TEN PEOPLE HAVE been arrested in Palestine following attacks by Israeli settlers on European politicians and a Washington Post photographer over the weekend, Israel’s police in the illegally occupied West Bank said on Monday morning. 

The occupation police force said that they raided several locations across the West Bank and also seized cars and potential evidence related to the attacks, which have stepped up as settlers disrupt Palestinians’ annual olive harvest.

“Following the severe incidents of violence over the past weekend, including the assault of a media worker and the suspected attacks on foreign civilians, an arrest operation was conducted before dawn,” said Major General Moshe Finchi, the Israeli police’s West Bank commander.

“Suspects were arrested on suspicion of involvement in the violent incidents, violating a military commander’s order concerning a closed military zone, and illegal construction,” he said.

The photographer, Heidi Levine, was among a number of journalists working in the Ramallah area when dozens of settlers began to throw rocks towards the Palestinians who were harvesting olives, some of which they then set on fire. 

The attack left Levine in hospital with broken vertebrae.

Israeli occupation forces prevent Palestinians from harvesting olives on their own land in Nablus, 17 October Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo

It came 10 days after settlers beat an AFP photographer covering the West Bank olive harvest, Jaafar Ashtiyeh, who also required treatment in hospital.

Over the weekend, settlers also attacked a convoy of European diplomats including the French and Belgian consuls general in Jerusalem as they went through the predominantly Christian town of Taybeh in the West Bank over the weekend.

The settlers beat up Bernard Baudoux (78), the mayor of the northern French town of Aulnoye-Aymeries, an advocate of the Palestinian cause who had come on a goodwill visit and was helping harvest olives.

The attacks came amid global outrage over mounting settler pogroms and terrorism in the West Bank.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is facing a tight race in upcoming elections on 27 October, has tried to shore up his right-wing base and cast doubt on the circumstances behind the recent settler attacks.

Netanyahu’s office issued a statement on Saturday urging “caution” before drawing conclusions about “allegations” of attacks on European diplomats. 

“Any violence against diplomats is unacceptable. The more serious the accusation, the greater the demand for compelling evidence,” the prime minister’s office said in a post on social media. 

“These reports come amid concerns about a coordinated campaign to smear Israel and the Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria during the annual olive harvest, relying on sensational headlines before the full facts emerge,” it said, using the Israeli name for the West Bank. 

The opposition described the attacks on Westerners as a stain on Israel’s image and accused Netanyahu of allowing the violence to happen.

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Israel rarely prosecutes settlers when the victims are Palestinian and the Israeli military often provides protection for their attacks and the demolition of homes. 

Settler attacks against Palestinians, including killings, beatings, vandalism and arson, averaged six a day in the first half of the year, according to the United Nations.

According to a ruling from the International Court of Justice (ICJ), all Israeli settlements in the West Bank are illegal, as is the decades-long Israeli military occupation of the Palestinian territory.

According to a recent report on West Bank violence from the Israeli-Palestinian human rights organisation B’Tselem, Israel’s “project of elimination is now being implemented more openly, directly and violently than before”.

It said the project “increasingly relies on cooperation between official state authorities and settler militias operating in the West Bank with state backing and support”.

The Palestinian death toll in the West Bank has risen dramatically in recent years.

Between 7 October 2023 and 30 June 2026, Israel killed 1,087 Palestinians in the West
Bank, including East Jerusalem. Of those killed, 242 were children and 21 were women, according to figures compiled by B’Tselem. 

With reporting from AFP