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Thursday, December 11, 2025
Al Mughayyer, north of Ramallah – For the fourth consecutive day of Israeli assaults, a gang of armed Israeli settlers raided the Abu Hamam family home yesterday. Later at night, the Israeli army abducted a US and an Australian citizens.
At around 18:45, settlers attacked those present on location, Palestinians and solidarity activists alike, trying to intimidate them. Settlers cocked a rifle in the activists face. The Abu Hamam home is located in the al-Khalayel area of al-Mughayyer on the outskirts of the village. Soon after the attack began, the settlers were joined by Israeli soldiers, who shot live ammunitions at residents of al-Mughayyer trying to come to the family’s aid.
A pregnant woman and the children living at the Abu Hamam residence were eventually evacuated to safety. The settler mob had only left towards the Havat Shlisha outpost at around 21:30, with the soldiers following them about half an hour later. For the entire time soldiers were there, they kept pointing laser scopes at family members and international activists, occasionally shooting live fire in the air, with a military drone constantly hovering overhead.
At around 23:00, five military jeeps carrying over 20 soldiers and border police officers stormed the compound again, declaring the entire al-Khalayel area a closed military zone for 24 hours. Close military zone orders usually exempting the residents of the close area from it and allowing them to remain in the area. However, the order served yesterday did not, raising concerns over the intent of Israeli authorities and a possible threat of forced displacement. In a prime example of cooperation between Israeli authorities and settlers, the Havat Shlisha outpost, from which the assailants set out from, was not included in the closed area, and as is the norm, Palestinians were punished for being victims of Israeli violence.
In a similar development, the Israeli police announced last night that they concluded the investigation into the assault in Ein al-Duyuk on November 30. The case was closed on the grounds that “no evidence was found that a crime was committed”, in an incident that sent three Italian and one Canadian activists to hospital, and where passports, phones and other equipment were stolen, and without even bothering to interview the victims of the attack who filed the complaint.
During the raid, border police officers detained two internationals – US and Australian citizens – and warned the rest they would come back in an hour and arrest anyone who remained there. The two who were detained were taken to the Shaar Binyamin police station for questioning, were they were sent away without being questioned and told to return this morning.
Earlier in the day, a settler ran over a German citizen with an ATV, causing him minor injury, as two solidarity activists made their way from the village to the Abu Hamam home. A similar incident took place on Sunday, December 7, only hours before the brutal attack in which eight Israeli settlers raided the Abu Hamam residence, resulting in the injury of 13-year-old boy Riziq. That time, two activists were chased and hit by a car driven by settlers, causing them extensive bruising.
The family of Abu and Umm Hamam is the only one currently standing between the settlers and achieving territorial contiguity between al-Mughayyer and Ein Samia. Displacing them would allow the settlers to create a line of settlements and settlement outposts all the way to the South Nablus area, and going down from there all the way down to the Jordan Valley.