Israeli authorities are directly involved in settler attacks that have killed, injured and displaced Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, while Israeli security forces provide protection to settlers, a UN inquiry said on Tuesday.
The report by the Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory found that Israeli authorities have enabled settler attacks through financial and military support, in a climate of impunity fostered by judicial and law-enforcement bodies, Reuters said.
It said attacks on Palestinian villages and agricultural land have surged since 2023, rising by 130%, including incidents involving groups of masked assailants. Israeli security forces have routinely accompanied settlers and acted as a shield for the violence, the report said.
The Israeli Prime Minister Office and military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Israel rejects charges that its troops shield settlers during attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank, saying such actions are rogue incidents that violate military protocol and are investigated. Israeli and Palestinian rights groups say such investigations rarely lead to punishment.
Hundreds of thousands of Israeli settlers live among millions of Palestinians on land Israel captured in a 1967 war, where Palestinians hope to build a state. Most countries and the UN's top court consider such settlements a violation of international law, which Israel disputes citing historical and biblical ties to the land.
At least seven Palestinians were killed and 832 injured last year, with violence continuing into 2026 in the form of near-daily attacks, according to the United Nations.
“The increasing participation of Israeli security forces in settler attacks amounts to a de facto collapse of the distinction between settlers and soldiers,” the report found.
It said such violence has been used to advance state policy, including the unlawful occupation, displacement of Palestinians and the annexation of Palestinian territory.
The Commission documented cases of assaults, abductions and abuse of Palestinian children by settlers. In one incident on April 19, 2025, a 12-year-old girl and her 3-year-old brother were abducted at knifepoint, dragged to an olive grove and tied to a tree with plastic restraints until their family intervened. In July 2024, the International Court of Justice issued a non-binding advisory opinion that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories and its settlements there are illegal and should be withdrawn as soon as possible, in its strongest findings to date on the conflict.
The Commission also said settlers committed or threatened sexual violence to instill fear and harassed Palestinian women.
“The relentless, daily assaults by Israeli settlers against Palestinians are intolerable — and must end,” said the commission's head, S. Muralidhar, an Indian former senior judge. He urged the international community to pressure Israel to dismantle settlements and outposts and curb the violence.
Despite periodic condemnations and the dismantling of some unauthorized outposts, Israeli authorities have not taken sustained measures to stop the attacks, the report said.
HAMAS VIOLATIONS
The report said it was also gravely alarmed by serious abuses it documented in the Gaza Strip, another Palestinian territory, by the militant group Hamas which controls it.
Hamas did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the findings.
The commission found that Hamas-affiliated forces were involved in at least 60 of 249 documented cases of executions and severe physical violence in 2024 to 2025, including beatings with metal pipes and bone-breaking as punishment for alleged collaboration with Israel or looting aid.
In two instances, 11 men were publicly executed. The Commission said these acts amount to war crimes and violations of international law.
The Commission found that October 7, 2023 attacks on Israel by Hamas and other armed groups, which killed 1,200 people and involved hostage-taking and destruction of property, amounted to war crimes. The attacks precipitated an Israeli assault on Gaza which has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians and destroyed much of the territory.
A previous report by the Commission found that Israel had committed genocide during its military offensive in Gaza, and that senior Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, had incited these acts. Israel rejected those allegations as "scandalous".
