Tensions have flared again between Australia and Israel after the federal government joined a coalition of countries to impose extra sanctions on extremist settlers in the West Bank and the organisations that support them.
Israel lashed out at Australia and the other countries for adopting what it labelled “disgraceful” sanctions, accusing them of fuelling antisemitism in their own nations.
In a joint statement issued on Tuesday night, Foreign Minister Penny Wong and her counterparts from France, the United Kingdom, Canada and Norway said: “For too long, violent settlers have been able to act with near impunity, and settlement expansion and creation of outposts continue with the support and facilitation of the government of Israel.
“In some cases, settler violence takes place under the protection of Israel’s security forces.
“We continue to urge the government of Israel to take action to ensure meaningful accountability for violence in the West Bank.”
The foreign ministers said: “Extremist violent settlers, with the backing of their supporters, continue to attack Palestinians and abuse their human rights.
“They use violence to displace Palestinians, destroy property and perpetuate the illegal settlement enterprise, undermining the viability of the State of Palestine and the prospects for peaceful coexistence.”
This masthead reported last year on the surge of settler violence in the West Bank over recent years.
Australia last week imposed financial sanctions and travel bans on three Israeli individuals and four entities in response to escalating settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank.
The extremist settlers who were sanctioned include Ben Zion Gopstein, the leader of a far-right settler organisation called Lehava and a disciple of Meir Kahane, a US-born rabbi who promoted the forced expulsion of Palestinians from Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories.
The US State Department has found that “under Gopstein’s leadership, Lehava and its members have been involved in acts or threats of violence against Palestinians, often targeting sensitive or volatile areas”.
Extremist settlers Eden Levi and Moshe Sharvit, who are accused by Australia of engaging in attacks and intimidation of Palestinians, have also been sanctioned.
Settler farming outposts that serve as bases for extremist settlers were also sanctioned, meaning Australians cannot provide them with financial support.
The UK went further by adding official guidance advising businesses against economic and financial activity in illegal settlements in the West Bank.
“The UK continues to support trade with Israel within 1967 lines, but states that there should be no economic involvement in illegal settlements,” the British foreign office said.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer has come under pressure from Labour MPs to take more dramatic action by banning all British commercial activity in West Bank settlements.
The vast majority of countries, including Australia, view Israeli settlements as illegal under international law and a major obstacle to the viability of a two-state solution.
The Albanese government imposed sanctions against seven Israeli settlers accused of violence in the West Bank in 2024, and last year sanctioned two influential far-right ministers in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet, Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, for promoting violence.
Israel’s foreign ministry said in a statement that it “firmly rejects the disgraceful measures adopted by foreign governments against Israeli citizens, entities and a government minister”.
“The real essence of these steps is the attempt to impose a political stance regarding the right of Jews to live in the Land of Israel and concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – camouflaged as measures against violence,” the foreign ministry said.
“What these governments have in common is their resounding failure to combat the antisemitism that is rampant in their own countries. Anti-Israeli policies of the kind adopted today only serve to fuel that antisemitism.”
The progressive Jewish Council of Australia urged the government to go further and impose country-level sanctions against Israel, rather than against individual settlers and organisations.
“Targeting specific farms treats the symptom while ignoring the disease,” executive officer Bart Shteinman said.
“True accountability means recognising that this expansionist violence is effectively government policy.”
Australia Palestine Advocacy Network executive officer Katie Shammas said: “The urgency of further action could not be clearer.
“Just this week, seven-month-old Palestinian infant Sam Abu Haikal was killed amid the escalating violence facing Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank.”
“While these measures target some of those enabling settler violence, they do not yet reach the political leaders, institutions and organisations responsible for expanding settlements, entrenching annexation and creating the conditions in which this violence continues.”
A new report by an independent United Nations commission of inquiry this week found that “Israeli authorities are directly involved in settler attacks that have killed, caused physical and mental harm”.
At least seven Palestinians were killed and 832 injured in settler attacks last year, the commission found, a 130 per cent increase in killings and injuries on 2024.
The UN report found Israeli settlers had assaulted, abducted and abused Palestinian children while they were engaged in activities such as playing, going to school or tending to animals and fields.
“The deliberate targeting of children in such circumstances is particularly egregious as it results in immediate physical and mental harm and also in long term psychological impacts, disrupting children’s education, preventing freedom of movement and undermining their basic sense of security,” the report states.
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