Palestine - AL-MONITOR: The Middle Eastʼs leading independent news source since 2012

Palestine cover image

Palestine

September 20, 2026

Ramallah 7:46 am

18°C

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and French President Emmanuel Macron arrive to hold a joint press conference in Jerusalem, Oct. 24, 2023.

Analysis

After France's settlement ban, Israel sees no warming of ties with Macron government

Israeli diplomats say France’s decision to ban imports from West Bank settlements has brought bilateral relations to an unprecedented low point.

Rina Bassist

By Rina Bassist

In Paris, reporting on Israeli politics and European affairs

Jewish settlement of Kedumim, in the West Bank

Analysis

Europe’s West Bank trade ban fires warning shot at Israel’s economy

Weeks before key Israeli elections, a dozen nations announced new trade restrictions targeting settlements in the West Bank, delivering a sharp rebuke to Israel's government that could presage additional international pressure.

Samuel Wendel

By Samuel Wendel

In Washington, DC, reporting on regional business and tech

Chaim Goldberg / AFP via Getty Images

Netanyahu threatens to sue Haaretz for reporting UAE warned Israel of Oct. 7 attack

The Emirati president reportedly warned that a planned attack could cause bloodshed, destabilize the region and threaten the Abraham Accords.

Palestinians hold up the green Hamas flag during a protest by supporters of both the Fatah and Hamas movements, as they rally in support of the Palestinian people following Friday noon prayers in Hebron, occupied West Bank, Nov. 3, 2023.

Majority of Palestinians lose trust in Hamas and Fatah, new poll finds

A recent poll by a Palestinian survey center found that trust in Palestinian factions has declined, amid stalled efforts to implement the Gaza peace plan and escalating settler violence in the West Bank.

Latest News

12 countries including France, UK, Canada end trade with West Bank settlements

West Bank settlements

Katz warns PA against 'Oct. 7-style' attack as West Bank violence rises

Israeli soldiers take positions during a military operation in the town of Qalqiya, in the occupied West Bank, Dec. 4, 2025.

Analysis

LORA missile test reveals limits of Germany’s Gaza criticism of Israel

A woman walks past a model of a Lora missile, Israel's long range artillery missile at the Israel defence stall at the international DefExpo 2008 defence fair, in New Delhi on February 16, 2008. India kicked off South Asia's largest defence fair, with hundreds of global weapons firms offering their latest hardware to the country's technology-hungry military. About 450 weapons companies from 30 countries are present at the four-day "DefExpo" in New Delhi, with several big-ticket announcements expected. AFP P

Rina Bassist

By Rina Bassist

In Paris, reporting on Israeli politics and European affairs

Analysis

As Israeli settler attacks mount, Trump avoids public pressure on Netanyahu

Israeli soldiers arrive in the village of Qusra, south of Nablus in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, which has faced escalating Israeli settler violence over the past month, on Aug. 29, 2026.

Elizabeth Hagedorn

By Elizabeth Hagedorn

In Washington, DC, reporting on diplomacy, regional politics, human rights

Beatrice Farhat

Associate Editor (Lebanon)

In Beirut, reporting on regional news, culture, conflict

Daoud Kuttab

Palestine Columnist

In Amman, reporting on Palestinian politics

Rasha Abou Jalal

In Gaza City, reporting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

Abeer Ayyoub

In Istanbul, reporting on Palestine

Naima Morelli

In Rome, reporting on Middle East culture

Fatima AbdulKarim

In Ramallah, reporting on the West Bank

A Palestinian woman waits to receive food supplies at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) headquarters in Gaza January 7, 2009. Israel and Hamas said they were temporarily holding their fire in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday to ease the flow of humanitarian aid and both sides said they were studying an Egyptian proposal for a ceasefire. REUTERS/Mohammed Salem (GAZA) - RTR234UE

UNRWA struggles to deliver as poverty rises in Gaza

UNRWA has again cut or halted food aid to thousands of Palestinians as it struggles to keep up with rising poverty rates due to the Israeli-Egyptian siege on Gaza and crisis situations elsewhere.

EDITORS' NOTE: Reuters and other foreign media are subject to Iranian restrictions on leaving the office to report, film or take pictures in Tehran.

Hamas Leader Ismail Haniyeh speaks during a ceremony to mark the 33rd anniversary of the Islamic Revolution, in Tehran's Azadi square February 11, 2012. REUTERS/Raheb Homavandi (IRAN - Tags: ANNIVERSARY POLITICS RELIGION) - RTR2XN6M

Hamas unfazed by Fatah outreach to Iran

Syria is still a sticky issue between Hamas and both Fatah and Iran.

A page from the Facebook website is seen in Singapore May 11, 2011. Facebook users' personal information could have been accidentally leaked to third parties, in particular advertisers, over the past few years, according to Symantec Corp's official web blog. Third-parties would have had access to personal information such as profiles, photographs and chat, and could have had the ability to post messages, the web blog said. REUTERS/Tan Shung Sin (SINGAPORE - Tags: BUSINESS SOCIETY SCI TECH) - RTR2M8NN

Facebook chats cause divorce in Gaza

Facebook has enabled a new openness in Palestinian society, but also offers temptations of infidelity.

