Israeli settlers attack Jalud village in occupied West Bank, torch homes

More than 100 Israeli settlers rioted overnight in the Palestinian village of Jalud, south of Nablus in the northern occupied West Bank, torching Palestinian homes, cars and other property, the Israeli military said.

According to the Israel Defense Forces, the rioters blocked roads, burned tyres and threw stones at security forces during the violence on Monday night (Times of Israel). Three Border Police officers were lightly injured and a security-force vehicle was damaged. Two suspects were detained and handed to police, the army said; Ynetnews reports a third, an 18-year-old, was arrested later (Ynetnews).

The violence forced the IDF to abandon an operation to return the Tubasi family to their home in Jalud, from which they had been displaced since July after months of settler harassment. According to Anadolu, cited by Al Jazeera, the family had returned to two of its homes only hours earlier under an Israeli court decision after nearly two months of forced displacement; the Anadolu-sourced local reports claim Israeli forces protected the settlers and compelled the family to evacuate again at gunpoint (Al Jazeera).

Family patriarch Mahmoud Tubasi earlier told Ynetnews: “For almost three months we were besieged in our house, and in the end they drove us out.” President Isaac Herzog called the attack “a moral stain” and urged that those responsible face the full force of the law.