When night descends on the West Bank town of Sinjil, Palestinian residents don’t stay indoors. Instead, they gather along a roadside overlooking a nearby valley, flashlights in hand, scanning the terrain for any sign of approaching Israeli settlers.
This has become the new normal in Sinjil, located roughly 15 kilometers — about 10 miles — northeast of Ramallah. Residents say they face settler attacks on a regular basis, and have formed a volunteer night watch to respond. When a settler group is spotted, members alert each other by phone, drawing more residents to the area to confront and drive the settlers back.
On one recent night, the volunteer watchmen spotted a group of masked settlers moving down a hillside toward the town. As more Sinjil residents arrived to defend the area, some set roadside brush on fire in an attempt to stop the settlers’ advance. The settlers responded by hurling stones and launching objects with slingshots, and Palestinian residents responded in kind. The confrontation later escalated when the sound of gunfire sent people running for cover.
Mayor Moataz Tawafsha described the situation plainly: “This is another episode in the series of settlers’ attacks against Sinjil.”
The broader context is one of rising violence across the West Bank since the Israel-Hamas war began on October 7, 2023. That conflict has brought with it a sharp increase in settler attacks on Palestinians, as well as repeated raids by the Israeli military.
For the people of Sinjil, these nightly patrols are no longer extraordinary — they have become a routine part of daily life, carried out in the absence of any government or security force willing to offer protection.
This report is based on a photo gallery curated by AP photo editors.
