Israeli forces in the city of Hebron in the southern occupied West Bank have arrested two journalists, two foreign solidarity activists and a Palestinian anti-settlement activist, as they were documenting attacks carried out by illegal settlers.
Osama Makhamera, a Palestinian activist engaged in resistance against settlement expansion, told Anadolu that Israeli forces raided the Rujum al-Aala area after illegal settlers attacked residents of the Masafer Yatta region, south of Hebron.
Makhamera said Israeli forces arrested two journalists working for a foreign media outlet, along with two foreign activists and the coordinator of the popular and national committees against Israeli settlement activity in southern Hebron, Rateb al-Jbour, while they were documenting the settler attack.
He added that those arrested were taken to a nearby Israeli settlement in the area. Al-Jbour was later released, while the fate of the foreign journalists and activists remains unknown.
He said the community of Rujum al-Aala has faced repeated attacks by illegal settlers, with incidents escalating in recent days. The attacks have left residents, including women and children, injured, caused extensive damage to homes and property, destroyed agricultural crops, and prevented residents from accessing their agricultural lands and grazing areas.
According to the Palestinian Authority's Committee for Resistance to the Wall and Settlements, illegal settlers carried out some 4,723 attacks across the West Bank during 2025, resulting in the killing of 14 Palestinians and the forcible displacement of 13 Bedouin communities, involving 1,090 people.
Official Palestinian data shows that the number of illegal settlers in the West Bank reached about 770,000 by the end of 2024, spread across more than 180 settlements and 256 settlement points.
Israel has intensified military operations in the West Bank since the start of the war in the Gaza Strip in October 2023, including killings, arrests, forced displacement and settlement expansion, a trajectory that Palestinians say aims to pave the way for the formal annexation of the occupied territory.
According to Palestinian estimates, more than 1,112 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank, around 11,500 have been injured and over 21,000 have been arrested during this period.
In a historic opinion in July 2024, the International Court of Justice declared that the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories is illegal and called for the evacuation of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
