Understanding Israeli Settlements: Context, Impact, and What You Need to Know
What are Israeli settlements? Why are they unlawful under international law? How do they shape the daily realities of Palestinians and their land? This guide will tell you.
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What are settlements?
Israeli settlements are colonies built by Israel inside the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT), including the West Bank and East Jerusalem. They include both officially recognised residential areas and smaller outposts, which are established without prior government approval and are often legalised later. These areas are primarily - but not exclusively - inhabited by Israeli Jews. Since the occupation began in 1967, successive Israeli governments have invested heavily in creating and expanding these settlements.
Settlements are built on land acquired in several ways: by declaring it needed for “military purposes,” by designating areas as “state land” using an old 1858 Ottoman law, through private land transfers, or by establishing outposts without formal permission from the Israeli authorities. The Absentee Property Law has also been used - especially in East Jerusalem - to seize, lease, or transfer property belonging to Palestinians who live elsewhere, often without compensation.
There are many documented cases of Palestinians facing threats, intimidation, and violence from settler groups attempting to push them off their land. If farmland is left uncultivated, it can be declared “vacant” and then expropriated by the state. Settlers have also been accused of damaging crops, burning fields, and uprooting olive trees to prevent Palestinian farmers from accessing their land.
People sometimes think of settlements only as a few isolated outposts inhabited by extremists, because these incidents are the ones most often reported in the news. While violent elements do exist and cause serious harm to Palestinian communities, settlements are far more extensive than the houses settlers live in. They are supported by a wide network of infrastructure - roads connecting them to Israel, public facilities, schools, and community centres. As a whole, the settlement system reshapes the demographic and geographic reality of the West Bank, fragments Palestinian areas, and contributes to long-term Israeli control over the occupied territory.
As of May 2025, there were more than 160 official Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, along with over 220 outposts. Today, an estimated 700,000 Israeli settlers live in these areas - over 500,000 in the West Bank and around 246,000–250,000 in East Jerusalem.
How do settlers justify their presence?
Israeli settlers justify their presence in the West Bank and East Jerusalem for a range of religious, ideological, security, and economic reasons. Many religious Zionists believe they have a biblical or historical right to live in what they call Judea and Samaria, seeing settlement activity as part of a divine mandate to restore Jewish life on land they consider ancestral. Others view settlements as an extension of Zionist nationalist ideology, continuing the early project of securing a Jewish homeland.
A significant number of settlers argue that their presence strengthens Israel’s security. They believe that settlements act as a civilian “buffer” and help protect strategic areas, a view that has been encouraged at different points by Israeli government policy.
Economic incentives also play a major role. Some settlers - including new immigrants who have moved to Israel (a process known as Aliyah) - choose to live in settlements because housing is more affordable and government subsidies make life there financially attractive, even though the land’s status is contested internationally.
Many settlers also point to the fact that Israeli authorities authorise, support, or retroactively legalise numerous settlements. This reinforces their belief that living in these areas is legitimate under Israeli law, even though the international community considers the settlements illegal under international law and a significant obstacle to the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Why are the settlements considered illegal?
The settlements established since 1967 are considered illegal under international law. Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states that an occupying power -here, Israel - may not transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies. This rule exists because occupation is meant to be temporary; if it becomes permanent, it effectively amounts to annexation, which is also prohibited under international law.
Settlements change the demographic makeup of the Palestinian territory and help establish long-term control over it, paving the way for de facto annexation. The ban on annexation is part of customary international law, meaning it applies to all states, even those that are not party to specific treaties. Although states once routinely took territory by force, the international system created after the Second World War no longer allows this. When a state violates this rule, other states are expected not to recognise the annexation and to consider it illegal.
Israel does not accept the view that the Palestinian territories are occupied. Instead, it argues that the areas are “disputed.” This position, however, is rejected by the international community, including the United Kingdom.
Two different legal and administrative systems
Israeli settlements operate under Israeli civilian law, while the rest of the Occupied Palestinian Territories are governed by Israeli military law. This means Palestinians are tried in military courts and do not have the civil rights and legal protections that come with civilian law. Settlers, however, are tried in civilian courts, where civil and political rights are upheld. As a result, Palestinians and settlers living in the same territory are effectively governed by two separate legal systems that grant them very different levels of rights and protections.
Settlements are increasingly connected to each other - and to Israel - by a network of roads built for the exclusive use of Israelis. Many settlements are also surrounded by “closed military areas,” which are exclusion zones established on Palestinian land to create buffer zones and provide additional protection for settlers.
In the West Bank, Palestinians face a system of restrictions that limits their movement, access to services, and property rights. Settlers are not subject to these restrictions; they can travel freely in and out of the settlements and in and out of Israel
A recent surge in settlement growth
Over the past four years, Israel has significantly accelerated the expansion of settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, creating even greater obstacles to Palestinian self determination.
The current Israeli government includes senior ministers closely linked to the settler movement, such as Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich. Both have publicly encouraged harsh measures against Palestinian communities and have been sanctioned by the UK and other governments.
According to Trading with Illegal Settlements, Israeli settlers established 26 new outposts in 2023 - the highest number since 1991. Outposts are usually created without official government approval, but Israeli authorities frequently “retroactively approve” them, effectively legalising these sites and granting them the subsidies given to authorised settlements. In 2023 alone, 15 previously unauthorised outposts were retroactively legalised.
