While Israelis go to the polls this week in one of the most consequential elections in years, many Palestinians in the West Bank have been confined to their homes or neighbourhoods as a wave of Israeli military operations around Hebron continues.
The West Bank city has been in a state of lockdown since two Palestinian gunmen opened fire at an army checkpoint at Hebron’s northern entrance on Friday, killing two Israeli soldiers and wounding three. After the suspects were killed, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the isolation of Hebron and said troops would go house to house in the gunmen’s neighbourhood. “We will act to destroy this place, to change it completely,” he proclaimed.
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What followed has been a mass displacement operation in the Hebron area, echoing last year’s military expulsions of three refugee camps, alongside widespread destruction in the neighbourhoods targeted by the army, evoking scenes out of Gaza.
During the weekend, soldiers ordered residents of al-Jalda and Ein Deir Baha neighbourhoods out by loudspeaker, according to residents. Thousands have been forced out of their homes already, with Defence Minister Israel Katz saying people would not be allowed back “until we’ve finished dealing with all the Hamas issues in Hebron”. By Monday, the governorate’s fourth day under closure, at least 3,171 Palestinians from 488 families had been forced out, according to Hebron Municipality data cited by the Wafa news agency. Hebron Governor Khaled Dudin said Israeli forces had searched more than 500 homes, arrested more than 70 people and fragmented the city with 128 closed gates and 120 checkpoints.
The Palestinian Prisoner’s Society says the displaced include 127 infants, 81 pregnant women and 26 people with disabilities, and that at least 47 people have been detained in Hebron since Friday.
Bulldozers razed a three-apartment building belonging to Riyad Amrish, as well as a tile and ceramics factory, an auto-parts shop and other businesses in Farsh al-Hawa. Israel’s Channel 12 said Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich ordered the demolitions.
Israeli NGO B’Tselem warned the operation amounts to “collective punishment and acts that could constitute war crimes”.
Sieges at every scale
But Hebron is only the most prominent of multiple sieges happening at different scales, with years-long efforts to strategically encircle Palestinian communities in the West Bank now being employed to devastating effect:
Homes: The three-week siege by Israeli settlers of the family of Yusuf Shanaran in Wadi al-Rakheem, Masafer Yatta continues, with the family unable to leave or receive aid for days at a time without army coordination, Shanaran told Al Jazeera on Monday. In Umm Safa, northwest of Ramallah, village Mayor Marwan Sabah said Mohammad al-Obaiyat’s 1954 house received a demolition order with a November 11 deadline after months with a gate blocking its road. Settlers have since been filmed attempting to break into the family home, which has been besieged for nearly a month, with few supplies entering during that time.
A village: Madama, south of Nablus, is only just emerging from a two-week siege of its four entrances, with heavy restrictions remaining at its just-opened northern entrance, according to villagers. A kindergarten principal there told Al Jazeera she lifts children over the barrier one by one.
A region: Twelve Masafer Yatta communities in the southern West Bank were cut off for several days, with about 50 teachers unable to reach their schools, and Wafa reported that Bethlehem governorate’s roads were closed for several days.
A territory: The Israeli army barred Palestinian workers from illegal Israeli settlements on Sunday and Monday and will close all crossings on election day.
The only Palestinians who can vote – Palestinian citizens of Israel – may face issues at the polls, too; Israel’s Channel 12 reported that Netanyahu’s Likud party was preparing to challenge results from Arab polling stations before a vote had been cast.
Olive harvest attacks
This year’s olive harvest has drawn unprecedented levels of settler pogroms, theft and closed-military-zone orders. The Palestinian Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission has counted 482 attacks on the harvest by Sunday across nine governorates, Wafa reported.
