{"id":307061,"date":"2025-04-19T05:28:10","date_gmt":"2025-04-19T05:28:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=307061"},"modified":"2025-04-21T06:25:34","modified_gmt":"2025-04-21T06:25:34","slug":"itv-documentary-our-land-lays-bare-the-fanaticism-of-the-israeli-settler-movement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=307061","title":{"rendered":"ITV documentary &#8216;Our Land&#8217; lays bare the fanaticism of the Israeli settler movement"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center;\">Armed Israeli settlers on the West Bank in 2024<\/p>\n<h1 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Imran Mulla \u2013 Middle East Eye April 18, 2025<\/strong><\/h1>\n<p>An <a href=\"https:\/\/www.middleeasteye.net\/countries\/israel\">Israeli <\/a>settler polishes his gun. \u201cThe <a href=\"https:\/\/www.middleeasteye.net\/countries\/palestine\">Palestinian <\/a>savages around here, they have no mercy, no law, nothing,\u201d he says coolly. \u201cJust blood and blood, like you see in the movies.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The settler, introduced to television viewers as Yair, has a beard and a ponytail, and speaks fluent English.<\/p>\n<p>He is one of the most prominent figures featured in ITV\u2019s brilliant new documentary, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.itv.com\/watch\/our-land-israels-other-war\/10a6253a0001B\/10a6253a0001\"><em>Our Land<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Made by BAFTA-winning filmmaker Jordan Bryon and produced by Hardcash Productions, it was filmed across eight months last year in the occupied West Bank.<\/p>\n<p>A rarity on British television,\u00a0it provides up-close insight into the sensibilities and motivations of the Israeli settler movement.<\/p>\n<p>Some may argue it is irresponsible to give these violent settlers a platform.<\/p>\n<p>But the film contextualises what it depicts. Israeli settlements in the West Bank, text at the start of the documentary informs us, are legal under Israeli law but illegal under international law.<\/p>\n<p>The film documents not just settlers but everyday resistance by Palestinians they are besieged and attacked.<\/p>\n<p>It also shows how settler violence, far from being a fringe phenomenon, is backed by the Israeli military and through official policy.<\/p>\n<p>The footage lays bare in vivid detail the extraordinary fanaticism of the settlers themselves.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>&#8216;Everything is Jewish land&#8217;<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>We are shown Yair visiting a hilltop that overlooks Nahalin, a Palestinian village. The hill has an Israeli flag planted on it.<\/p>\n<p>He plans to set up a new outpost here, he proudly tells the camera: it will be illegal under Israeli law at first, but will ultimately form the basis of a new settlement.<\/p>\n<p>Yair and some settler friends enter a former Palestinian home. The family has been expelled. They walk around laughing. \u201cThat\u2019s the kitchen,\u201d one points out gleefully. \u201cThat\u2019s the living room.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The settlers refer to Palestinians as \u201cenemies\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHopefully they are going to understand that if they stay enemies, either they\u2019ll be dead or they&#8217;ll be out of here,\u201d Yair says.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThirteen years ago you couldn\u2019t drive [through] this area without meeting a lot of Arabs. Thank God, today everything is Jewish land.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Then he utter the two words that make up the film\u2019s title.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Bible is proof that it\u2019s our land, since 3,500 years ago,\u201d Yair declares.<\/p>\n<p>The phrase \u201cour land\u201d is also used by Layla, a Palestinian woman who lives with her family of 15 on a farm near Avigayil, an Israeli settlement.<\/p>\n<p>Their house is besieged on all sides by settlers, and they can\u2019t go a hundred metres in any direction without being at risk of an attack.<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/pd0X6XiPf-c?si=Yhj_ncmZsnUXJawf\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n&#8212;<\/div>\n<p>Their home is regularly robbed. We see footage of the family car being set on fire by settlers.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is our land and we\u2019ll stay here,\u201d Layla declares in Arabic. \u201cWe won\u2019t give up. However they pressure us we\u2019ll be patient because this is our land.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After the Hamas attack on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.middleeasteye.net\/news\/israel-hamas-military-defeat-7-october-failure\">7 October 2023<\/a>, Layla notes, the settler attacks ramped up. If not for the attack, she suggests, things might have been better.<\/p>\n<p>Another member of the family dissents. \u201cWhether Hamas started it or not, Israel would have started it on us,\u201d he argues.<\/p>\n<p>In a particularly chilling scene, we see four settlers &#8211; all young men &#8211; march up to Layla\u2019s house.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGive me a coffee,\u201d one of them says. They have the confident swagger that comes with a sense of complete impunity and power. They lounge on a sofa outside the house and light cigarettes.<\/p>\n<p>A young woman, Layla\u2019s daughter Farah, emerges from the house and kicks them out. \u201cGet lost!\u201d she shouts, brandishing a camera. They sullenly walk away as she films them.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn the end she became stronger than me,\u201d says Layla proudly of her daughter.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Israelis are cowards. Only their weapons make them stronger than Palestinians.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Victim and victor<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The film takes us to Tulkarem refugee camp in the northern part of the occupied West Bank\u00a0just after a deadly Israeli military raid.<\/p>\n<p>Abdallah, a paramedic with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, explains what has happened.<\/p>\n<p>The army have bulldozed a woman\u2019s house &#8211; no one seems to know why. Two Palestinians were killed in an airstrike during the raid, and another died when a building collapsed on him.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDo you see it\u2019s like Gaza, or no?\u201d Abdallah laughs bitterly.\u00a0The Israeli assault on Gaza looms large on everyone\u2019s minds throughout the film.<\/p>\n<p>Yair is asked about the death toll there &#8211; at the time, 45,000 were confirmed dead. &#8220;I feel more secure after 45,000 terrorists died,&#8221; he says. &#8220;I don\u2019t believe in innocent people in Gaza.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The settler is pushed on his genocidal attitude. What about the children?<\/p>\n<p>He scoffs.\u00a0\u201cWhat do you mean children?\u201d Palestinian children learn hatred from when they are babies, he insists. \u201cKill the Jews and you\u2019ll go to heaven.