Israel is trapped in a cycle it created. Occupation fuels resistance, and resistance is used to justify more occupation. Near Nablus, that cycle turned deadly yet again: five Palestinians killed as four new outposts were erected. Al Jazeera’s Leila Warah reports.
Published On 9 Aug 20269 Aug 2026
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As Israel gears up to hold elections in October, a dramatic surge in settlement activity has heightened concerns that the settler movement is stepping up efforts to cement its grip on the occupied West Bank, in stark defiance of international law.
Last week, the United Nations warned that attacks by Israeli settlers – often carried out alongside Israeli forces – and the creation of illegal settlements and outposts had hit “an all-time high”.
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The uptick comes as members of Israel’s hard right seek to ratchet up the political temperature ahead of the crucial polls. It also follows a parliamentary term during which Israel moved to entrench control over the West Bank deeper within the machinery of the state, shifting authority from military administration to civilian institutions, accelerating settlement planning and expanding infrastructure.
However, the Religious Zionist Party of Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich – the man widely credited as pushing the settler project to the forefront of Israeli political debate – is suggested by numerous opinion polls to be far from certain to even meet the electoral threshold for the post-election Knesset.
This has prompted what analysts describe as a desperate scramble to promote the settlement mission while consolidating the support of the settler minority that Smotrich grew up within.
Speaking at a meeting of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud Party in late July, Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz boasted that, under the governing coalition and Smotrich’s supervision, Israel had approved the establishment of 104 illegal settlements and some 160 settlement farms in the West Bank since coming to power in 2022, according to Israeli media.
In August of last year, Smotrich announced the creation of the E1 settlement project, linking occupied East Jerusalem with the existing settlement of Maale Adumim, located several kilometres to the east – a proposal which, Smotrich bragged, “buries the idea of a Palestinian state”.
Smotrich, who made increased administrative control over the West Bank a condition for supporting Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition in 2022, has undertaken a series of measures to expand the influence of settlers within policymaking.
In 2023, he established his influential Settlements Administration agency within the Ministry of Defence – which oversees the West Bank’s occupation. And last month, he legally embedded the agency within the ministry, making it harder to reverse any of the decisions taken under its watch.
Israeli political analyst Nimrod Flaschenberg said it is “hard to imagine” that Netanyahu “won’t come up with some kind of imaginative ploy to keep him and the far right on the ticket”, referring to Smotrich.
“He has very strong support within the settlements and the ideological far-right,” Flaschenberg added, “but that might not be enough in and of itself to get him securely past the threshold. He’s being squeezed between the populism of [far-right Israeli National Security Minister Itamar] Ben-Gvir and what many people in the lower middle class see as the security of Netanyahu.”
Allied to Smotrich is a prime minister who observers describe as facing not simply an electoral battle, but an existential battle for both his freedom – as a consequence of his long-running corruption trial – and legacy, should the independent inquiry into his failings ahead of the Hamas-led attack of 2023 go ahead.
Given the stakes, some analysts have suggested the incumbent was far from ready to gamble on losing the support of Israel’s hard right and settler movement by condemning the increasing levels of violence in the West Bank.
“We saw him come out on US TV and concede that there may have been a few incidents in the West Bank, but nothing serious,” Chatham House’s Yossi Mekelberg said of Netanyahu’s response to the widespread violence that has swept the West Bank in recent weeks.
“He needs the hard right and settlers’ support, if not for him individually, then at least for his bloc.”
While Netanyahu may feel he has room to manoeuvre over the hugely controversial issue of ultra-Orthodox conscription, no such margin existed within the hard right and settlers. Ultra-Orthodox parties, a key component in the 2022 coalition government, have made the exemption of their constituents from the draft – which almost all Israeli adults are eligible for – a pillar of their political campaigning in recent years.
“Netanyahu knows that the ultra-Orthodox will likely stay with him,” added Mekelberg. “The settlers are more binary. You’re either for them or against,” he said.
