Israel’s far-right government seeks to intensify confrontation with the Palestinians, argues John Clarke

In an article I wrote for Counterfire last month, I suggested that Israel’s new government welcomed intensified confrontation with the Palestinians, that it would vigorously pursue this objective, and that its national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, would be ‘ideally suited to the role of provocateur.’ Subsequent events are confirming this in the most dreadful way.

On 22 February, Israeli forces carried out a punitive action in the West Bank town of Nablus that was described by the Washington Post as ‘the deadliest such raid in years’ and ‘another escalation in counterterrorism tactics by Israel under its new far-right government.’ At least eleven Palestinians were killed and more than 100 wounded, most of them hit by live bullets.

An Israeli military spokesperson stated that armed Palestinian groups were the targets of the action and that these ‘were planning to carry out attacks against Israelis in the “immediate future”.’ This raid followed a similar action last month in Jenin that led to the deaths of ten Palestinians. Apart from these two particularly brutal actions, Israeli forces have for months been ‘conducting near-daily raids across the West Bank’ in response to armed actions by Palestinians inside Israel last spring.

According to the Post, ‘Palestinians say the raids have inspired more people, many of them young and impoverished, to take up arms.’ It goes on to report that such resistance is being driven by ‘loss of hope in their future, frustration with the Palestinian leadership and anger at escalating Israeli violence.’

The raid on Nablus sparked an immediate outpouring of Palestinian anger. ‘Soon after Israeli soldiers withdrew, thousands of people gathered in the debris-strewn streets of Nablus for funeral processions, and there were reports of clashes between Palestinians and Israeli forces in Jenin, Hebron and East Jerusalem.’

Provocative strategy

Israel’s political leaders and military commanders are obviously aware that the course they are pursuing is a provocative strategy that can only engender retaliation from those they target. Israel-based i24 News reported on the day of the raid that ‘police head Kobi Shabtai informed National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir that officers are on high alert for any disruptions or retaliation strikes.’ Moreover, the ‘raid may be the catalyst for an escalation, according to a senior Israeli security source, who also noted that emotions have been high since last year.’

This Israeli drive to escalate and inflame is at levels that haven’t been seen for decades. The Palestinian health ministry issued a statement following the Nablus raid that stated that the ‘start of this year is the bloodiest in the occupied West Bank since the year 2000, at least. In the past 22 years, we have not recorded this number of martyrs, in the first two months of a year.’ Al Jazeera also reports that ‘Israeli forces have killed 65 Palestinians, including 13 children, this year so far, and injured hundreds of others, making the first two months of 2023 the deadliest for Palestinians compared with the same period since 2000.’

A particularly horrifying element of the assault on Palestinian communities is that state repression is being augmented by racist mobs drawn from the settler population. On 26 February, following an armed attack in the town of Huwwara by a ‘suspected Palestinian’, Israeli settlers rampaged through towns in the occupied West Bank in revenge attacks, burning and attacking Palestinian homes and property for hours.

The scale of the attacks was truly shocking: ‘Homes, shops, cars and agricultural land were set ablaze by settlers who roamed the streets … at least 35 homes were completely burned down and 40 others were partially damaged. More than 100 cars were burnt or destroyed,’ according to Middle East Eye. Ghassan Daghlas, a Palestinian activist who monitors the expansion of Israeli settlements, told the paper that: “What the settlers are doing tonight are war crimes similar to the events of the Nakba and the attacks of the Zionist gangs.”

By 27 February, it was clear that ‘Israeli settlers [had] carried out at least 300 attacks, including shootings and arson, in a rampage through Palestinian villages in the Nablus area of the occupied West Bank.’ The death of one Palestinian man was reported, along with at least 390 injuries. These included ‘one person [who] was in hospital after being beaten in the head with a rock, causing fractures to the skull. Another person suffered a beating with a metal rod to the face.’

The role of Israeli state forces in facilitating these attacks is neither surprising nor unusual. The Ramallah-based Al Haq rights group said the attack was the ‘result of decades long impunity enjoyed by Israel and settlers for international crimes committed against Palestinians.’ Last year, a statement issued by the United Nations declared that: ‘Disturbing evidence of Israeli forces frequently facilitating, supporting and participating in settler attacks, makes it difficult to discern between Israeli settler and state violence.’

Far from condemning this appalling outburst of vigilante violence, national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, stated that he intended to ‘crush enemies’. It’s glaringly apparent that he welcomes the settler attacks and that he will relentlessly pursue the objective of escalation. There have, of course, been obligatory efforts to strike a more moderate pose inside the Israeli establishment. A military spokesperson deplored the settler attacks and Netanyahu made a perfunctory appeal to settlers to remain calm and ‘don’t take the law into your hands.’ No one could seriously imagine, however, that any serious effort to contain these violent outbursts can be expected.

No restraining hand

A wide of swathe of the media is now presenting Benjamin Netanyahu as the voice of moderation, engaged in a difficult ‘balancing act’, as he tries to ‘walk a diplomatic tightrope between Washington – pushing for a lasting compromise – and his own cabinet that includes hard-line settlers demanding tough action against Palestinian attacks.’ The reality is that, whatever tactical reservations and secondary differences exist with the present government, the course that it is following is entirely in line with the political trajectory that the Israeli colonial project is on.

As to Washington’s supposed restraining influence, it would be a mistake to place any undue confidence in it. US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, spoke at a conference of the liberal Zionist organisation J Street, at the end of last year. He very deliberately and harshly dashed hopes that his administration would apply serious pressure on the Israeli government. He informed the audience that “security assistance to Israel is sacrosanct” and he made clear that unconditional support from Washington will be maintained regardless of differences.

Blinken’s position that there are no ‘red lines’ that Israel is forbidden to cross, on pain of reduced support from its US sponsor, was no flippant posture. It means that Israel’s crimes will never reach a point where Washington will cut off the supply of weapons. There will be expressions of concern and shuttle diplomacy, but the US continues to see Israel as a vital garrison that protects its strategic interests in the Middle East.

On 25 February 1994, Baruch Goldstein, a US-born settler and member of the far-right Kach movement, entered the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron. He shot and killed 29 Palestinian worshippers and wounded at least 125 others. Nearly three decades later, the development of the Zionist project has brought the then relatively marginal and hateful perspective that Goldstein represented into the political mainstream. Those schooled in it now sit around the cabinet table and Ben-Gvir is known to have kept a portrait of Goldstein on a wall in his own home.

The events of recent weeks have been shocking and there is no reason to imagine the attacks will abate. The present leaders of Israel have decided that they can provoke and crush Palestinian resistance. The strength of that resistance and the support that it generates around the world will be the vital considerations in the months ahead.