Palestinian foreign minister: Israeli settler violence 'complementary pillar' of settlement expansion

Palestinian foreign minister: Israeli settler violence 'complementary pillar' of settlement expansion Palestinian Minister for Foreign Affairs Varsen Aghabekian Shahin said on Monday that the violence of Israeli settlers and the expansion of settlements in the occupied West Bank, which has accelerated in recent years, are not separate phenomena but “two complementary pillars of Israel’s illegal colonial project” to seize Palestinian land. Shahin said that settler terrorism has evolved into a tool for systematic demographic change, and their impunity has become official policy, supported by countries that provide Israel with weapons and diplomatic cover. She rejected the idea that such attacks are isolated incidents by a small group of extremists, as it is often presented, arguing that the scale, organisation and political backing of the project during its acceleration since 2023, points to a larger pattern.