Did you know that Truthout is a nonprofit and independently funded by readers like you? If you value what we do, please support our work with a donation.

The year 2025 saw the unprecedented displacement of Palestinian rural communities by Israeli settlers, who enjoy the Israeli army’s backing. At least 13 rural Palestinian communities in the West Bank were completely wiped off the map. This impacted at least 190 families and 1,090 individuals.

The wave of settler attacks has continued into 2026, with the displacement of the Ras Ain al-Auja community near Jericho last week.

The dramatic escalation of Israeli settler violence against the Palestinian countryside began after October 7, 2023, and has been particularly devastating to Bedouin communities in the Jordan Valley, the West Bank’s eastern slopes, and the South Hebron Hills. Palestinians from these areas consider their silent displacement a “second Nakba,” and an extension of Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

Last week, the head of the Palestinian Authority’s official Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission, Moayad Shaaban, announced the commission’s findings for the year 2025 at a press conference. According to the report, between January and December 2025, Israeli settlers conducted 892 attacks on Palestinians, killing 14 people in the West Bank. Settler attacks also provoked 434 fires, 127 of which affected farmland, and 307 fires against other Palestinian properties. These attacks concentrated in the areas surrounding Ramallah, Nablus, Hebron, and Tulkarem.

The report also indicated that in 2025, 35,273 trees were destroyed and poisoned, including 26,988 olive trees in the areas of Salfit, Nablus, Ramallah, Bethlehem, and Hebron. This was coupled with a wave of demolitions by the Israeli army, which leveled 1,400 Palestinian structures that year, including 304 inhabited homes, 74 uninhabited houses, 4,900 farming structures, and 270 other livelihood structures. Demolitions, according to the report, concentrated in Ramallah, Nablus, Tubas, Hebron, and Jerusalem.

A year ago, Shaaban told........

© Truthout