Settler violence increases dramatically in the occupied West Bank
One of the co-directors of the Palestinian Oscar-winning film No Other Land has been detained by Israeli forces. It happened after he was attacked by a mob of Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank.
He was in an ambulance trying to receive treatment when the doors were opened and he was taken by the Israeli military.
A number of American activists were also attacked, and video on social media shows them fleeing the settler violence.
This is just another issue in the rising settler violence across the occupied West Bank, which has dramatically increased since Israel’s war on Gaza. The United Nations has been documenting these attacks, and back in January, they said there was already a record high for the month of January 2025.
And these settlers often operate under the protection of Israeli forces, even though they are damaging Palestinian property, injuring Palestinians, stoning cars. They are operating under the protection of the Israeli forces, rendering Palestinians defenceless to a wide variety of threats, Israeli army raids, expulsion from their land and also settler violence.
Israeli military says Palestinian filmmaker arrested for throwing stones
Here’s more on the detention of Hamdan Ballal, a Palestinian filmmaker who directed the Oscar-winning documentary, No Other Land.
The Israeli military has confirmed arresting three Palestinians in the Masafar Yatta area, without naming Ballal.
In a post on X, it said it sent soldiers to the village of Susya to defuse tensions after “terrorists” threw stones at Israeli settlers. But the “terrorists” began throwing stones at the soldiers and the police, resulting in the arrest of three Palestinians and an Israeli, it said.
It denied reports that a “Palestinian was arrested while inside an ambulance”.
Earlier, Israeli journalist and No Other Land co-director Yuval Abraham, said that a group of “armed KKK-like masked settlers” had “lynched” Ballal and that he had injuries to his stomach and head. But Israeli “soldiers invaded the ambulance he called, and took him”.
Abraham shared a video of the incident on X. Watch below.
The group of armed KKK-like masked settlers that lynched No Other Land director Hamdan Ballal (still missing), caught here on camera. pic.twitter.com/kFGFxSEanY
— Yuval Abraham יובל אברהם (@yuval_abraham) March 24, 2025
No news on location, condition of arrested Palestinian filmmaker: Lawyer
The whereabouts of Oscar-winning filmmaker Hamdan Ballal remain unknown after he was attacked by Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank and taken away by Israeli soldiers.
Ballal was one of the three Palestinians detained in the village of Susiya on Monday. According to their lawyer Lea Tsemel, police told her they’re being held at an unidentified military base for “medical treatment”.
But Tsemel said she hadn’t been able to reach them and had no further information on their whereabouts.
Basel Adra, the co-director of No Other Land, witnessed the detention and said about two dozen settlers – some masked, some carrying guns, some in Israeli uniform – attacked the village. Soldiers who arrived pointed their guns at the Palestinians, while settlers continued pelting stones.
“We came back from the Oscars and every day since there is an attack on us,” Adra told the AP. “This might be their revenge on us for making the movie. It feels like a punishment.”
‘Israel quite literally can get away with murder’
Diana Buttu, a Palestinian lawyer and activist, says Oscar-winning film director Hamdan Ballal will “face the wrath” of the Israeli military after he was disappeared by soldiers.
She said it’s unclear if the detention of such a prominent Palestinian voice will raise awareness of Israel’s “apartheid” in the West Bank and its brutality in Gaza.
“If anything has been shown over the past year and a half, it’s that Israel quite literally can get away with murder. It’s gotten away with genocide,” she told Al Jazeera. “And so I don’t really have a whole lot of faith that the Israelis are going to behave any differently.”
There’s been no contact with Hamdan and three others taken by Israeli soldiers after they were beaten by masked Israeli settlers while troops looked on.
