West Bank Expansion Accelerates on Eve of Israeli Election: 12 Countries Announce Trade Restrictions on Settlements

With less than a month until Israel's general election, settlement expansion in the West Bank and violent attacks against Palestinians are accelerating in tandem. According to a report by The Hindu International Edition, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs recorded more than 1,600 settler attacks against Palestinians between January and August this year, with annual incidents exceeding 1,200 since 2023; over the past four years, more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed and more than 10,000 injured in the West Bank; since 2023, settler attacks have caused damage to or demolition of more than 6,000 Palestinian properties, forcing thousands to be displaced.

Citing data from the Israeli monitoring organization Peace Now, The Hindu International Edition reported that when Israel occupied the West Bank in 1967, there were fewer than 5,000 settlers; more than half a century later, the total number of settlers has exceeded 500,000, accounting for roughly 5% of Israel's overall population. The Israeli government has formally established more than 140 settlements with full planning approval; in addition, there are approximately 430 "outposts"—settlements deemed illegal even under Israeli domestic law, more than half of which were established in the past three years. Approximately 900,000 dunams of Palestinian private land have been incorporated into the settlement construction system through Israeli "declarations" rather than "expropriations."

The legal framework is accelerating this process. In July 2024, the Israeli Knesset passed a resolution opposing the establishment of a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River; a year later, in July 2025, the Knesset again passed a historically significant resolution formally supporting the application of Israeli sovereignty to what its government refers to as "Judea and Samaria," i.e., the West Bank. Citing Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana's remarks at the time, The Hindu International Edition reported: "1967 was not the beginning of the occupation, but its end. The only way to achieve genuine peace is from a position of strength."

This trend is deeply intertwined with electoral politics. Dalia Shaindl, a visiting senior fellow at the Center for American International Policy, told The Hindu International Edition: "Smotrich's party, Religious Zionism, polls at roughly five to seven Knesset seats, many of whose voters truly prioritize settlement expansion. Voters who cast ballots for any other party in the ruling coalition also presume that these parties will always support settlements and oppose any form of dismantling." The report noted that major participating parties—whether the camp of Prime Minister Netanyahu or the "Yashar" party led by former Chief of Staff Gadi Eizenkot—hold highly consistent positions on the settlement issue.

Concrete actions on expansion are also coming thick and fast. Two months before the election, Israel unveiled a tender for 1,234 housing units as part of the E1 settlement project, which aims to connect occupied East Jerusalem with the Ma'ale Adumim settlement into a continuous settler "corridor." At the same time, far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich publicly called on September 27 for an "all-out war" in the occupied West Bank and demanded that the Israeli military employ the tactics used in Gaza.

For the nearly three million Palestinians in the West Bank, daily life means navigating the multiple obstacles imposed by the Israeli authorities—checkpoints, road blocks, and movement restrictions that have fragmented Palestinian communities, severely constraining their access to education, healthcare, farming, and even contact with aid agencies. The United Nations noted in 2025 that the scale of displacement in the West Bank has reached its highest level since the beginning of the occupation nearly 60 years ago.

International reaction has followed. Israel's decision to publish the E1 settlement tender prompted a joint trade counter-response from 12 countries. According to a report by The Hindu International Edition, the United Kingdom, France, Canada, together with Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden issued a joint statement on September 8, 2026, confirming the imposition of new trade restrictions on Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Two months earlier, spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights had already expressed concern over the Israeli government's further increase in the number of settlements, Israeli leaders' public calls for retaliation and collective punishment against Palestinian communities, and threats to turn the West Bank into "another Gaza."

The report cited Shaindl's analysis pointing out that a "critical majority" for cracking down on settler violence already exists within Israel, because many in the right-wing camp believe such violence damages the image of the settlement project and draws international attention, while crackdowns themselves can in fact defuse external pressure. However, regardless of internal policy debates, the facts compiled by The Hindu International Edition show that, in the election countdown phase, settlement expansion, settler attacks, and top political leaders' public calls for occupation are accelerating in tandem, and the West Bank is being drawn onto a track parallel to Gaza, oriented toward militarization and annexation.