At the same time, Israel released nine of 10 settlers arrested following last week’s attacks on a foreign journalist and diplomats. The attacks have continued undeterred. Wafa reported 17 attacks on farmers and their property on Thursday, and the commission documented 21 in 12 hours on Friday. The past week’s harvest-related incidents fall into a handful of repeating patterns:
Theft of olives and equipment in at least a dozen villages, including Sinjil, Silwad, Berin, Beit Iksa, al-Lubban Asharqiya, Kafr Malek, Ein Arik and Deir Ballut, according to Wafa and local reports. Near Immatin, at least 25 masked settlers sent three tractors and two trailers rolling down a hillside, destroying the equipment and olives on board.
Assaults in at least 15 places, among them Burin, where stones left three farmers with head wounds; Ein Arik, where The Times of Israel reported a farmer suffered fractures; and Beit Iksa, al-Lubban Asharqiya and Kafr Malek, where pickers were pepper-sprayed. Settlers fired live rounds at pickers in Berin and Osarin, and smashed cars and trucks in Marda, Wad Qaddoum and Sinjil, Wafa and local monitors reported.
Detentions and expulsions in at least a dozen places. Fifteen farmers were detained in as-Sawiya on Sunday. In Beit Iksa, where the harvest had been coordinated with the Israeli Civil Administration, Mohammed al-Kiswani was pepper-sprayed and detained; settlers told farmers they would never harvest “with or without coordination”. Land at Deir Jarir and Turmus Aya was declared a closed military zone without orders shown, Ayed Jafry reported – and far-right influencers were brought to film the expulsions for campaign content.
Damage to olive trees in at least 10 locations. Settlers burned dozens of trees in Burqa on Friday, keeping Palestinian Civil Defence crews out, according to Wafa; trees were set on fire in Immatin, Salem and Beit Furik; and a bulldozer uprooted hundreds in Madama, according to villagers. Soldiers uprooted dozens more in Deir Qaddis for a settler road and posted a notice at al-Mughayyir ordering hundreds of trees uprooted and in Khirbet Abu Falah for a “security buffer zone”, giving residents 24 hours to object, Jafry reported.
Arson. In Burqa, settlers set fire on Tuesday to a memorial to Palestinian residents killed and, an hour later, to the home of Jamal Bajes, a Palestinian-American – the second arson at his house in recent months, according to local reports. Local activist networks reported a home was burned in Deir Abu Mishal, and Wafa said settlers tried to set another ablaze in Burin under army protection.
Those joining the harvests in solidarity were targeted, too. United States Democratic congressional candidate Brad Lander was among about 80 volunteers detained near Nahalin on Wednesday and released with a “warning”; Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs accused him of “harvesting headlines”.
Gaza: Managed scarcity as killings continue
The last week in Gaza saw at least 37 more Palestinians killed as Israel’s daily attacks continued. Monday’s daily report from the Gaza Ministry of Health alone recorded 11 deaths – eight newly killed, three recovered from rubble – and 35 wounded, taking the toll since the October 2025 “ceasefire” to 1,559 killed and 5,608 wounded, with a cumulative toll of 74,555.
Among those killed this week:
Akram Yassin and his wife, Dina Abu Bakr, in a strike on their apartment behind al-Shifa Hospital on Tuesday.
Majdi Mohammad Fakhri Hassan, a child, shot near the Happy City resort south of Khan Younis; Rafif Raed Lubad, 17, shot in the head in Jabalia; and Fatima Abu Laban, killed in Tal al-Dhahab, northwest of Beit Lahiya on Saturday, according to Wafa.
Three security guards – Sami Baroud, Ashraf Dahlan and Shadi Abu Ataya – at the Islamic University in Gaza City on Sunday, after an earlier strike wounded seven students. Israel said it was targeting a Hamas operative.
For days, hunger worsened with crossings into Gaza shut: Flour stocks ran out, leaving seven of 20 commercial bakeries open, Abdul Nasser al-Ajrami of the bakers’ association told Wafa, and a tray of eggs reached a price of 60 shekels ($19.50).
The pressure began to ease somewhat on the evening of October 23, as Israel told traders that commercial goods would resume and an Egyptian committee delivered flour, Mohammad Abu Warda of the private sector’s emergency committee said.
