RAMALLAH: Israeli settlers stormed a Palestinian village and injured five people on Thursday, a rights group said, after the military dismantled illegal outposts.

The Israeli military, which has come under international criticism over settler violence, said it intervened and took down two outposts built by settlers without permission in the occupied West Bank.

More than 500,000 Israelis live in settlements across the West Bank, all of which are deemed illegal under international law, and some of which, known as outposts, are built without Israeli government approval.

“After Israeli military forces left the area, dozens of settlers, armed with clubs, tear gas and stones, stormed the village of Atara,” the Israeli rights group Yesh Din said in a statement.

“Five residents were injured and hospitalised, one in serious condition with a brain haemorrhage,” Yesh Din added. The Palestinian Red Crescent said one of the injured people was 67 years old.

The army said it had removed tents, vehicles and “temporary stru­ctures” erected by settlers in two outposts including one near Atara.

“During the enforcement activity near Atara, Israeli rioters barricaded themselves inside structures” and were dispersed, the military added.

Abdelhadi Atari, a resident of Atara and local journalist, said that settlers broke into and vandalised Palestinian houses soon after the army arrived.

“The fact that the army had blocked the village from several directions (ahead of the dismantling operation) also helped the settlers attack and operate freely during the assault inside the village,” Atari said. “The children were terrorised. The settlers ripped doors off houses. Some houses had their doors torn off, and all the windows were smashed,” Atari added.

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967, with settlements there proliferating under caretaker Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing government.

More than 1,100 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since the Oct 7, 2023 attack by Gaza-based Hamas on Israel, mostly by Israeli soldiers but also by settlers, according to a tally based on data from the Palestinian health ministry.

More than 50 Israelis have been killed in Palestinian attacks or during Israeli military operations over the same period, according to Israeli figures.

A number of countries including Britain and France in September announced trade sanctions on products from settlements over the violence.

France last week refused entry to Yossi Dagan, the head of a body representing Israeli settlements in the West Bank, according to his office.

The Israeli foreign ministry highlighted the efforts to dismantle outposts, saying four were taken down over two days. “The law applies to everyone,” it said on X.

In a separate incident on Thursday, settlers committed various acts of vandalism in the Palestinian Christian village of Taybeh, east of Ramallah.

According to the Christian Presence Observatory in the Holy Land, a watchdog organisation, settlers attacked the village at night, setting fire to a vehicle and spray-painting slogans in Hebrew on the walls of a house.

Published in Dawn, November 13th, 2026