In recent months, a wave of what has been described as “silent forced displacement” has intensified across the West Bank, with entire Palestinian villages and refugee camps being emptied away from media scrutiny.
Settlers have been attacking Palestinian residents under the protection of occupation forces and with backing from the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with the clear aim of driving them from their land. The United Nations has warned that the West Bank is experiencing its worst humanitarian crisis since 1967, as a result of widespread demolitions and mass displacement, particularly in refugee camps.
The UN estimates that more than 37,000 Palestinians were displaced across the West Bank in 2025 alone, an unprecedented figure since records began. How, when, and why did these attacks escalate so sharply?
Escalation after 7 October
The West Bank witnessed a sharp escalation in settler violence and displacement operations following the outbreak of the assault on Gaza on 7 October 2023. Settlers exploited global focus on events in Gaza to intensify attacks on Palestinian towns and villages.
Human rights organisations documented the complete emptying of at least seven Palestinian communities during October and November 2023 alone, following attacks carried out by heavily armed settlers with the participation and protection of occupation soldiers.
A recent report by Human Rights Watch found that settlers assaulted Palestinians through beatings and torture, stole their property and livestock, and issued death threats unless families permanently left their homes. These scenes evoked memories of the ethnic cleansing carried out during the Nakba of 1948.
As a result of these systematic attacks, more than 1,200 Palestinians were displaced from rural communities within just a few months of the Gaza assault, including around 600 children. The United Nations confirmed that settler attacks during this period reached their highest recorded level since documentation began in 2006.
The violence was not limited to settler groups alone. Reports revealed that occupation forces were present in nearly half of settler attacks in late 2023, and in some cases directly participated in forcing Palestinians from their homes.
Human Rights Watch documented incidents in which occupation soldiers accompanied settlers during village raids and assisted in detaining and beating residents at gunpoint to compel them to leave.
In one case south of Hebron, settlers and occupation forces destroyed every home in the village of Khirbet Zanuta, forcing all residents to flee on 30 October 2023.
Similarly, communities such as Khirbet al Ras al Ahmar and al Qanoub in Hebron governorate were emptied, along with two Bedouin communities near Ramallah, Ein al Rashash and Wadi al Seeq, during the same period.
Observers warn that the occupation authorities are using the assault on Gaza as cover to redraw the demographic map of the West Bank through a systematic campaign of silent displacement.
Destruction of refugee camps
At the start of 2025, occupation forces launched a wide scale assault on cities and refugee camps in the northern and central West Bank under the name “Iron Wall”. The operation targeted refugee camps in Jenin and Tulkarm and their surroundings, repeatedly storming them under the pretext of pursuing resistance groups, while employing unprecedented levels of destructive force.
Large sections of the camps were levelled, forcing tens of thousands of residents into displacement.
One year after the assault began, Philippe Lazzarini, Commissioner General of UNRWA, confirmed that around 33,000 Palestinian refugees remain forcibly displaced from camps in the northern West Bank, particularly Jenin, Nur Shams, and Tulkarm. He stated that occupation forces “demolished vast areas of these camps, severely reducing the ability of these communities to recover”.
Hundreds of refugee families lost their homes and possessions, leaving them sheltering in schools, temporary halls, or with relatives, amid acute shortages in basic services including education and healthcare.
The West Bank has not witnessed displacement on this scale since the Naksa of 1967. UNRWA estimated that the total number of Palestinians displaced as a result of Israeli military incursions in 2025 alone reached approximately 33,362 people from the Jenin and Tulkarm camps and surrounding areas.
This staggering figure reflects the impact of sustained military assault. Jenin camp, for example, experienced its fiercest attack in July 2023, followed by repeated raids throughout 2024, culminating in a wide scale incursion in January 2025 that was the longest and most lethal.
During these operations, occupation forces used bulldozers and armoured vehicles to destroy almost the entire infrastructure of the camps, including streets, house walls, and public facilities.
UNRWA reported that 12,557 Palestinians were displaced from Jenin camp alone during 2025, in addition to around 20,805 displaced from the Tulkarm and Nur Shams camps in the same year.
While some displaced families later managed to return, many found their homes completely destroyed or uninhabitable, turning their displacement into a long term reality.
The Palestinian Authority has accused Israel of exploiting these operations to impose a new reality in the northern West Bank by emptying entire areas of refugees and expanding settlements surrounding the camps.
Erasing entire villages
Away from refugee camps and major cities, settler attacks have targeted small rural Palestinian communities, particularly those in remote areas or near newly established settlements.
International organisations have revealed that entire Bedouin villages have disappeared from the map over the past two years due to settler violence.
Across the area stretching between Ramallah and Jericho, east of Ramallah and north of the Dead Sea, around seven Bedouin communities with a population of approximately 1,000 people existed until 2022.
By early 2025, only one community remained, al Maarajat, home to a few dozen families. All other communities, including Ein Samia, Wadi al Seeq, Ras al Teen, and Ein al Qabu, were forcibly displaced following repeated attacks.
Based on data from the Norwegian Refugee Council and Human Rights Watch, this illustrates the most prominent Bedouin communities that have been displaced due to settler violence, the number of residents they once had, and what remains today.
Official complicity and military protection
Palestinians attribute the growing boldness of settler violence to the green light and support provided by the occupation government and its military institutions.
The current far right government includes ministers and settler leaders who openly declare their intention to expand settlements and impose occupation sovereignty over the West Bank. Concrete steps have been taken to entrench impunity for settlers.
Data from the Israeli human rights organisation Yesh Din shows that more than 90 percent of investigations into settler attacks on Palestinians are closed without any indictments.
This sense of total immunity emboldens settlers to continue their assaults, particularly as occupation soldiers deployed across the West Bank rarely intervene and often provide cover during attacks.
Numerous videos have documented soldiers standing beside settlers as they attack villages, and in some cases firing directly at Palestinians attempting to defend their property.
At the same time, the Netanyahu government has provided direct support for arming settlers and forming local militias under the pretext of self defence. Following the attacks of 7 October 2023, occupation forces mobilised 5,500 settlers as reservists and assigned them to so called regional defence duties in the West Bank.
Authorities also distributed an additional 7,000 rifles to settlers and members of what are known as civilian guard units in settlements and outposts.
Israeli media acknowledged that among those armed were settlers with criminal records linked to violence against Palestinians, who were effectively released into the field.
In parallel, 2023 saw the government legalise dozens of settlement outposts that had previously been deemed illegal even under Israeli standards, while allocating public funds to develop infrastructure and connect them to road and electricity networks.
Ultimately, the reality on the ground paints a bleak picture. A silent war is underway to reengineer the West Bank demographically by uprooting Palestinians from their land step by step.
While the world is preoccupied with events in Gaza or other developments, Palestinian families continue to be expelled under cover of night, their villages reduced to memory. It is a scene that echoes past catastrophes, repeating itself quietly across hills and valleys.
