{"id":1032884,"date":"2026-08-30T11:55:20","date_gmt":"2026-08-30T11:55:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1032884\/"},"modified":"2026-08-30T11:55:20","modified_gmt":"2026-08-30T11:55:20","slug":"idf-israel-police-trade-accusations-as-west-bank-settler-violence-ramps-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1032884\/","title":{"rendered":"IDF, Israel Police trade accusations as West Bank settler violence ramps up"},"content":{"rendered":"

The IDF and Israel Police traded accusations on Sunday morning, criticizing each other\u2019s handling of extremist settler violence in the West Bank after at least eight Palestinians were injured<\/a> in clashes on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Settlers arrived at the Palestinian villages of Kusra<\/a> and Jalud on Saturday afternoon, barricading themselves inside a Palestinian home and hurling stones at locals. The settlers dispersed following the arrival of Israeli forces at the scene, but no arrests were made.<\/p>\n

A senior police official hit out at the military\u2019s handling of the violence, arguing that the IDF had failed in its response to the incident.<\/p>\n

Police official blasts IDF over lack of action in West Bank clashes<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Dozens of masked men arrived in open-bed pickup trucks. Who knows who was in those trucks? Were they right-wing activists, or Hamas terrorists who came to raid a community?” the unnamed police official told Maariv. “Does the military expect a police patrol car to stop these trucks?”<\/p>\n

The official further criticized the IDF for failing to stop the trucks. “Where was the military and its observation posts? How did it not stop them while they were on the move?”<\/p>\n

\"IsraeliIsraeli leftist activists gather as Palestinian residents and solidarity volunteers stand on the roof of a house besieged by Israeli settlers in the village of Qusra, south of Nablus, West Bank, August 14, 2026 (credit: FLASH90)<\/p>\n

Israel Police\u2019s Judea and Samaria District commander, Asst.-Ch. Moshe Pinchi, argued in a 103FM radio interview with Eli Ohana and Barak Seri that the military should have detained the settler extremists instead of dispersing them.<\/p>\n

“The IDF should have detained the rioters instead of dispersing them,” Pinchi said. “The incident occurred in Area B [of the West Bank]; responsibility for the area lies with the military… Border Police forces operating under the army were there; they should have carried out the arrests.”<\/p>\n

The police officials\u2019 comments come amid increased tensions within Israel\u2019s security establishment after IDF sources claimed in recent briefings that the failure to make arrests stemmed from the Israel Police\u2019s failure to act.<\/p>\n

A police source said that they had asked: “for the videos [of the incident] so we could move the investigation forward, but Central Command told us that the videos had to be reviewed by the legal adviser, and she is off today.”<\/p>\n

The source further claimed that the IDF does not know how to maintain control of the area in Kusra amid clashes.<\/p>\n

IDF sources: Border Police should have chased settlers on foot<\/strong><\/p>\n

By contrast, an IDF source told Maariv that while it was “important to stop [the settler extremists], it was more important to prevent civilians from being harmed.<\/p>\n

“Our force used tear gas; the company commander shouted at them to \u2018Get out of here\u2019… The Jewish rioters<\/a> turned and ran,” the source added. “Was it right for the Border Police officers who were there to pursue the fleeing suspects on foot? Probably,” the source said.<\/p>\n

The source noted that from the moment the pickup trucks began driving from Kusra toward Jalud, it was clear to the IDF that they were Jewish terrorists and not Hamas terrorists. Therefore, the IDF did not conduct an aerial interception; instead, it set up roadblocks. However, the pickup trucks bypassed the roadblocks.<\/p>\n

Tension within the security establishment comes as Defense Minister Israel Katz announced earlier this month that he had instructed the IDF to prepare a plan to transfer all civilian enforcement authority<\/a> for Israeli communities and residents in the West Bank to Israel Police, amid growing Jewish violence targeting Palestinian villages in the West Bank.<\/p>\n

Jerusalem Post Staff contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The IDF and Israel Police traded accusations on Sunday morning, criticizing each other\u2019s handling of extremist settler violence…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1032885,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2],"tags":[4784,99,40554,399915,1802,50,31235,20605,17262,47142],"class_list":["post-1032884","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-idf","tag-israel","tag-israel-police","tag-kusra","tag-military","tag-news","tag-palestinians","tag-settler-violence","tag-west-bank","tag-west-bank-violence"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117184334966817565","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1032884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032884\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1032885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1032884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1032884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1032884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}