On the night of February 26, 2023, Huwwara, a Palestinian town of about 6,000 residents in the northwestern West Bank, endured a brutal sequence of events. Hours after two Jewish settlers were killed on the road that bisects the town, hundreds of settlers surged into Nablus, equipped and ready to unleash violence. The attackers moved through the streets, singing and acting with apparent impunity while soldiers stood by. Homes, stores, and vehicles were set ablaze, and dozens of Palestinians were assaulted with sticks and iron rods. By dawn, 25 houses, 70 businesses, and 90 vehicles had been burned. One neighbor perished from a gunshot to the chest, and many others were injured.
The assault was described by the Israeli army as a pogrom—a term linked to 19th century massacres in the Tsarist empire and aimed at ethnically cleansing communities. Some witnesses recalled soldiers saying it was a night of destruction. The organization Breaking the Silence, made up of former Israeli soldiers, labeled the actions as state-sanctioned violence. Although more than 400 settlers participated, those responsible faced no punishment. This attack wasn’t the only incident in a wider pattern of violence that followed the town under siege since August 2022, when a neighbor raised a Palestinian flag on a home.
The main shopping street around the town hall, once bustling, now lies desolate. Israeli soldiers patrol in battle-ready groups, watching every corner through gaps in the streets. Businesses have closed. The once lively alley that bisects Huwwara is now a quiet no-man’s land. A few days earlier, on October 5, clashes intensified as Hamas warned of an escalation and soldiers sealed the area with a military zone. In the same period, another group of extremists attacked the town, and a Palestinian seeking to defend his family was shot three times by a police officer using a sniper rifle. Since that day, residents have been prohibited from stepping onto the street except to cross to the other side, and vehicle movement is discouraged. Entrances to the town have been blocked with earth and stones.
Approximately twenty attacks in one month
The fear is constant. A local administrator, known to some as Dmaidi, the person overseeing the town’s education office, described how residents, around 2,500 people, were confined to their homes for 18 days with dwindling food supplies. When crossing the street, families now send their children to the roof to keep watch for settlers or soldiers. In just over a month, neighbors counted twenty attacks on the town.
The daily terror runs deep. The town remains without its own armed defense, and many residents feel unprotected. Huwwara, part of the larger West Bank area where Israeli forces maintain control, has little to no Palestinian police presence. Several schools have remained closed for over a month due to the risk of attacks by settlers, mirroring the fate of similar facilities in the region where arson and vandalism have occurred in recent years.
Residents describe an economy under siege as streets empty and normal commerce stalls. Movement restrictions, taxes, and curfews hinder daily life. A local elder explained that people have learned to endure, though the strain is evident in every household. A man who lost three fingers recently told of a settler shooting incident as he collected basic necessities on the main street.
Threats of ethnic cleansing loom over Huwwara. The town sits among Jewish settlements that international observers consider illegal, with more than 460,000 Israelis living in the occupied West Bank. The area has become a focal point in a broader campaign of displacement. Some residents report being told that they do not belong, while others recall political leaders suggesting drastic measures. Leaflets and speeches have urged residents to leave, and posters referenced historical expulsions from 1948 as a warning of what might come next.
Moataz Qusrawi, who lives at the town’s edge among olive groves and two nearby settlements, has fortified his home with locks and shutters. Settlers frequently target homes with stones and threats at night, and the fear is pervasive, spreading through families and especially affecting children who respond with distress when the word settler is mentioned. In many cases, the confrontation pits residents against groups that operate with military accompaniment, resulting in damage to olive groves and crops. The sense of impunity strengthens the resolve of those who insist on remaining on their land, despite the constant pressure and fear that surrounds their daily lives.