure into a pretext for collective punishment – mass demolitions, expulsions, the annexation of Area B – would light the fuse for the next round of killing. This approach is not counterterrorism. It is an effort intended to exploit these deaths to advance the settler agenda.

“The Israeli government's response to its own failure should be to confront the settlers who lit this fire,” said Hadar Susskind, President and CEO of New Jewish Narrative. “A government genuinely concerned with the safety of Israelis would be dismantling illegal outposts and reining in armed settlers. 

“Unfortunately, this Israeli government has shown time and time again that they will make the wrong choice – prioritizing the settler agenda over the safety of Israelis and Palestinians. President Donald Trump should step in and press the Israeli government to take steps to keep this incident from triggering something far deadlier.”