Israel is systematically dismantling Palestinian collective life in the West Bank, the NGO B’Tselem claimed in a new report titled “The Elimination Project.”
B’Tselem has been critical of Israel for decades, but in recent years its reports have become even harder-hitting, going so far as to label Israel an apartheid state.
Israel and the IDF have vehemently rejected the vast majority of the claims as groundless or sensationalized, while acknowledging specific, more limited criticisms in some circumstances.
The report considers Israel to be orchestrating a comprehensive mechanism of elimination that works to “dismantle the conditions for continued Palestinian existence in the West Bank, while deepening Jewish control and supremacy in an irreversible manner.
“At any moment, Palestinians may be exposed to violence by soldiers or armed settler militias, arrested and imprisoned, subjected to abuse and humiliation, and sometimes even killed,” it claims.
“The Elimination Project” purportedly draws on more than 2,000 testimonies from Palestinians since October 2023, combined with B’Tselem’s materials from the last three decades.
While other NGO reports focus on specific incidents of harm against Palestinians, B’Tselem chooses to take a broader approach, looking also at the reality in the West Bank as “not simply a series of separate violations of individual and collective rights” but a “comprehensive mechanism of elimination” involving multiple intersecting Israeli actors.
B’Tselem frames “elimination” not only as physical elimination, but also as the “elimination” of Palestinian land, institutions, language, culture, social ties, leadership, shared memory, and history.
The report is split into five domains: violence and intimidation; movement restrictions; economic strangulation; social and political destruction; and ethnic cleansing and territorial takeover.
The IDF told The Jerusalem Post this week that “any claim that the State of Israel, including the IDF, is advancing a course of action aimed at eliminating the Palestinians as a people is false, baseless, and blatantly disconnected from reality.
“The IDF’s mission in Judea and Samaria is to thwart terrorism, protect all residents, and enforce law and order in the area,” the IDF added.
Additionally, B’Tselem presents as established fact that Israel is committing the following: genocide, ethnic cleansing, settler colonialism, and apartheid.
Even Israel’s Western critics do not accept such allegations as established fact, with the International Court of Justice legal proceeding on genocide now delayed until at least 2029 to cope with a 4,000-page comprehensive defense presented by Israel earlier this year, and Israel continues to deny all such blanket accusations.
B’Tselem goes further to say that its own legal analysis – detailed in the report – is that Israel’s actions in the West Bank meet the legal threshold for apartheid.
Israel has rejected apartheid allegations in the past, noting that it has well over two million Israeli-Arab citizens with full rights, including representation in all areas of government.
It has also noted that the Palestinians are not only not Israeli citizens, but have been in an armed conflict for decades with Israel, and their land rights and future potential sovereignty rights are connected to a process of negotiations under UN Security Council Resolution 242. Negotiations have been frozen since Hamas invaded Israel in October 2023.
While taking these accusations against Israel as truths, B’Tselem does not meaningfully acknowledge the existence of Palestinian terrorism, or the role this plays in retaliatory Israeli policy.
And while it does acknowledge 7 October 2023 as a precipitating factor in Israeli policy in the West Bank, B’Tselem does not describe the massacre as an act of terrorism.
Instead, it refers to Hamas as an “armed Palestinian organization” which carried out a “criminal attack.” B’Tselem also argues that the 7 October attack cannot be detached from the history that preceded it, and that “context is essential for understanding the circumstances in which those crimes occurred.”
Hamas is mentioned only seven times in the 250-page report. Three of the mentions are within the testimony of a Palestinian resident in the West Bank when relaying how he was accused of being a Hamas member. Only four are in the report proper. This is despite the pervasive presence of the terrorist group in the West Bank, including in cultural institutions.
‘Impunity’ of Israelis
B’Tselem claims that Israelis – whether soldiers, police officers, or settlers – who harm Palestinians enjoy almost total impunity. This, it argues, is reflected in the “absence of punishment after the fact, backing in advance, and a broad institutional and public understanding that harming Palestinians will carry no cost and may sometimes even be rewarded.”