In 2024, settlement growth accelerated further. Israeli settlers established 59 new outposts, doubling the previous record set the year before. Peace Now reports 86 new outposts in 2025, alongside 54 new official settlements approved by government decisions.
Over the last three years, the Israeli government has approved 69 new Jewish settlements in the West Bank, including 22 approved in May 2025 alone - the largest expansion in decades.
A major shift occurred in May 2024, when the Israeli military transferred significant civil authority in the West Bank to civilian bodies under Smotrich’s control. This change makes it considerably easier to approve new settlements by reducing legal oversight and administrative barriers.
Settler violence
Since 7 October 2023, settler violence in the West Bank has risen sharply. In 2025, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) recorded more than 1,800 incidents of settler violence - the highest number documented in a single year since OCHA began tracking such incidents in 2006. This marks a significant escalation in both scale and frequency.
Violence and reprisals have become increasingly common, creating widespread fear across large areas of the West Bank and, more recently, in parts of Jerusalem. Reports consistently show that Israeli police and military forces often protect settlers during these incidents, even when settlers are the ones using violence. Palestinians may experience harm twice: first through settler attacks, and then through police intimidation, detention, or additional force. Settlers do not face this “double jeopardy”.
Many documented cases illustrate these patterns. On 17 April 2025, in the Ar Rakeez community of Masafer Yatta (Hebron governorate), armed settlers approached a 60 year old Palestinian man and his 15 year old son while they were working their land. After demanding they leave, settlers fired shots into the air and then shot the man in the leg when he refused. When residents called Israeli forces for help, soldiers arrived and detained both the injured man and his son. The man was taken to a hospital inside Israel, where his leg was later amputated. Both father and son were released three days later.
According to Yesh Din, settler violence driven by ideological motives has reached unprecedented levels over the past two decades. More than 93% of police investigations into such incidents close without indictment, and only 3% lead to any form of conviction. This long standing failure of law enforcement has created a climate of near total impunity, enabling ongoing violence and contributing to the gradual takeover of Palestinian land.
Settler violence during the olive harvest
Settler violence has long had a severe impact on Palestinian olive harvests in the West Bank. Each year, UN agencies and humanitarian organisations document widespread attacks on Palestinian farmers, destruction of olive trees, and damage to agricultural infrastructure during the harvest season. These incidents have intensified in recent years, with many Palestinians facing near daily harassment or violence when attempting to reach their groves.
Farmers commonly report being beaten, threatened, or chased away by armed settlers. In many cases, settlers steal harvested olives, damage farming tools, or vandalise trees — including burning, cutting, or uprooting them. These attacks frequently take place even when Palestinians access their land through coordination with Israeli authorities, and often in the presence of Israeli forces.
Palestinians also face physical obstacles: restricted access to farmland near settlements and outposts, limited harvest days granted by the military, and blocked roads or gates. These barriers make it difficult for families to harvest their crops safely or on time. Over the years, thousands of olive trees — some hundreds of years old — have been destroyed, leading to significant financial losses for families who rely on olives as a major source of income.
According to OCHA, the 2025 olive harvest season saw a particularly sharp rise in settler attacks, with 150 documented incidents between 1 October and 3 November. These attacks resulted in injuries, the theft of crops and equipment, and the destruction of more than 4,200 trees across 77 Palestinian villages and towns. Settler violence during the harvest not only harms farmers physically and economically, but also contributes to the long term displacement of Palestinian communities by undermining their ability to maintain and cultivate their land.
The impact of settlements on the Palestinian economy
Israeli settlements have a profound and damaging effect on the Palestinian economy. They confiscate land, restrict movement, and undermine local livelihoods, leaving many Palestinians with few real alternatives but to seek work inside the settlements themselves. As highlighted in Trading with Illegal Settlements, settlements fragment Palestinian markets, block access to farmland and water, and impose multiple layers of military and administrative restrictions. These conditions limit Palestinian economic activity, suppress local industries, and contribute to extremely high unemployment rates.
As a result, thousands of Palestinians are pushed into low‑paid and often exploitative jobs in settlements because their own economic options have been eroded. Local businesses have been weakened or destroyed, farmland has been seized, and severe movement restrictions have made it difficult for goods and workers to travel between Palestinian communities. Many Palestinians working in settlements face unsafe conditions, lack of written contracts, long working hours, wage theft, and discrimination. Yet these jobs often pay slightly more than what is available in the heavily restricted Palestinian economy.
This dynamic illustrates how settlement expansion contributes directly to Palestinian economic hardship. By limiting Palestinian access to land, resources, and markets, settlements create the very conditions that push Palestinians into dependence on settlement employment—reinforcing an economic system that deepens inequality and supports the continued dispossession of Palestinian communities.
Conclusion
Understanding how settlements are built, justified, and expanded — and how they shape movement, safety, livelihoods, and land — helps us see the fuller picture of their impact on Palestinian communities. This knowledge matters, because the patterns described throughout this article reveal a broader system that fragments land, limits rights, and deepens economic dependency, while continuing to grow at unprecedented speed.
Educating ourselves about these realities is essential. It allows us to understand not only the daily challenges Palestinians face, but also why justice, accountability, and protection are so vital for the future of the region. When we see the whole picture more clearly, we are better equipped to imagine — and contribute to — a future rooted in dignity, equality, and lasting justice for everyone who calls this land home.
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