Amnesty International has accused Israel of carrying out what it described as a state-led campaign of “ethnic cleansing” against Bedouin and herding communities in the occupied West Bank, saying the measures were intended to accelerate the annexation of Palestinian territory.
Issued on: 10/06/2026 - 18:15
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In a report released on Wednesday, the rights group said rural Palestinian communities were facing a sharp increase in settler violence, land grabs and forced displacement, particularly in Area C of the West Bank, which makes up around 60 percent of the territory and remains under Israeli control under the Oslo agreements of the 1990s. The report, titled Erasing anything Palestinian: Israel’s ethnic cleansing of West Bank Bedouin and herding communities, said Israeli authorities were “accelerating annexation through a state-driven campaign of ethnic cleansing targeting Palestinian Bedouin and herding communities”. Amnesty said its research found that 27 Bedouin and herding communities, comprising hundreds of Palestinians, had either been forcibly displaced between 2023 and 2025 or were at risk of displacement. UN raises concerns of 'ethnic cleansing' amid record displacement in West Bank A drive to expand settlements The rights group accused the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, one of the most right-wing in Israel’s history, of advancing the religious nationalist agenda of the settler movement. “It has accelerated settlement expansion and land grabs, increased financial and logistical support to settlements, and it has armed settlers, thereby enabling a brutal state-sanctioned campaign of settler violence,” the report said. Amnesty argued that the violence should not be seen as the work of isolated individuals or “rogue settlers”. Instead, it pointed to “explicit calls by Israeli officials for settlement expansion” and policies it said were designed to minimise the Palestinian presence in Area C. “The ethnic cleansing campaign is state-led, and state-sponsored, not driven by rogue settlers or so-called extremist ministers,” the report concluded.