To evidence this claim, B’Tselem cites the Force 100/Sde Teiman affair as an example of alleged impunity.
This involves a case filed by former IDF military advocate-general Yifat Tomer Yerushalmi in February 2025 against five soldiers for alleged crimes against a Palestinian security detainee held at the “Sde Teiman” detention facility.
B’Tselem claims that the incident was cast in political discourse as a story about “heroic soldiers” persecuted by the military justice system, and that the indictment in the case was withdrawn because of this.
This entirely omits large parts of the story. While the indictment was dropped, it was not because of the soldiers’ actions. The case was dropped because Yerushalmi illegally leaked a video of the alleged beating prior to trial, where it could have been legally and publicly presented. She then resigned, saying her actions were an attempt to counter a false smearing campaign against the IDF law-enforcement agents handling the case.
If the video had been kept until trial, the soldiers might have been convicted. The IDF actually angered cross sections of the Israeli public by arresting the soldiers, interrogating them, and indicting them anyway.
Also, in February 2025, an IDF court convicted and sentenced an IDF reservist who abused Gazan detainees in Sde Teiman to seven months’ imprisonment despite political criticism of such decisions in the post-October 7 context.
There have also been several cases where Israeli soldiers have received punishment for harming Palestinians in the West Bank.
A notable example is the sentencing of 21-year-old Ben Deri, a Border Police officer, who shot and killed a Palestinian during the Nakba Day clashes in 2014. Deri was convicted of negligent homicide, with the court determining that he had aimed what he thought was a rubber bullet at the victim’s chest. Deri was sentenced to nine months.
Then there is the case of IDF soldier Elor Azaria in 2016. Azaria shot a wounded Palestinian terrorist in the head in Hebron, after the latter stabbed an Israeli soldier. Azaria was arrested and convicted of manslaughter. He was sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment and demotion in rank.
Open-fire policy and unprovoked violence
A lot of the fallacy of B’Tselem’s later discussion of Israel’s military action in the West Bank is that it is depicted as purely instigative rather than responsive.
B’Tselem spends a great deal of time detailing how “at any time, soldiers may break into a home, settlers may arrive at a grazing area, a checkpoint may close without explanation, gunfire may erupt in an ambush or raid, a child may be detained, a person may be arrested or beaten, a home, a road or a piece of infrastructure may be demolished, or access to medical care, work or school may be blocked” – as if these actions by Israel are entirely spur-of-the-moment.
There is no acknowledgment that arrests, checkpoints, or the blocking of roads may occur due to the existence of Palestinian violence or terrorism against Israelis.
There are frequent Palestinian attacks on Jews in the area. Just last week, Palestinian attackers carried out a terror stabbing at Maoz Yehuda Farm near Kusra that left one moderately to seriously wounded.
IDF raids frequently uncover weapons caches in Palestinian villages, and several hundred to sometimes over 1,000 attacks are foiled per year on a regular basis.
But, according to B’Tselem, all military or security actions against Palestinians in the West Bank happen spontaneously, vindictively, and as part of the pattern of “settler colonialism.”
Later in the report, B’Tselem dedicates a section to the notion of an “open-fire” policy in the IDF.
B’Tselem claims that Israel has changed its military’s practices since October 2023 and now permits soldiers to “open fire in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including situations in which forces on the ground face no life-threatening, or any other, danger.”
It also says that “Since 2021, soldiers have been officially permitted to shoot fleeing Palestinians even when they posed no real and immediate danger to the forces, if they had previously thrown stones or Molotov cocktails.”
This narrative grossly oversimplifies a highly complex and constantly evolving situation in both the West Bank and Gaza.
In Gaza, after October 2023, the IDF, after spending weeks evacuating specific areas of civilians, often did give temporary permission to be more aggressive to open fire, given that all or most of the people left in those areas were combatants (especially since often even some of the combatants would evacuate under the guise of the civilian evacuation, and only the most hardcore combatants remained).
