Israel hands West Bank policing to civilian forces, cementing annexation

Israel's Defence Minister Israel Katz ordered the military to prepare a plan for transferring civilian law enforcement in the occupied West Bank to the Israeli police. This decision follows criticism over the army's handling of Israeli settlers who besieged a Palestinian home in the village of Qusra. The move is seen by Palestinian officials and analysts as a dangerous acceleration of illegal annexation, apartheid, and ethnic cleansing. Mustafa Barghouti, secretary-general of the Palestinian National Initiative, called the settlers the "spearhead in the process of annexation and Judaisation," drawing parallels to the 1948 Zionist terror gangs. He warned that placing security in the hands of National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and settlements under Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich amounts to "handing over the West Bank to the settlers." Analysts argue that replacing military occupation law with domestic civilian law fundamentally alters the legal reality of the territory, effectively annexing it. The Palestinian group Hamas called the order a "dangerous step on the path to imposing de facto annexation." Nihad Abu Ghosh, an expert in Israeli affairs, noted that settlers have evolved into "fascist militia formations" that perform the state's dirty work. The dual legal framework has drawn sharp international criticism, with Andrew Whitley, a former UN official, stressing that the transfer is "completely illegal" and that the "Palestinian state is disappearing before our eyes." The move is part of a broader pattern of Israeli actions that have intensified settler violence, especially after the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, 2023. The Israeli military has been reluctant to confront settlers, with rights groups reporting that 94% of investigations into settler violence since 2005 ended without an indictment. The US, under President Trump, has rescinded sanctions on settlers and appointed a staunch supporter of settlements as ambassador. The Israeli government, led by Prime Minister Netanyahu, is the most nationalist and religious in Israel's history, and has boasted of establishing over 100 new settlements. The transfer of policing to civilian forces is seen as a step towards de facto annexation, with the ultimate goal of ethnic cleansing and trapping Palestinians in isolated cantons.