The ongoing, siege of Palestinian homes in the village of Qusra, south of Nablus, shows how Israel’s creeping annexation of the occupied West Bank has shifted into an accelerated, paramilitary phase. Beginning on August 10, 2026, armed extremist settlers surrounded three Palestinian homes on the village outskirts—including the property of Palestinian-American Loui Ridi—blocking doors, severing water and electricity lines, and threatening residents at gunpoint to abandon their land. Rather than arresting the aggressors, the Israeli military responded by declaring the area a  military zone and physically barring Palestinian residents while protecting armed settler encampments. What began as a localized terror campaign against families in their homes—coming just weeks after settlers torched Qusra’s Al-Rahma mosque on July 26, 2026—is not an isolated outburst of vigilante zeal. It is the tactical edge of official state policy, engineered to achieve physical takeover by force. By driving Palestinians off their land, Israel is systematically executing a de facto annexation of the West Bank—subverting the unequivocal ruling of the International Court of Justice, which reaffirmed in July 2024 that the entire Israeli settlement enterprise, administrative regime, and occupation are illegal under international law—a reality recognized by the vast majority of the international community.

What is unfolding on the ground across the West Bank is a deliberate campaign of forced displacement, where violent terror exerted by armed settlers functions as an un-uniformed instrument of state policy.

What is unfolding on the ground across the West Bank is a deliberate campaign of forced displacement, where violent terror exerted by armed settlers functions as an un-uniformed instrument of state policy.

According to data compiled by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), settler attacks surged to over 3,000 recorded incidents between January 2025 and mid-2026,........

© Middle East Monitor