Hamid Khoshayand – An Expert on Regional Issues

Field developments in the West Bank in recent months show that this area has practically abandoned a “marginal” status and turned into a “main front.”

In the past year, the more the Zionist regime focused on the Gaza war, the more the threats from the West Bank against this regime have increased.

While the resistance and struggle against the Zionist regime in the West Bank before the October 7 operation was limited only to Jenin and its camp and the enclosed areas in the north of the West Bank, this situation has now extended to the north of the West Bank as well.

In the last year, the Zionist regime, while intensifying the killing of Palestinians living in the West Bank, has increased restrictions and prohibitions in this area. During this period, more than 600 Palestinians have been martyred by the Zionist army in the West Bank.

In addition, the movement of Palestinians between villages and cities has become more limited, and the number of checkpoints, obstacles, and temporary stops of the Zionist regime has increased from 200 posts in October 2023 to more than 800 posts.

Some roads connecting neighborhoods are only open for limited hours. While roads and infrastructure easily connect Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank, the areas where the Palestinian population lives have been turned into areas with very few and humiliating facilities and concessions. They are also disconnected from each other, which, of course, puts the Palestinians in an unbearable situation and makes them more prone to struggle and resistance.

The war in Gaza, the terrible economic situation, and the violence of the settlers are “three effective factors” in the escalation of tensions in the West Bank.

Although resistance in the West Bank is not a new phenomenon, the growing trend of settler violence, which is heavily armed and acts like an unofficial army, has created challenging conditions for Palestinian citizens.

About 300,000 Zionist settlers live in the West Bank of the Jordan River, 260,000 of whom have permits to carry weapons. In other words, private gun ownership is significantly higher in Israeli settlements than in Israel’s inner cities, and 86 of the 100 cities with the highest percentage of gun license holders are in the West Bank settlements.

Armed settlers in various ways commit violence against Palestinian citizens and their properties; Private civilians who carry weapons, settlement dwellers as part of civilian security squads, and settlement soldiers acting as part of regional defense battalions or rank-and-file soldiers.

From shooting arrows and throwing stones and heavy objects at Palestinians, their houses, and cars to setting fire to homes, workshops, farms, and other private properties, as well as cutting down olive trees, damaging water infrastructure, and stealing, killing, and driving away livestock with the use of various tools such as drones are only part of the violence of extremist and armed settlers.

According to a report of the National Security Studies Institute based in Tel Aviv, since the beginning of the Gaza war, more than 1,500 violent incidents have occurred between Zionist settlers and Palestinian residents of the West Bank, which has also claimed the lives of many Palestinian children. The daily violence faced by the Palestinians in the West Bank is currently at an all-time high.

As a result of the increase in the level of violence and terrorist acts of the Zionists, more than 4000 attacks have been carried out by the Palestinians in the West Bank since the beginning of the war, which resulted in the death of more than 50 Zionist soldiers and the wounding of about 400 people.

While there may be fewer weapons in possession of the Palestinians living in the West Bank compared to Gaza, the regime’s performance in this area and the continuation of the war in Gaza have placed the West Bank in a “boiling point,” the least consequence of which is the expansion of the depth, scope and the intensity of anti-Zionist operations.

A point to ponder is that most of these operations and other anti-Zionist measures are carried out by youths and groups that are not affiliated with any organization and only have the motive of revenge. The issue of not having a coherent and identifiable organization has made the work for the Zionist regime far more difficult than in the past.

The continuation of the war in Gaza and the organized violence against the Palestinians, as the regime officials admit, has put the West Bank on the verge of becoming the “second front” of the war and far more “dangerous” than other fronts after the Gaza Strip.