തെരഞ്ഞെടുപ്പിന് തൊട്ടുമുമ്പ് വെസ്റ്റ് ബാങ്കിൽ പുതിയ കുടിയേറ്റ കേന്ദ്രങ്ങളുമായി നെതന്യാഹു സർക്കാർ

For two decades, Israeli leaders shied away from advancing the controversial E1 settlement, wary of the international backlash if they pushed ahead with a project widely seen as the death knell for a viable Palestinian state.

But with an election looming this month, Benjamin Netanyahu's far-right government is doing just that. In August, the housing ministry launched a tender for 1,200 housing units in the tranche of sun-blasted land outside Jerusalem. Two weeks ago, it opened another for a further 2,100 units -- and set the opening date for bids just two days before the October 27 vote.

The tenders for E1 -- which would cut the occupied West Bank in two, and separate it from East Jerusalem -- are part of a series of moves by Netanyahu's coalition that analysts say aim to prevent a new administration from undoing its steps to tighten Israel's grip on the Palestinian territory.

Polls suggest the election is currently too close to call and could yet end in gridlock. But the grouping with the best chance of ousting Netanyahu is a collection of opposition parties led by the former general Gadi Eisenkot. They are mostly less hawkish on the West Bank than Netanyahu's far-right allies -- a number of whom are ultranationalist settlers.

"It's clear that the government is trying to create facts on the ground that will be very difficult for the next one to reverse," said Yonatan Mizrachi, from the Israeli rights group Peace Now. "This is their ideology, and they do not hide it."

The E1 tenders -- one of which was delayed by the attorney-general over concerns it would be used for electioneering -- have been accompanied by a steady drumbeat of less high-profile but still highly strategic moves to advance Israeli settlements across the West Bank. At the same time, attacks on Palestinians by Jewish settlers have spiralled to record levels.

The finance ministry -- headed by Bezalel Smotrich, himself an ultranationalist settler -- recently submitted a request to allocate Shk36mn ($11.7mn) for land registration in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Peace Now has warned that the process, which is illegal in occupied territories, will pave the way for a "massive land grab" by the Israeli state.

In August, a group of settlers returned to Kadim, one of four settlements in the north of the West Bank that were dismantled in 2005. Overall, Netanyahu's government has announced plans for 19 settlements in the north of the West Bank, one of the few parts of the territory where there is still relative contiguity between Palestinian areas. The West Bank settlements are illegal under international law.

"With these new settlements, Israel will be able to fragment the north of the West Bank, and encircle Jenin", a Palestinian city, said Yehuda Shaul, co-director of Ofek, the Israeli centre for public affairs.

Settler leaders make no secret of their intentions. Smotrich has said E1 will "bury" the idea of a Palestinian state. At the inauguration of a new settlement in September, he said the coalition was "preparing the ground for a million settlers" -- a third more than the 750,000 who currently live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. In February, he said the next government should "encourage the migration" of Palestinians from the West Bank.

Some settlers claim settlements are necessary for Israel's security. But many believe they have a God-given right to the West Bank, which they refer to by the biblical names of Judaea and Samaria, and believe they should be able to settle throughout the Palestinian territory.

"We are returning to our homeland," said Jeff Prawer, a high-tech worker from the settlement of Ma'ale Adumim, which overlooks the site of E1. "We've lived in this land for thousands of years."

The blitz of settlement activity has been accompanied by an explosion of settler violence, with the number of attacks in 2026 on course to be the highest since the UN's humanitarian arm OCHA began collecting data.

According to OCHA, since Netanyahu's bloc took office in 2022, settlers have carried out 6,100 attacks on Palestinians and their property. More than 6,500 Palestinians and 132 communities have been displaced in whole or in part.

Along with restrictions imposed by the Israeli military and economic pressure from the government, the violence has upended life in the territory.

A web of military checkpoints has turned once-short journeys into unpredictable, hours-long odysseys. The proliferation of settlement outposts has cut off Palestinians from their land. Israel's withholding of Palestinian tax revenues has pushed the Palestinian Authority to the verge of bankruptcy, forcing it to pay public sector workers a fraction of their salaries, and many schools to open just three days a week.

Among those affected is Loui Ridi, a Palestinian-American whose house in the village of Qusra was besieged by settlers who cut off its electricity and water supplies. After international outcry, the Israeli military belatedly forced the settlers to move a few hundred metres away. But it then set up a checkpoint outside Ridi's house and restricted his family's ability to come and go from their property for their "own protection" for the next 30 days. Those restrictions were eventually eased. But settlers continue to roam nearby.

"My sister is a school teacher and she is afraid to leave on her own," said Ridi. "The [Israel Defense Forces] is not doing its job to remove the settlers. We don't feel safe in our own houses."

Settler advocates claim the rampant violence is the doing of a small number of youths. "It's antisemitic to call it settler violence," said Chaim Silberstein, founder of the Jerusalem Center for Applied Policy, a rightwing think-tank, claiming a "maximum" of 300 "Jewish delinquents" were involved.

But rights groups say the number is far higher. Earlier this week, the Israeli military itself said more than 100 settlers took part in a single attack on the village of Jalud, in which settlers torched buildings and cars in order to prevent a Palestinian family displaced by previous attacks from returning home.

Violent settlers operate in a climate of near-total impunity. The IDF rarely stops them carrying out attacks, and almost none are ever convicted. A study by the rights group Yesh Din found that, between 2005 and 2024, only 3 per cent of investigations into offences by Israelis against Palestinians in the West Bank ended with convictions.

The violence has also paved the way for new settlements, said Mizrachi, pointing out that Metzoke Eretz was one of a number of new settlements located on or near the site of displaced communities.

Diplomats said the extent to which a new government would change tack depended on which parties end up in it. Several constellations remain possible, but polls currently suggest the most likely is a coalition led by Eisenkot, uniting the current Zionist opposition.

Those parties' views on the West Bank are mixed, ranging from support for dismantling illegal settlement outposts to backing annexation of the territory. Despite the divergence, diplomats expect such a coalition would take a tougher line on settler violence and might also take de-escalatory steps, such as releasing some of the Palestinian revenues withheld by Israel.

However, given the political climate in Israel -- an August poll by the Jewish People Policy Institute found that 55 per cent of Jewish Israelis favoured keeping control of all settlements -- few observers expect a new government would significantly roll back projects already under way.

"What we see now is not a push to get things past the finishing line," said Shaul. "The push is to get as much as possible past the starting line, so that even if there is a government of change after this election . . . it will be politically very, very difficult for them to undo."