JERUSALEM – Israel’s settlers are watching the US election closely, a community leader said, expressing confidence that if Donald Trump wins he will lift what they see as illegitimate sanctions imposed on some of them for attacks on Palestinians.

While much of the world’s attention has been focused on the war in Gaza, increasing violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank and land grabs in the occupied territory have raised concerns among some of Israel’s Western allies.

Washington and others have imposed asset freezes and banking restrictions on settlers, outposts and violent groups and urged Israel to do more to stop attacks they say undermine efforts to end the conflict.

Israel Ganz, president of the main Yesha settler council, which has close ties to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, described the sanctions as interference in Israel’s legal system that would ultimately cause problems for the government.

“If Trump wins the election, there will be no sanctions,” he told Reuters in an interview. “If Trump loses the election, in the State of Israel… we will have a problem with the sanctions that the government here will have to deal with.”

When asked about the sanctions, a spokesman for Netanyahu’s office declined to comment, while senior Trump campaign adviser Brian Hughes said that “only President Trump will restore peace and stability in the Middle East for all.” people.”

Most countries consider Jewish settlements built on land Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war illegal under international law and say their expansion blocks the only path to lasting peace: a viable Palestinian state alongside a safe Israel.

In 2019, the then-Trump administration abandoned the long-held US position that the settlements are illegal before President Joe Biden restored it.

Ganz said the sanctions on settlers are unfair because they are not equivalent to those applied to violent Palestinians, although Washington has tightened long-standing sanctions against Palestinian militant groups since the Hamas-led attack on Israel on November 7. October.

“Sanctions hurt families and farms,” ​​Ganz said, referring to farming settlement communities in the West Bank. Palestinians say those communities have already taken the best land from them and are determined to take more.

Twenty Palestinians have been killed in settler attacks this year, according to an organization affiliated with the Palestinian Authority, among hundreds of Palestinians and dozens of Israelis reported dead in the West Bank on each side as Israel carries out raids against militants.

Both tolls include civilians and those in combat.

Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris has said extremist settlers must be held accountable for violent acts while emphasizing that Israel has the right to defend itself against attacks. His campaign team did not respond to a request for comment on Ganz’s remarks.

Ganz heads the Yesha Council, which has overall responsibility for more than 500,000 people living in settlements – just over 5% of Israel’s population. That number has risen from about 374,000 in 2013, Yesha data showed.

Many settlers believe that Jews have a God-given right to live in a territory they call by the biblical name Judea and Samaria.

Some members of Israel’s ruling coalition, the most right-wing in its history, support settlement expansion and ultimately annexation of the majority Palestinian territory.

Britain said earlier this month it was considering sanctions on Israel’s most powerful hardline public figures, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, after they reportedly said violent settlers they were heroes and that the starving Palestinians could be justified. Smotrich has said the comments were taken out of context.

Ganz said countries had no right to meddle in Israel’s democracy.

“When you sanction ministers, you mean you change the (results) of the elections here. You change what the people here want.” REUTERS