Irrespective of electoral tactics, the consequences for people living in the occupied West Bank have been catastrophic. In July alone, according to the Palestinian Authority’s Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission, there were 2,256 attacks against Palestinians and their property: 1,458 by the Israeli army and 798 by settlers.
After Yair Golan, leader of the opposition Democrats party, offered a rare criticism of the settler “extremism” which triggered the latest round of violence, Katz accused him of spreading a “blood libel”.
According to leaks of the same meeting in Hebrew-language media, other ministers present called for a harsher response to any resistance from Palestinians, and for the military to be given even greater freedom to shoot at them.
“As the election gets closer, we’re seeing an even greater increase in the violence that’s been escalating ever since October 2023,” said Yair Dvir, of the Israeli rights group B’Tselem.
“It’s important to add this isn’t just the scale of the violence, but also its brutality and the participation of the Israeli state – both the soldiers and the political support they’re receiving.”
Imagine if Sunday’s World Cup final were played under rules that blatantly favored one side over the other. Let’s say Argentina was spotted four goals against Spain.
Spain could, conceivably, overcome that 4-0 deficit. But it would be awfully hard and something of a miracle if the Spanish team prevailed.
Fans the world over would be rightly outraged. Why bother holding the tournament? What’s the point if one team is saddled with near-insurmountable odds?
Increasingly, that’s what elections for the House of Representatives look like.
As recently as the late 1990s, around 4 in 10 congressional districts were considered competitive, meaning Democratic and Republican candidates each had a plausible shot at winning. Today, per the nonpartisan handicappers at the Cook Political Report, only 18 of 435 House districts are considered toss-ups.
Another 20 districts are rated as either leaning Democratic or Republican, meaning candidates from one party or the other enjoy a noteworthy advantage, but aren’t necessarily a lock to win in November.
In sum, that means fewer than a tenth of all House seats are even somewhat competitive.
George Skelton and other analysts cover the insights, legislation, players and politics you need to know. In your inbox Monday and Thursday mornings.
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That’s hardly an accident, as lawmakers have increasingly manipulated the election process to suit themselves, rejiggering congressional districts to sideline voters and boost their political parties.
It’s undemocratic, and it stinks.
“Every voter has a stake in making sure that these elections are fair and that the process is transparent,” said Rep. Jeff Hurd, a Republican who represents a large, mostly rural swath of western and southern Colorado. “Gerrymandering undermines representative democracy … by preventing voters and communities from having cohesive representation.
“It unfortunately rewards political extremes,” he went on. “It reduces competition and contributes to the polarization and dysfunction that prevents Congress from effectively addressing the issues that our constituents care about.”
Hurd is a member of the Problem Solvers Caucus, a bipartisan group of 44 House members dedicated to working through their ideological and political differences to — lordy! — try to get stuff done.
Recently, to mark Independence Day, the caucus announced a framework for legislation aimed at bringing competition back to many congressional races, in part by limiting the redrawing of political maps to once every 10 years, following the census. Among other reforms, the bipartisan group also called for establishing a uniform, national standard requiring that congressional districts be drawn “using clear, objective criteria while rejecting partisan advantage and incumbent protection as legitimate goals.”
The effort is, of course, too late for this election. The hope is Congress will enact the changes in time for the next scheduled round of redistricting, which is due to take place after the 2030 census. The rules would be in place starting in 2032.
The chances of passage are not strong. As Hurd noted: “Any reform that asks politicians to give up political leverage is going to be challenging.” But if ever there was a time for a badly needed systemic fix, it’s now.
Gerrymandering has been around for more than 200 years. The term derives from the efforts of Massachusetts Gov. Elbridge Gerry to skew state Senate races in the election of 1812. The portmanteau, which appeared in the Boston Gazette, described one politically engineered, misshapen district that resembled a salamander.
The practice reached new heights of creativity (or deviousness, depending on your perspective) in the modern age, when ever-more sophisticated computers allowed for ever-finer slicing and dicing of the electorate.
