Israeli settlers torch Palestinian village in West Bank

Dozens of Israeli settlers have set fire to houses and cars in a village in the occupied West Bank, with the Palestinian health ministry saying at least one person has been killed.

The settlers – some of them wearing masks – threw rocks and Molotov cocktails as they attacked the village of Jit, near the town of Nablus, on Thursday evening, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said.

The Palestinian health ministry said a local villager in his early 20s was killed and another person critically injured in the chest. The IDF said it was examining the report of the fatality.

Israeli political leaders condemned the attack, pledging to punish the perpetrators. One Israeli national was detained in Jit, the IDF said.

Footage has emerged on social media purportedly showing houses and vehicles set ablaze in Jit late on Thursday.

Plumes of smoke are seen rising above the village.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement that “those responsible for any criminal act will be caught and prosecuted”.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog wrote in a post on X: “This is an extreme minority that harms the law-abiding community of settlers and the settlement as a whole and in the name and status of Israel in the world during a particularly sensitive and difficult period.

“Law enforcement officials must act immediately” to bring those responsible to justice, Mr Herzog added.

In a statement, the IDF said its forces were deployed in the village “within minutes” of receiving reports of violence, shooting in the air to disperse the crowds. Attackers were then removed from Jit.

The IDF added that a joint investigation was launched by its forces, Israel’s security agency Shin Bet and the Israeli police following the “serious incident”.

The US said attacks by settlers were “unacceptable and must stop”.

“Israeli authorities must take measures to protect all communities from harm, this includes intervening to stop such violence, and holding all perpetrators of such violence to account,” a White House National Security Council spokesperson said.

Palestinians regularly accuse Israeli security forces of allowing groups of violent settlers to attack their villages.

According to OCHA – the UN office for Humanitarian Affairs – there have been more than 1,000 attacks by settlers against Palestinians since October, with at least 1,390 people – including 660 children – displaced.

Lethal violence has frequently accompanied the attacks. OCHA recorded 107 that led to Palestinian fatalities and injuries, 859 causing damage to Palestinian property.

International attention has been focused on the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip – but the scale of settler violence has prompted the US, the EU and the UK to impose sanctions on some settler leaders and, for the first time, against entire settler outposts.