Tourists walk near evaporation basins in the southern Dead Sea December 16, 2008. Warnings continue that the Dead Sea is slowly but surely drying up, and could be gone completely in 50 years if no action is taken.The water level is dropping at close to one metre (three feet) per year due to a sharp decrease in inflow from the Jordan and other rivers whose waters now irrigate fields. Picture taken December 16, 2008. REUTERS/Baz Ratner (ISRAEL ENVIRONMENT TRAVEL) - RTXCYP2

Israel-Palestinian peace requires realism on Jordan Valley

Trilateral cooperation projects to save the Dead Sea and the Jordan River must be accompanied by transferring parts of the Jordan Valley to Palestinian sovereignty.

SodaStream is wrong target for Oxfam’s Israel boycott

Boycott threats against Israel's SodaSteam company will achieve the opposite of advancing peace, by destroying an example of Israeli-Palestinian commercial cooperation and depriving hundreds of Palestinian families of their livelihoods.

A member of the security forces stands guard near a national flag outside a police academy, where the trial of ousted Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi and members of the Muslim Brotherhood is due to take place, on the outskirts of Cairo, January 28, 2014. Mursi went on trial at a Cairo police academy on Tuesday on charges in connection with a mass jail break during the 2011 uprising, state television reported. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh (EGYPT - Tags: POLITICS CRIME LAW CIVIL UNREST) - RTX17Y5A

US Working Group gives wrong advice on Egypt

A distinguished group of US experts on Egypt offers the wrong advice on Egypt.

A Palestinian tunnel worker uses his mobile as he rests inside a smuggling tunnel beneath the Gaza-Egypt border in the southern Gaza Strip July 19, 2013. The Islamist group Hamas appealed to Egypt's new rulers on Thursday not to pursue its destruction of smuggling tunnels into the Gaza Strip, warning they risked throttling the small Palestinian territory. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa (GAZA - Tags: POLITICS TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY) - RTX11ROK

Gaza factions limit cellphone use to avoid Israeli assassinations

Hamas and Islamic Jihad have instructed their members to minimize their use of cellphones, as they are monitored by Israel to pinpoint assassination targets.

Israeli police scuffle with a Jewish settler as they remove him from a roof on which he barricaded himself in the illegal outpost of Migron, near the West Bank city of Ramallah, after eviction orders were handed to the residents September 2, 2012. Jewish settler families were removed from the unauthorised outpost in the occupied West Bank on Sunday, police said, after they fulfilled an Israeli supreme court order to vacate their homes. REUTERS/Nir Elias (WEST BANK - Tags: POLITICS CIVIL UNREST) - RTR37ECE

Does Netanyahu have plan for settler withdrawal?

The settler movement is anxious about the possibility of the Israeli government making a deal that would force them to leave.

Isaac Herzog (R), the newly elected head of Israel's left-of-centre Labour Party, speaks during a news conference after his meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank city of Ramallah December 1, 2013. REUTERS/Mohamad Torokman (WEST BANK - Tags: POLITICS) - RTX15ZO7

Herzog: opposition not yet seeking alternative government

Opposition leader Isaac Herzog has no intention of joining the coalition or forming an alternative government, reminding Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that peace supporters “have a majority in this Knesset for an agreement with the Palestinians.”

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (C) gives the letter of appointment to Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh (L) as senior Fatah leader Mohammed Dahlan watches in Gaza February 15, 2007. Abbas formally asked Haniyeh of Hamas on Thursday to form a new unity government and urged him to abide by peace accords signed with Israel. REUTERS/Suhaib Salem (GAZA) - RTR1MG8X

Hamas sees Dahlan as bridge to Egypt

Former arch rivals Hamas and Mohammed Dahlan have found common ground in that they both oppose President Mahmoud Abbas.

HEBRON, WEST BANK, PALESTINIAN TERRITORY, SEPTEMBER 23: Israeli soldiers on patrol on September 23, 2013 in the West Bank city of Hebron. Unknown gunmen shot and killed an Israeli soldier in the city of Al-Khalil (Hebron) in the occupied West Bank on Sunday and troops are searching for the shooter, the military said. (Photo by Mamoun Wazwaz/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)

Shin Bet report: terror increase originating from West Bank

The 2013 Shin Bet report indicates a rise in terror activities originating in the West Bank, attributed partly to the resignation of Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and the weakening of Fatah security mechanisms.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (R) shakes hands with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin after delivering joint statements in the West Bank town of Bethlehem June 26, 2012. REUTERS/Darren Whiteside (WEST BANK - Tags: POLITICS) - RTR3461J

Russia considers role in peace talks, Gaza energy

The Kremlin prefers a multilateral, not bilateral, approach to the peace process, while Gazprom considers opportunities in the Gaza Strip.