In 2019, the Supreme Court effectively greenlighted the practice in a 5-4 decision by the conservative majority, decreeing that partisan gerrymandering was beyond the purview of federal courts. In other words, have at it! And lawmakers did.
But this last year, in particular, has broken new, insidious ground.
Pressured by President Trump — who fears losing the GOP’s whisper-thin House majority — lawmakers in Texas tore up their political map mid-decade and redrew the state’s congressional districts in hopes of nabbing five additional seats this November. California responded in kind, with passage of Proposition 50, a measure that shelved the work of a nonpartisan redistricting commission in favor of a map aimed at handing Democrats five additional seats.
More than half a dozen other states — most of them Republican-run — have jumped into the fight, gerrymandering their congressional districts to gain a partisan edge. Lawmakers in several Democratic-run states are now looking at the prospect of retaliatory gerrymandering ahead of the 2028 election.
There’s not much upside to all this self-dealing — if, that is, you care about political competition and allowing the electorate a genuine say. But all that manipulation and maneuvering has, at least, made voters much more aware of the once-obscure practice of congressional line drawing. And that offers reformers a flicker of hope.
One ally, improbable though it may seem, is Paul Mitchell. He’s the Sacramento political guru who drew the gerrymandered map that California voters approved with passage of Proposition 50. (California, he said, was left no choice but to respond after Texas made its move.)
Mitchell said he has long favored a national redistricting standard that would apply to all 50 states and put the much-abused process on an even footing. “I really believe that redistricting should … serve the public, not serve the politicians,” Mitchell said.
Still looking on that bright side, he suggested perhaps the current redistricting war will prove so odious and have “done so much harm” that combatants will reach a point where they “put down [their] arms and embrace a kind of nonpartisan, non-politicized, public-oriented redistricting.”
It seems far-fetched. But miracles do happen.
The must-read: Californians rallied to save the coast 50 years ago. Trump is spoiling the celebration
The deep dive: On birthright citizenship, the Supreme Court originalists split on history and Trump
The L.A. Times Special: Inside the states’ case to block the Paramount-Warner Bros. merger: ‘Each side is taking risks’
Until next time,
mzb
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As primary voters head to the polls Tuesday to determine which candidates will face off in November to become California’s governor and Los Angeles’ mayor, both races are wide open, with a new crop of candidates challenging the Democratic status quo.
For Democrats, little clear consensus has emerged so far on who should lead the city and state into the future.
In California’s crowded gubernatorial race, Democrats have struggled in recent months to settle on a candidate to succeed term-limited Gov. Gavin Newsom.
After former Rep. Eric Swalwell suspended his campaign in April amid allegations of sexual misconduct, Xavier Becerra, a former Biden cabinet member, inched ahead by positioning himself as the safe, experienced Democratic candidate. Another Democrat, billionaire climate activist Tom Steyer, and Republican Steve Hilton, a former Fox News commentator, trail close behind.
In L.A., experience seems to be as much a liability as an advantage.
Mayor Karen Bass finds herself in the extraordinary position, as an incumbent, of fighting to make the runoff as she is assailed from the left and the right. The latest UC Berkeley-L.A. Times poll shows Bass leading with just 26% of the vote, one point ahead of City Councilmember Nithya Raman, a wonkish Democratic socialist, and four points ahead of Republican Spencer Pratt, a former reality TV star.
“There’s a clear sense of frustration with the Democratic Party,” said Sara Sadhwani, a professor of politics at Pomona College. The reason a wave of conservative outsiders like Pratt and Hilton are doing so well in such a solidly liberal city and state, Sadhwani said, is that they’re more willing to spell out the challenges that L.A. and California face.
“Democrats tend to be very concerned about not upsetting one coalition or another, so it’s politics as usual with many of the Democratic candidates,” Sadhwani said. “Spencer Pratt has blown a hole in that by just naming the problems that everyday residents and voters are seeing and feeling on the ground.”
On homelessness, many Angelenos are frustrated Bass hasn’t significantly moved the needle.