In the West Bank, IDF open-fire regulations changed in March 2022 when a wave of Palestinian terrorism swept over Israel, but at times those regulations were walked backward to be more conservative.
Open-fire regulations changed again in January 2025 when the IDF saw that the Palestinian Authority had failed to regain control of the Jenin refugee camp from Palestinian terrorists who were acting against both Israel and the PA.
However, at times after that, open-fire regulations have again become more conservative, and in any case, they have never been as aggressive as in Gaza, because most of the West Bank where the IDF acts is still populated by Palestinian civilians.
Strangling the Palestinian economy
Next, B’Tselem discusses the intentional “strangulation” of the Palestinian economy, which it presents as purely eliminative in objective.
“Israel has revoked or suspended almost all work permits held by Palestinians for employment in Israel, cutting tens of thousands of Palestinian workers and their families off from a major source of income. At the same time, it intensified delays and deductions from the Palestinian Authority’s tax revenues and impaired its ability to pay salaries and provide basic services; Israel also threatened to sever the Palestinian banking system from Israeli banks, through which it is also connected to the international banking system,” the report reads.
B’Tselem does not take into account that the suspension of Palestinian work permits followed the October 7 massacre and was driven by complex calculations, including security concerns, rather than being some kind of unprovoked attempt to economically harm Palestinian civilians.
Additionally, the description of Israel “intensifying delays and deductions” from Palestinian tax revenues also omits the legal and security framework governing those transfers, including Israeli deductions connected to funds that the PA pays to prisoners and families of terrorists (“pay for slay”).
This is not to say that every Israeli decision concerning PA revenues and Palestinian employment is beyond criticism. But B’Tselem’s implication that Israel is simply withholding Palestinian tax money arbitrarily in order to cause economic suffering is false and reductive.
NGOs and social organizations
B’Tselem argues that, since its establishment, Israel has tended to cast any Palestinian political, social, and community organizing – particularly when such organizing articulated demands for collective and national rights – “as a security threat and a challenge to the political order it seeks to impose.”
It criticizes Israel’s closure of “civil society” organizations that it has deemed to be terrorist organizations, saying that Israel’s definition of terrorism is too broad.
As an example, B’Tselem cites then-defense minister Benny Gantz’s designation of six prominent Palestinian organizations as “terrorist organizations” in 2021, including Al-Haq and the Palestinian branch of Defense for Children International.
B’Tselem describes Al-Haq as a veteran organization that “documents human rights violations against Palestinians,” by and large ignoring Al-Haq’s extensive connections to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (designated a terrorist organization also in the US, EU, and Canada) and the fact that Al-Haq itself is also sanctioned in the US.
B’Tselem also accuses Israel of “waging a sustained attack on the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA),” which it describes as the main body that provides Palestinian refugees with education, healthcare, employment and social services. Israeli policy for some NGOs has been controversial in the West, but even most critics acknowledge extensive evidence of the pervasive infiltration of Hamas into UNRWA.
B’Tselem also denies that PA textbooks are “rife with incitement to violence against Israelis and even antisemitism,” arguing instead that the textbooks contain “emotionally charged portrayals of Israeli violence” but no incitement to terrorism, demonization of Israelis or Jews, or calls to harm them.
As of November 2025, according to an IMPACT-se report, PA textbooks and educational materials still include content that glorifies jihad and incitement to violence.
So much so, in fact, that the European Union – not known for holding the PA to account – has passed several resolutions condemning PA educational materials containing antisemitism and glorification of jihad.
The issue of prison systems
However, this section of B’Tselem’s report includes claims that may have more merit.
For example, B’Tselem claims that Israel’s prison system has seen more incidents of violence and abuse against prisoners since Itamar Ben-Gvir was appointed minister of national security.
“Ben-Gvir and others exploited the public mood and embedded a logic of revenge in the prison system,” the report reads. “The abuse of Palestinian prisoners and detainees became declared policy, with almost no attempts by the Israeli public, legal system, or media to restrain it.”
The Post reported in June 2026 that there has been a massive influx of prisoners into Israel’s prison system.
