The cards are stacked against Israel no matter what it does, but that doesn’t excuse the government’s failures on the West Bank.
Two wrongs don’t make a right, the saying goes. Equally, two rights — even many rights — do not justify a wrong.
Does the Jewish people have the right to live anywhere in the Land of Israel, including in the West Bank of the Jordan River, the biblical areas of Judea and Samaria?
Yes.
Are the vast majority of the Jewish residents on the West Bank of the Jordan River peaceful?
Yes.
Does the leadership of the Jewish communities on the West Bank reject a policy of violence and condemn the violence by a small number of its residents against Palestinian residents there?
Yes.
Isn’t the history of the modern State of Israel built on Jewish settlement of the Land of Israel, beginning mainly in the 1880s?
Yes.
Isn’t it true that Palestinian residents of the West Bank encroach on Jewish communities there, and attempt to damage them?
Yes.
Isn’t it true that most Palestinians living anywhere in the Land of Israel do not want a “two state solution,” an independent Palestinian state living in peace alongside the independent Jewish State of Israel?
Yes.
Isn’t it true that a Palestinian who sells land to a Jew is subject to the death penalty by the Palestinian Authority?
Yes.
Isn’t it true that virtually all of those who do want an independent Palestinian state also do not want Jews to have full citizenship rights therein?
Yes.
Isn’t it true that the vile nature and extent of Palestinian terrorism against Jews trying to live in the Land of Israel far surpasses the Jewish violence that has now cropped up — that it is inaccurate to equate the dimensions of the Palestinian violence and the Israeli violence?
Yes.
Isn’t it true that for every act of reported Jewish settler violence, there are countless unreported acts of Palestinian violence, including murder — not to mention, scores of attempted Palestinian murders of Jews that the IDF thwarts?
Yes.
Isn’t it true that Palestinian media feature the likes of PA Chairman Abbas’ adviser Mahmoud Al-Habbash affirming the legality of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack (“the legality of jihad, the legality of resistance”), regretting Oct. 7 only because Israel fought back?
Yes.
Isn’t it true that Palestinian terrorists have wiped out almost entire Jewish families, such as the Fogel family, whose three-month-old child was decapitated?
Yes.
And also: No.
No, all these “yes’s” cannot justify a wrong.
Yes, there is a wrong.
The yes’s above tell most of the story of the Palestinian-Israel conflict on the West Bank, but do not tell the whole story.
Under Prime Minister Netanyahu, Israel has suffered a moral blow, an educational blow and a PR blow.
Be they small in number or large in number, some residents of the West Bank think it is moral to harm unarmed people and their property, and think the Torah says that G-d’s promise of the Land of Israel to our father Abraham and to his descendants mandated the absence of other people from living on the same land.
The moral failure is the province of a minority — a minority, however, that seems to be growing, even as exact numbers are not ascertainable. One thing is clear: If, as Prime Minister Netanyahu says, the violent settlers are a only bunch of “juvenile delinquents” or a very small percentage of the total Jewish population on the West Bank, this does not ease the moral calculus.
Whether many or few, these violent settlers also represent an educational failure.
Who are their teachers? Most of these violent youths identify as religiously observant. They wear kippot. Many have pe’ot. Under what system of Jewish education are they learning that violence is the Jewish way — that holy land displaces every other holy Jewish value? Who taught them that it is OK for them to burn homes, destroy fields, intimidate or attack people even if the settlers’ own homes or fields are also attacked? Who taught them to displace Israel’s military and civilian institutions? Needed is not only a moral accounting but an educational revision.
Whatever one might argue in defense of violent Hilltop youth, there is only one word for the PR blow: disaster. Do Prime Minister Netanyahu and Security Minister Ben Gvir not understand the way these youth undercut the image of Israel? Do they not understand how this PR damage is repercussive — affecting everything from popular opinion in the West to resistance in the US Congress to selling arms — even defensive arms — to Israel? The PR damage to Israel is undeniable and incalculable.
One can denounce Israel’s critics for — to use one of their favorite words — disproportionately responding to the settler violence, and one can be right; but this is beside the point. Which is: Why did this settler violence emerge to start with? Why hand Israel’s critics a PR weapon on a silver platter?
True enough, many countries have long refused to acknowledge Israel’s right to live on the West Bank. True enough, many in the EU blame Israel for trying to defeat Hamas once and for all. This is the background to, but not the primary cause of, the recent acrimony and sanctions from Europe.
The current government’s failure to end the Jewish violence on the West Bank has badly damaged Israel in the PR arena — and not just in Europe.
Whoever wins in the upcoming election in Israel will inherit a moral, educational and PR mess on the West Bank that the current government seems unable or unwilling to fix, or even to see.
© IJN 2026
