Warning over escalation of settler activity in the West Bank

Tehran, IRNA — A Palestinian political analyst warned of an escalating pattern of occupier movements in the occupied West Bank, suggesting their objective is to prevent the formation of a Palestinian state. Na’mān Amru told IRNA, citing Shehab News Agency, that planned settlement expansions in the West Bank are unfolding alongside ongoing violence against Gaza. He pointed to raids on the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron, and to the continued ban on the call to prayer in that site for more than three months—the longest such ban since the 1994 mosque massacre—as central elements of this colonial trend. Amru said these assaults, carried out with armed settlers' violence and with support from Itamar Ben-Gvir, the occupier’s so-called interior minister, seek to expel Palestinians and seize religious and ancient sites and areas classified as “B” and “C,” benefiting a settlement company. He described what is happening in the West Bank as a “silent and de facto annexation” aimed at fragmenting Palestinian land and blocking the establishment of a Palestinian state in the future. The analyst emphasized that the frequent attacks on the Ibrahimi Mosque are part of this colonial process.