According to a State Comptroller’s Report, the prewar totals of 16,200 total prisoners and 5,200 security prisoners had jumped to 23,400 total prisoners and over 10,000 security prisoners by early 2025.
Settler violence and police inactivity
A discussion of settler violence takes up a large part of B’Tselem’s report.
B’Tselem writes that settler violence is an “integral part of the Israeli regime’s violence,” that violent settlers are “backed by Israeli forces and protected by various state mechanisms,” and that Israeli forces “again and again escort attacking settlers, enable and participate in the attacks.
“The lines between the different perpetrators of violence have blurred, as military, police, and settlers cooperate more closely, operating as complementary parts of a single mechanism of control,” it said.
Speaking to the Post on Monday, the IDF said it strongly condemns incidents of violence on nationalistic grounds. In such cases, it said, soldiers must act to stop the violation and, when necessary, detain or arrest suspects until the police arrive at the scene.
“IDF soldiers are required to act in accordance with this mission and IDF orders. In situations where soldiers fail to adhere to these orders, the incidents are thoroughly investigated, and disciplinary measures are taken accordingly,” the IDF added.
For example, in addition to prosecutions of individual soldiers for misconduct against Palestinians, during the recent incident when some IDF reservists were found to be too cooperative with violent or harassing Jewish extremists near the Palestinian village of Kusra, OC Central Command Maj.-Gen. Avi Bluth gave special orders to bring in the highly trained Golani Brigade and Paratroopers Brigade to ensure the safety of the local Palestinians.
The IDF also said that B’Tselem’s implied claim that the IDF supports acts of violence by Israelis is false and misleading.
“As stated, the IDF, together with the other security forces, works to prevent violent incidents and thwart attacks of this kind. The IDF is committed to combating violence on nationalistic grounds, which harms IDF operations, directly contradicts IDF values, and poses a threat to the security of civilians.”
Due to the IDF’s constant presence in the area, the IDF said, soldiers do encounter cases of law violations by Israelis, some of which may involve violent incidents or incidents directed against Palestinians or their property. In cases of law violations by Israelis, the primary body responsible for handling such allegations is the Israel Police.
Here, the IDF and the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) have repeatedly slammed the police under Ben-Gvir for failing to fully uphold their missions to arrest violent extremist Jews who have harmed Palestinians. At times, they have also criticized Defense Minister Israel Katz for taking away the power to place Jewish extremists in administrative detention.
In that sense, most of the defense establishment believes that enforcement against Jewish extremists in the West Bank should be tougher, but that the IDF is doing all it can, and that more improvements can be achieved if Ben-Gvir is removed from running the police.
In any event, the IDF said it does not direct its actions against civilians and takes all operationally possible measures to prevent and minimize harm to civilians. It rejected any claim or implication that it is acting to harass or persecute the Palestinian population.
As already stressed, this is not to say that the IDF does not kill Palestinians terrorists, and that Palestinians, both terrorists and innocents, are not killed by Israeli non-military individuals.
But even by B’Tselem’s own figures, the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli nonmilitary individuals is small.
The report says that between 7 October 2023 and 30 June 2026, Israel killed 1,087 Palestinians in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. Of the total number, 35 were reportedly killed by Israeli civilians, and 15 by Israelis whose status as civilians or members of the security forces is unknown. The rest were killed by Israeli forces.
In the same time period, over twice as many Israelis were killed by Palestinian terrorists – 77 Israelis were killed in Palestinian terrorist attacks in the West Bank and Israel between October 7, 2023, and December 25, 2025.
B’Tselem does correctly document some problems in the police and prisons that should not be dismissed. However, many of its claims appear to be exaggerations of the available facts or lacking context for the massive Palestinian terror problems which Israel must constantly confront.
Its sweeping conclusion that Israel is engaged in a comprehensive project to “eliminate” Palestinian life relies on a narrative in which Israeli actions are foregrounded while Palestinian terrorism and the security rationale behind many Israeli measures receive comparatively little attention.
The result is a deeply one-sided account of an extremely complex reality.