Doron Spielman, a public-diplomacy and policy expert, spoke about the international campaign against “settler violence” at the Farm Conference organized by Arutz Sheva and the Binyamin Regional Council, Arutz Sheva reported.
“It all started here in Israel from Haaretz,” Spielman said. “There was no awareness about it abroad until Haaretz began spreading it. The claim is that all ‘hilltop youth’ are violent and that there is no distinction between farms and violence. The data tells a completely different story.”
He explained how the reports are circulated worldwide.” “Last year there were maybe 300 youths who were involved in something connected to violence, but there were 870 reports of ‘hilltop-youth violence.’ You need to understand that a ‘report’ means any Arab in a village who claims something. Even if we assume that every report is accurate—out of half a million residents, this is only 0.15 percent—that’s nothing. In New York, there are 47 times more cases of violence than in Yehuda and Shomron, according to their own reports.”
“The reason they try to connect it to the farms here is simple: it’s the only way they can try to bring them down. That’s exactly what happened to me at the City of David—once we began uncovering the archaeological treasures, the radical left rushed to brand us as extremists.”
“We can’t base our future on the international community. If we depend on them, we won’t retain Yehudah and Shomron. What is portrayed as a burden can be turned into a strategic communications asset. When people see the genuine connection to the land, it becomes a national asset for Israeli public diplomacy.”
(YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)
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That’s a lot of bull! Yeh we all know “Haaretz” is a rotten left wing rag. YWN won’t allow links so you’ll have to look around yourself. Many websites, including Times of Israel (which although not frum is generally quite “normal” in reporting) will have on almost a daily basis reports of crazed right wing settlers attacking, burning cars, olive groves, grazing cattle onto arab lands. Beating up, shootings, even old arab men.
Not revenge for the horrible arab terrorists, that I get and would even encourage to make them stop. But these cases on a daily basis are mostly against neighboring arab villages that are just trying to live their lives!
From TOI:
Israeli defense figures showed a 25-27% increase in nationalist crimes by settlers during 2025, contradicting the narrative that the issue is merely a media invention.
Throughout 2025, the IDF and Shin Bet recorded 867 incidents of “nationalistic crime,” compared to 682 last year, representing an increase of 27%.
These attacks have led to the forced displacement of over 37,000 Palestinians and the abandonment of entire herding communities in 2025 alone.
Officials at the IDF’s Central Command, responsible for the West Bank and Jordan Valley, said they felt a sense of failure for their inability to mitigate the increasing violence.
The attacks, which occur on a near-daily basis, largely go unchecked. Prosecutions of Jewish extremists are rare, and convictions are even rarer. Critics have accused the government, described as the most hardline in Israel’s history, of shrugging off the attacks.
In addition to the overall rise in settler attacks, in 2025 there was also an increase in the number of severe incidents initiated by settlers, including shootings, arson, and other violent crimes: 128 in the past year, compared with 83 in 2024 and 54 in 2023, according to the data.
Times of Israel is NOT “normal”. It’s very left-wing.
@Milhouse, you’re totally wrong.
However even if you’ll believe different about TOI, can you respond to these statistics coming from the IDF & Shin Bet?