Christian village in occupied West Bank faces settler attacks as clergy urge urgent global action

Church leaders and diplomats have condemned Israeli settler attacks on Taybeh, a historic Palestinian Christian town in the occupied West Bank, where settlers twice set fire to the 5th-century Church of St George and adjacent cemetery while seizing olive groves for livestock grazing. The community – one of the last entirely Christian villages in the region – faces what clergy describe as systematic targeting, with its 50,000-strong minority doubly vulnerable as both Palestinians and Christians. Representatives from 20 nations and the EU joined local leaders in demanding accountability, warning that unchecked settler violence (extending across the West Bank) threatens to erase the ancient Christian presence through forced displacement. Church officials highlighted how settlers, emboldened by Israeli state impunity, are aggressively expropriating Palestinian lands and homes, undermining decades of efforts to sustain Christian communities. Urgent international intervention is sought to halt what priests term "ethnic unmixing" of the West Bank, as arson attacks on sacred sites and livelihoods intensify. The crisis reflects broader annexation pressures, with settlers operating under military protection while Palestinian Christians, caught between occupation and identity erasure, face existential threats. Amid escalating tensions, Taybeh’s plight symbolises the collision of religious heritage, territorial conquest and fading international protections in the occupied territories.

Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim reports.

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