Father and son shot by Israeli forces as settlers overrun Hebron

The Palestinian city of Hebron has been the target of another Israeli military excursion. Occupation personnel flooded into the Old City to roll out the proverbial red carpet for “settlers tours” in the southern West Bank city — a coloniser gathering held on Shabbat that compounds the terror Palestinian residents experience in Hebron, one of the most heated fronts of colonial settler violence.

Israeli military presence is not incidental. It safeguards setters, offering them a carte blanche to overrun indigenous Palestinian territories. With the military on their side, they are answerable to neither local nor international law, acting with repugnant impunity.

Israeli system of Apartheid

The latest flood of alleged religious pilgrims — all of whom are illegal settlers — was not without violence. By the evening of the 15 August, the tormenting of Hebron’s Palestinian population had begun as the settlers playbook of intimidation tactics took a violent turn. Making their way towards nearby Kiryat Arba, colonists started attacking nearby neighbourhoods.

Meanwhile, Israeli occupation forces (IOF) forced shopkeepers to shutter their stores and businesses for the afternoon. Roads were also closed, severely restricting the movement of Palestinians in and out of the Old City.

A Palestinian who lives in Tel Rumeida tells the Canary that he and his wife felt ‘anxious’ and ‘fearful’ that evening.

“About 7.30pm, just before sunset, a group of settlers was roaming Tel Rumeida with the intention of attacking the Palestinian residents. They started throwing stones at our house. My wife and I were inside so, fearing we would be hit by stones and attacked, we had to lock ourselves in the house and wait.”

“They just wanted to kill the Palestinians”

By around midnight, settlers had reached Hebron’s Al-Ras neighbourhood, throwing stones and attempting to set cars alight. The Quds News Network, citing the Red Crescent Society, reported that it was treating 10 injured Palestinians that night.

Naser Jabari, 64, was shot in the back and hand, while his 40-year-old son, Fahed, was also shot and subsequently detained. Eight other Palestinians, including a 66-year-old woman, were beaten by settlers and soldiers. After shooting the two men, the IOF prevented an ambulance from reaching them for around 40 minutes.

A local neighbour, Alaa Jaber, describes these events to the Canary:

Two of my neighbours were shot by soldiers that night. The settlers turned up at midnight, and were intimidating people. The people were deterring them, and because of this the settlers started throwing rocks. The Palestinians then responded with the same. One of the rocks hit the Israeli settler’s car, so he then started shooting.

The soldiers heard this, and turned up quickly. They saw the two Palestinians, and maybe thought they had a gun, so shot them immediately. They made no attempt to see what was happening, but just wanted to kill the Palestinians. After that, the soldiers stormed the houses, defending the settlers.

Naser Al-Jabari was taken to a Palestinian hospital, while the IOF took his son to a hospital in Jerusalem, by military ambulance, and detained him.

No further information is known about their condition, or if Fahed Al-Jabari is still being detained. Jaber says:

The streets around this Restricted Area are closed off to Palestinian vehicles, so the only cars on the road belonged to Israelis. The Jabaris made a living repairing the settler’s cars, and even communicated with them in Hebrew. It’s sad.

There’s no stability here, the situation is so chaotic. The Israelis want everyone to leave. They used to get on well with the Muslims, and were treated well by them. But now they come in and do the same as what the Nazis did against them.

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Skyrocketing settler violence

Settler violence in the occupied West Bank has hit an all time high. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), more than 3,000 settler attacks resulting in Palestinian casualties or property damage had been recorded from the beginning of 2025 through to the end of June 2026. Much of this violence happens in and around the Hebron area.

Last year saw record levels of settlement construction in the occupied West Bank, with over 63,000 housing units advanced or planned. Now, in 2026, the occupation has been focusing on formalising settlements, funding their expansion and building supporting infrastructure. This is so it can continue deepening its control over the territory and continue fragmenting Palestinian communities, and what is left of their land.

Medical Aid for Palestinians warns of a continuing escalation in attacks on healthcare workers in the West Bank. Two further serious incidents have occurred. A group of settlers attacked an ambulance carrying a patient from Hebron’s Tel Rumeida area to hospital.

Just northwest of Hebron, in the village of Sa’ir, settlers shot 26-year-old Palestinian nurse Muhammad Mutoor, in the back. The attack severed Mutoor’s spinal cord, leaving him paralysed.

Israeli holding patterns

In 1997, under the Hebron Protocol, Hebron was divided into H1 and H2. H1 covers around 80 percent of the city and falls under Palestinian Authority control, while H2 covers the remaining 20 percent and remains under ‘Israeli’ military control. It includes the Old City and several areas where ‘Israeli’ settlers live alongside Palestinian communities.

Tel Rumeida and Al-Ras are two Palestinian neighbourhoods within the Restricted Areas of H2, and are therefore subject to severe access and movement controls. Palestinian vehicles are prohibited from entering, while residents face numerous checkpoints and restrictions affecting access to their homes, schools, workplaces and essential services.

Featured image via the Canary

By Charlie Jaay

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