Can there be hope in the West Bank?
JVL Introduction
This is a tough but necessary read. Palestinians in the West Bank are struggling; their plight may not be as urgent as for people in Gaza but many are feeling hopeless and unable to resist “caught between a Palestinian Authority that cannot protect them and Israel, with its military clampdown and its out-of-control settlers”. Things are worse than during the second intifada, according to Budour Hassan, a legal researcher at Amnesty International, because, he says “Now the people seem completely desperate. They feel completely abandoned.”
Meanwhile settlement expansion continues apace, with settler violence escalating ever faster and there are more and more checkpoints disrupting people’s lives. Unemployment stands at 33% and many who can leave are doing so.
It is even more urgent that there is action by the international community. The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement is growing in strength but important as, eg consumer and cultural boycotts are [and these are having an impact], we must lean even more heavily on our governments to impose sanctions. Israel cannot continue its apartheid regime.
LL
This article was originally published by The Guardian on Thu 11 Dec 2025. Read the original here.
I used to report from the West Bank. Twenty years after my last visit, I was shocked by how much worse it is today
Among the many people I met, there was a pervasive feeling of hopelessness and a sense that resistance is slowly becoming a memory
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/dec/13/new-israeli-barrier-slice-through-precious-west-bank-farmland?utm_term=693d1276fa588279a1792106a368f6ee&utm_campaign=GuardianTodayUK&utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&CMP=GTUK_email
the UberZionists need more Lebensraum