Amnesty Report Accuses Israel of State-Led Ethnic Cleansing in West Bank

Between January 2023 and April 2026, at least 117 Bedouin and herding communities in the Israeli-controlled Area C faced full or partial displacement, with 45 communities completely depopulated. During this period, Israeli authorities demolished over 3,400 Palestinian structures and authorized 102 new settlements—a record high. These actions, paired with the advancement of 50,000 settler housing units, are described by Amnesty as deliberate, state-led annexation rather than the work of rogue actors.

Violence has surged alongside these policy shifts. UN data indicates an average of four settler attacks per day since October 2023, ranging from the destruction of infrastructure to physical assaults and killings. Reports frequently document Israeli soldiers escorting or actively participating in these attacks. Amnesty International Secretary General Agnès Callamard argued that recent Western sanctions against specific settler individuals are woefully insufficient. She called for a total ban on trade and financial cooperation that sustains the occupation, urging targeted measures against high-ranking officials including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir. Without immediate international accountability, Callamard warned that Palestinian communities across the region face total erasure.