\u201d Why should Israel allow them to grow up so they can kill Israelis?<\/p>\n<p>In his mind, this is a simple and coherent argument. It is also a genocidal one.<\/p>\n<p>Yair\u2019s words combine an awareness of his extreme power, which is rooted in reality, given his ability to run wild on Palestinian territory with military protection, with a sense of grievance that seems out of place.<\/p>\n<p>He is at once victim and victor in his own head.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t know such a thing called settler violence,\u201d Yair tells us. \u201cWe have many enemies around us, and that\u2019s why I keep my gun.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He turns his rage onto Europeans who criticise Israel\u2019s actions. \u201cFor 2,000 years you killed us. All you guys, all the time, killed my people.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWho do you think you are, you can talk to me about how I am dealing with my enemy? How can you dare even talk to me about violence or about killing innocent people?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s only because what Hitler started, you want to finish.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Radical settlers backed by ministers<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The film also features Daniella Weiss, a prominent settler leader campaigning for the settlement of Israelis in Gaza.<\/p>\n<p>She describes Palestinian land currently occupied by Israel as \u201cthe present we got from God\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe do as civilians a parallel job to what the army do as army,\u201d she says in broken English.<\/p>\n<p>In De\u2019eri, two miles from Gaza, Weiss speaks at an event advocating for the resettlement of Gaza by Israelis.<\/p>\n<p>One of the great strengths of the ITV film is its demonstration that the settlers it features are not extreme figures in Israeli society.<\/p>\n<p>Senior members of the Israeli government attend the event, including the then-security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir. He praises a beaming Weiss and is later seen dancing with other Israelis.<\/p>\n<p>At a Petah Tikvah event in Israel, we see volunteers for the movement hand out pamphlets that read, \u201cCome build your house in Gaza\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>One Israeli woman is invited to mark on a map of Gaza where she wants her house to be.<\/p>\n<p>What do you do with the women and children that live there?\u201d she asks incredulously.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019re not there anymore,\u201d a volunteer explains patiently.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat do you do with their houses?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019re destroyed.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Another strength of this film is its exploration of different Israeli perspectives.\u00a0We are introduced to Yasmin, a young Israeli woman who refused compulsory military service and has spent nine years documenting violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.<\/p>\n<p>She often gives video footage she captures to defence lawyers when Palestinians are arrested.<\/p>\n<p>Yasmin says she herself has been attacked more than thirty times. We see a raging settler throw a stone at her car, smashing its window.<\/p>\n<p>She notes that while the settlers will attack her, unlike with Palestinians they won\u2019t shoot her.<\/p>\n<p>With Yasmin we watch settlers launching unprovoked violent attacks on Palestinians, accompanied by armed soldiers who point their guns at the victims to deter them from fighting back.<\/p>\n<p>Yasmin is good friends with Layla and visits her home often. She is clearly popular with the family.<\/p>\n<p>But she also reveals her mental anguish at living in the occupied territories.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s just crazy to choose to be Israeli, and to choose to stay here if I have the option not to be here,\u201d she reflects, adding that she feels she has \u201cblood on her hands\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m living on Palestinian land, I\u2019m white Jewish. I\u2019m doing Zionism even if I\u2019m not Zionist.\u201d<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Israeli police allowed 180 settlers to pray inside Al-Aqsa Mosque complex, a move condemned by Palestinians as a serious breach of the status quo. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/C7f6rDRVwV\">pic.twitter.com\/C7f6rDRVwV<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MiddleEastEye\/status\/1912551470337007667?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">April 16, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>These rounded portrayals make\u00a0<em>Our Land<\/em> a brilliant film, and particularly significant because it has been broadcast by a mainstream news channel.<\/p>\n<p>It explores a range and depth of perspectives and experiences that are rarely explored in the mainstream British media.<\/p>\n<p>The views expressed by settlers like Yair are a far cry from the talking points regularly spouted by Israeli government spokespeople every week on British television but are in keeping with the reality that Palestinians have to live as routine.<\/p>\n<p>Since January, after the documentary was made, Israel launched Operation Iron Wall, which the UN says has seen at least 40,000 Palestinians forced from their homes.<\/p>\n<p>A message at the end of the film tells us that Yair and his team remain at their illegal outpost to this day.<\/p>\n<p>Layla and her family are still in their house. &#8220;They\u2019re suffocating us,\u201d Layla says at one point in the film. \u201cThey\u2019re a pressure on our chest.\u201d But she resolves not to be forced out of her home.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf we leave the house everything will be gone\u2026 we decided to stay here holding onto each other until it\u2019s resolved,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is our land.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.middleeasteye.net\/discover\/itv-documentary-lays-bare-fanaticism-israeli-settler-movement\">Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A rare documentary on British mainstream TV exposes the violent extremism of the Israeli settlers<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":307064,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[118,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-307061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-7-10-gaza-war","category-Israel_Anti-Semitism_Zionism_and_US-UK_allies"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=307061"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307061\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":307066,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307061\/revisions\/307066"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/307064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=307061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=307061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=307061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}