Four Palestinians buried after deadly West Bank clash with settlers, Israel launches operation

The clash in Tal

On Friday, 24 July 2026, a group of about 20 Israeli settlers from the Havat Gilad settlement entered the Palestinian village of Tal, southwest of Nablus. According to Palestinian accounts, they approached the village mosque threateningly. A group of residents moved to protect the building. The Israeli army said a Palestinian youth grabbed a gun from a member of Israeli security personnel and opened fire, killing one settler. An exchange of gunfire followed, resulting in the death of a second Israeli and four Palestinian men.

I'm in my house and someone comes to attack me. By what law? By what moral or legal principle? I'm in my house, on my land. By what right do you, as settlers, come here?

The village head Walid Zidane described the incursion as unprovoked. The area, known as Area A, is under full Palestinian civil and security control, and Israeli entry is officially forbidden. The Palestinian Red Crescent reported that settlers shot and killed the four Palestinians during the exchange.

The burial and the military crackdown

On Saturday, the families buried the four dead. Zidane said only 30 people were allowed to attend the funeral because of restrictions imposed by the Israeli army. Soldiers remained in the village, and 51 residents were taken for interrogation. By Saturday evening, only six had been released, according to Zidane.

For every person they took, they wrote a number on his forehead. Until they let me go, I was handcuffed and blindfolded.

Saif Hamza, one of those released, described the treatment during detention. The Israeli military said it was conducting an "extensive operational activity against terrorism in the area", revoked conscript leave, and set up roadblocks across the northern West Bank.

Political reactions and settlement drive

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the incident a "deadly attack" and held a security assessment with Defence Minister Israel Katz and army chief Maj. Gen. Eyal Zamir. He announced that the legalisation of "outposts" (usually trailers or prefabricated homes placed without government approval) would be accelerated. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich went further, stating that nearby Palestinian villages should be cleared of their residents and replaced by new Jewish settlements.

This is the appropriate Zionist response to terrorists and terrorism, and to the desire to harm our hold on areas of our country.

Smotrich's statement drew on the pro-settlement stance of the current government, which is intensifying settlement expansion ahead of Israeli elections due in three months. About 500,000 Israeli settlers live in West Bank settlements, considered illegal under international law, alongside roughly 3 million Palestinians.

Broader pattern of violence

The clash is part of a months-long series of ethnically motivated incidents that have escalated since the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023. Groups of young settlers have repeatedly entered Palestinian villages, burning homes, shops, and cars, uprooting olive trees, and stealing livestock, according to reports repeatedly condemned by the United Nations and the European Union. Ismail al Saifi, another Tal resident, said such attacks are frequent. "Their youth confronted them bravely to defend their homes and land," he added.

The latest incident comes amid a fragile security situation in the occupied territory, where settlement expansion and settler violence remain flashpoints ahead of Israeli elections.