“We can point to facts and figures that might suggest that things have changed,” Sadhwani said. “But when you walk down the streets of Los Angeles, it doesn’t feel like it, so she hasn’t passed the field test. That’s the problem.”
A growing segment of Angelenos also chafe at the city’s high cost of living. And many are angry about the Bass administration’s lack of preparation and response to the 2025 Palisades fire.
“The Democrats have to account for those challenges,” Sadhwani said. “They have been in power for all of this time.”
California, of course, remains a Democratic stronghold, and polls show state voters are overwhelmingly opposed to President Trump. His second-term agenda — including a sweeping immigration crackdown, tariffs and the war in Iran — only seems to have cemented California’s status as a resistance state.
But after so many years of Democratic dominance, in Sacramento and at Los Angeles City Hall, leaders have to answer for voter frustrations.
The top two vote-getters in California’s nonpartisan primaries will advance to theNovember runoff, unless one candidate manages to pick up more than 50% of the vote.
Republicans have turned out at higher rates than Democrats in early voting. Paul Mitchell, vice president of the Sacramento-based bipartisan firm Political Data Inc., said that older Democrats who reliably turn in their ballots were slower to vote this year, likely because two Republicans were on the gubernatorial ballot and the Democratic field was fractured.
“That has caused them to dive into a lot more strategic voting,” Mitchell said, noting many seemed to be waiting to cast their ballots for the Democrat who looks to have the best chance of moving on to November.
For the GOP, getting a candidate on the November ballot for governor means more than just demonstrating Republicans are players in California. A GOP candidate would bring out more Republicans to vote in the general election, raising the party’s prospects of winning down-ballot races and passing a GOP-led ballot initiative on voter ID.
For Democrats, the midterm races offer the party its first major chance to chart a new path for the future.
As polls show Trump cratering in popularity, Democrats in California and beyond are struggling a year and a half after Kamala Harris’ bruising 2024 defeat to agree on what went wrong.
The Democratic National Committee’s long-awaited autopsy of that election — which said Harris “wrote off rural America,” wrongly assumed identity politics would win over voters of color and failed to develop “defined or consistent” strategy against Trump — has only generated more hand-wringing.
“There is not a clear vision, there is not a clear policy agenda, and the Donald Trump presidency upended the policy world as we knew it,” Sadhwani said. “It’s unclear how any Democrat, including any of the individuals in these two races, is going to navigate the waters into the future. One thing is for certain: We aren’t going back. So, which of these candidates is going to lead us into an uncertain future?”
Referendum on Bass
In L.A., the election is a referendum on Bass, who pledged in 2022 to solve homelessness, cut crime and make the city more affordable.
“How has L.A. changed in four years?” said Christian Grose, a professor of political science and public policy at USC. “The Bass campaign is saying it has changed for the better and she still needs more time. All the other candidates, from very different perspectives, are saying that it’s much worse than it was four years ago, and it’s time for new leadership.”
Bass told The Times she plans to win in November by demonstrating her administration’s progress in clearing homeless encampments and accelerating the building of affordable housing. She has also noted that data shows homicides in the city are at their lowest since 1966.
Challenging Bass from the left is Raman, who was elected in 2020 as the first DSA-backed L.A. City Council member. Pitching herself as the viable progressive in the race, Raman has accused Bass of not doing enough to make the city affordable and critiqued Bass’ spending on Inside Safe, her program to move unhoused people into stable housing. Although Raman presents herself as an outsider, she is a former Bass ally who has chaired the council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee for more than three years.
“She’s absolutely a part of the establishment,” Sadhwani said. “She’s been in City Hall longer than Karen Bass.”
As Raman tacked to the center during the campaign to appeal to more moderates and distanced herself from past calls to defund the police, she alienated some DSA members who complained they didn’t know what she stood for. Her three fellow DSA City Council members endorsed Bass.
Pratt is challenging Bass and the entire Democratic status quo.
