The Dispatch has an interesting article about how violent attacks by Israeli settlers on Palestinian civilians are "dividing" the settler movement. In one corner, there are those who insist the attacks are aberrational. They condemn them, but also clearly see a significant part of the problem as the "embarrassment" they cause to the settlement cause.
“An overwhelming majority of the settlement movement opposes these acts,” Oded Revivi, a former senior figure in the Yesha Council, an umbrella organization of all the local authorities in the West Bank, told The Dispatch. He said the violence posed both a moral problem and a threat to the legitimacy of the settlement movement. “This is an extremist minority that, quite simply, does the settlements no favors,” he said. “It puts the settlement movement in an embarrassing position and undermines its legitimacy because of these acts.”
Then there is the corner that actively endorses the violence.
In an interview with The Dispatch, Yehuda Shimon—a lawyer who volunteers with Honenu, an organization that provides legal assistance to Israelis facing criminal proceedings over nationalist-related offenses, and a settler himself—unequivocally defended acts of violence by extremist settlers.
At first, Shimon denied that there was such a thing as settler violence at all, repeatedly pointing to Palestinian acts of terrorism. “The entire ‘settler violence’ campaign is something the left-wing media made up. There is no such thing as ‘settler violence,’” he said. He later acknowledged that there is “very limited violence” by settlers, but quickly added that it stems from the fact that “settlers are fed up with taking it,” arguing that Israeli authorities haven’t done enough to prevent terrorist attacks on Jews in the West Bank.
The second reason Shimon cited for settler violence: retribution. “Revenge is a feeling that exists among all peoples,” he said, invoking the American response to the attack on Pearl Harbor as an example. Shimon then made the case for collective punishment: “There is no such thing as uninvolved people. If they had eliminated Sinwar and Hitler when they were children, that would have solved a lot of problems.”
This isn't even the half of it -- Shimon did an interview with the BBC that was unabashedly genocidal ("I think now, after they killed one Israeli, we need to kill all the people in Tal and Sarra, even Jit and Farata.... One Jewish life, it's 10 million [Palestinians]."). He is a true sociopath and a monster, and we shouldn't diminish that a whit.
It would be easy to dismiss Shimon as an outlier, and take Revivi at his word that the "mainstream" position is condemnation of violent settlers. But that is in many ways far too convenient a take. Shimon himself might genuinely be an extreme example, but the article makes clear that it's his people that ultimately are holding sway over Israeli government policy in the West Bank. They're the reason why the IDF "stands down" in the face of violent settler activity; they're the reason why the Israeli government intercedes to sabotage efforts by the security services to actually try and clamp down on Jewish terrorism. It's very much akin to the relationship of MAGA and the GOP, where we're all supposed to pretend like the racists and the extremists are some outlier faction as opposed to the clearly dominant force within the movement.
Meanwhile, the "moderates" (if you will) give off extremely strong Susan Collins vibes. There's a lot of lip-chewing and brow-furrowing, and the regular expressions of "concern" over what's going on. But when push comes to shove, they aren't really willing to endorse substantial, concrete initiatives to crack down on settler terrorism. If they oppose violent settlers, they oppose doing absolutely anything to stop them even more.
The scourge of violence by settler extremists, aided and abetted by the Israeli government, against innocent Palestinians is at a fever pitch. It is in fact dangerous for Israel's security and public image; it would also be abhorrent and evil and demanding of opposition even if it had no negative implications for Israelis at all. Like with the GOP, it's good, I guess, when some people who are part of that "faction" eventually see the light and speak out against the violence and abuse. It's all hands on deck. But at the same time, we cannot wait for the settler leaders to come around to doing something (even if we do buy that they're actually interested in "doing something", which one may not) before we ourselves commit to do something. If the Israeli government wants to lash itself to the mast of protecting violent settler terror-thugs, they should expect to face the consequences of that choice in the international arena.
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