West Bank settler attacks spread after Tal killings, reports say
Israeli settler attacks, raids and road closures followed deadly violence in Tal, as Gaza’s Health Ministry reported 1,203 killed since the ceasefire.
By Sofia Marchetti · World Affairs Correspondent
3 min read
West Bank settler attacks widened after deadly violence in the village of Tal on July 24, with Palestinian communities reporting arson, raids, road closures and new settlement activity. Al Jazeera reported that the escalation followed an attack by more than 20 Israeli settlers from the illegal Havat Gilad settlement on homes on Tal’s eastern edge, southwest of Nablus.
According to Al Jazeera, residents initially forced the settlers back, before the settlers returned with Israeli soldiers. Videos cited by Al Jazeera appeared to show a Palestinian man taking a settler’s rifle and fatally shooting him before soldiers killed the Palestinian man; other footage showed Israelis continuing to fire.
Four Palestinians from the Ramadan family were killed in the violence, Al Jazeera reported. A settler and an Israeli soldier also died.
What happened in Tal in the West Bank?
Tal is a Palestinian village southwest of Nablus in the occupied West Bank. Al Jazeera reported that the July 24 violence there triggered Israeli military action and settler retaliation across several Palestinian towns and villages.
Hours after the killings, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered what he called a “wide-scale military operation,” Al Jazeera reported. The measures included demolishing the alleged Palestinian attacker’s home, revoking work permits in villages Netanyahu described as “terror hotspots,” adding army units and speeding the “regularisation” of settler farms and outposts that are illegal under Israeli law.
Israeli public radio reported that 26 army battalions were deployed across the occupied West Bank by the weekend. Al Jazeera reported that Israeli forces raided Tal over several nights, arresting about 30 to 50 residents and searching roughly 70 homes, while operations also took place in Jenin, Tubas, Ramallah, Hebron, Bethlehem, Tulkarem and occupied East Jerusalem.
In Nablus, about 5km from Tal, the Wafa news agency reported that Israeli forces entered a hospital, handcuffed doctors and nurses, and detained a wounded patient shot during the Tal attack. Israeli public radio and activist Murad Samara said four new Israeli outposts appeared near Tal and nearby Awarta, Qusra and Jabal Ubayd.
Villages report arson, roadblocks and mosque attacks
Israel’s Army Radio counted 30 settler attacks across the West Bank over the weekend, according to Al Jazeera. Haaretz reported that prominent settler figures ignored army officers’ calls to calm the situation.
In Sarra, southwest of Nablus, Mayor Numan Abdullah said settlers burned six Palestinian homes and five vehicles and beat three residents. In Farata, east of Qalqilya, the Palestinian Red Crescent said settlers set fire to a woodworking shop, two homes and farmland, and that five Palestinians were wounded by gunfire, stones and shrapnel.
Settlers also burned two mosques before dawn Sunday in what Al Jazeera described as “price tag” attacks. Qusra Mayor Abdul Azim Wadi said Hebrew graffiti reading “revenge for Benayahu,” referring to the settler killed in Tal, was sprayed on the al-Rahma Mosque under construction; the Palestinian Ministry of Awqaf said another mosque in Kour near Tulkarem was defaced with racist slogans.
Wafa and local activists reported road closures across the northern West Bank, including closed entrances to Sinjil, a checkpoint at Nabi Saleh and repeated gate closures around Jerusalem. In Nablus, Ameed Ahmad, director of the city’s Emergency and Ambulance Center, told Wafa that tighter checkpoint controls were delaying ambulance transfers, including for kidney dialysis patients.
Gaza toll rises after the ceasefire
In Gaza, the Ministry of Health said the number of Palestinians killed since the October 2025 “ceasefire” reached 1,203 on July 27, according to Al Jazeera. Wafa, Gaza Now and Quds News Network reported deadly Israeli strikes in Jabalia, Gaza City, Maghazi, Sheikh Radwan, Khan Younis and near Deir el-Balah.
The World Food Programme warned that it would have to make deeper cuts without urgent funding. The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization and UNICEF said 67 percent of Gaza’s population, or 1.4 million people, still faced crisis levels of food insecurity.
This story draws on original reporting from Al Jazeera.