A former star of “The Hills” who lost his home in the Palisades fire, he has surprised many political observers with his success assailing the city’s handling of the 2025 firestorms. He has called unhoused people drug-addled “zombies” and argued that L.A.’s housing crisis requires heavy-handed policing.
Pratt has raised vastly more campaign contributions than Bass and Raman. He has also generated national online buzz by waging an aggressive social media campaign and inspiring supporters to post a stream of viral AI election campaign ads.
Still, most political experts agree that Bass has the most viable path to victory, starting with a solid base of Black voters and a large share of Latino voters, plus support from powerful unions.
“Under normal circumstances, or at least under historic circumstances, that would be plenty to get her over the finish line,“ said Jim Newton, executive director of UCLA Blueprint magazine and a former political journalist for The Times. “What’s problematic for her is that there are people who are angry with her.”
A reset in California
Newsom has emerged in recent years as the national face of Democratic resistance to Trump, bolstering California’s status through a barrage of lawsuits and all-caps trolling against Trump.
Whatever candidate replaces Newsom, things are going to be different.
The emerging front-runner, Becerra, is a safe-bet career politician who has served as California attorney general and U.S. secretary of Health and Human Services. Asked recently why he had climbed in the polls, Bercerra said he thought voters wanted experience, not “glitz and sizzle.”
He has pledged to issue executive orders declaring California’s housing shortage a state of emergency and directing state agencies to maintain coverage for every Californian affected by federal or Medi-Cal cuts. He also touts his record, as the state’s attorney general, of suing Trump 122 times.
Steyer, a hedge-fund billionaire, calls himself “the most progressive candidate on the ballot.” He has pledged to build one million affordable homes, make the wealthy pay more taxes, and defend the environment — stances that are certain to unsettle Sacramento lobbyists and test the limits of California’s progressivism. But his past investments in coal plants and ICE prisons raise questions for some voters.
“His wealth is in one way his Achilles heel in the election,” Grose said. “Voters think of him as a billionaire more than progressive.”
Republicans seem to have rallied around Hilton — a British immigrant and former top strategist forconservative prime minister David Cameron — who has secured Trump’s backing and is campaigning on the message that California is a failed state in need of radical reform.
Hilton has pledged to cut government spending, make housing more affordable and bring gas prices down. But to achieve some of his goals he would scale back public services and environmental regulations and ramp up domestic production of oil and natural gas — strategies that many Californians might hesitate to get behind.
Whichever candidates make it to the runoff, the California Democratic Party will face questions about its strategy and vision. Less than two months ago, the party chair had urged Becerra to drop out of the race to make way for Swalwell.
“Clearly, the party itself has lost its way in California,” Sadhwani said. “I would not be surprised if the California Democratic Party looks for new leadership after this election.”
Can a Republican win?
Because the top two spots in each contest are up for grabs, elections experts warn that the vote results may not be known for days.
If Republicans make it to the runoff, they face steep odds of being elected in November in a state where Democratic registered voters outnumber Republicans by more than 20 percentage points.
Rob Stutzman, a GOP strategist, said neither Hilton nor Pratt was likely to win. But if they made the runoff they could have a huge impact on the political environment by advancing “grievance issues that really put up a spotlight on what I call the blue state incompetence.”
Of all the candidates, Mitchell said, Pratt as an outsider adept at Instagram and TikTok has the greatest opportunity to create a new surge electorate. But he’s also going after the hardest voters to get to turn out: disaffected voters who are upset at the system.
Pratt had more retweets and viral videos than any other candidate, Mitchell said. “But that doesn’t buy him the vote of the disaffected DoorDash driver who believes that the system is broken, and who hasn’t voted in the last five elections.”
If Republicans don’t make it past the primary, Mitchell said, Democrats would likely hit the reset button.
“Pratt running has kind of obfuscated the differences between Raman and Bass,” Mitchell said. “It’s like a WWE match versus a chess match. I think Raman versus Bass would be more of a strategic and nuanced election than Spencer Pratt trying to hit Karen Bass over the head with a chair.”