Israel's Convenient Amnesia About Attacks on Palestinians by the 'Hilltop Youth'

Public and media attention in Israel to the “Hilltop Youth” phenomenon tends to come in cycles. Typically, a wave of condemnations follows a horrific act of terror that breaks through the wall of silence – such as the arson attack and murder of the Dawabsheh family – or when the targets are soldiers or members of the security forces.

This time, it appears that the wave of condemnations from Israel’s leadership was driven in part by heavy American pressure, prompting prime minister Netanyahu to join the chorus of critics. This was evident from the remarks of U.S. secretary of state Marco Rubio: “We are concerned that the violent incidents in the West Bank will spill over and undermine what we are doing in the Gaza Strip. We are trying to prevent that from happening. But both President Herzog and the Israeli Chief of Staff strongly condemned these attacks. The IDF also deployed forces there to deal with the situation, since their soldiers were assaulted.”

Between each wave of condemnations, Israel seems to fall into complete amnesia. For months at a time, much of the media offers almost no coverage of the violence and acts of terrorism carried out daily by Hilltop Youth activists. There is also a tendency to forget that the Hilltop Youth have been active for many years. As a result, condemnations from official figures – and from quite a few journalists – typically avoid addressing the Hilltop Youth as a long-standing phenomenon or as a litmus test for the state of Israeli society. Instead, they are framed merely as “wild weeds” that, one morning, we suddenly discovered growing in our backyard.

Records of Knesset committees’ meetings serve as a reminder that this is a long-standing phenomenon – and that previous waves of condemnation have come and gone. For example, a session of the Committee on the Rights of the Child on November 2, 2004, dealt with the problem of masked attackers who repeatedly assaulted Palestinian schoolchildren and their escorts with metal rods and chains on their way to school in the South Hebron Hills.

In a session of the Education Committee on January 5, 2016, Committee Chair MK Ya'akov Margi said that it was necessary “to change our approach and address this entire issue the way we would treat a ticking bomb… The committee regrets that the handling of the Hilltop Youth—who are, for the most part, dropouts from the education system – has failed, failed across all systems…”.

Given that this is not a new phenomenon, there have already been several generations of Hilltop Youth, and some activists have grown older and are now parents of teenagers themselves. At any given time, the group consists of only a few hundred youths and adults living in illegal outposts and farms across the West Bank, who, for ideological reasons and under the guidance of rabbis and other extremist leaders, carry out acts of terror against the Palestinian population in their vicinity.

The question naturally arises: why has the Hilltop Youth phenomenon persisted for more than twenty years? After all, the identities of all Hilltop Youth activists are known to the IDF, the police, and the Shin Bet – both because the group is small and because the Shin Bet operates informants within it. Their terrorist activities cause immense diplomatic damage to Israel, and over the past two years, the Hilltop Youth have even been added to the list of international sanctions by the European Union and other major Western countries.

It seems the answer is that Hilltop Youth activists serve as “model child-soldiers” in Israel’s ethnic-cleansing project in the West Bank. While there is no evidence that they receive direct orders from official Israeli authorities about where and when to act, it is convenient that they carry out violent actions and drive out Palestinian communities.

Except in rare cases, they are usually granted retroactive immunity – by law enforcement authorities who close complaints and refrain from filing indictments – and at the time of the incidents, soldiers and police often stand by as Hilltop Youth activists carry out pogroms and acts of terror in Palestinian villages. Clearly, if this were inconvenient for them, the authorities and security forces would have dismantled their cells.

In addition, Israeli authorities fund the presence of Hilltop Youth in outposts and farms from which the activists launch their terror attacks, cynically using tools intended for “at-risk youth.” Accordingly, in past years, Israeli governments have allocated millions of shekels for “educational” and “therapeutic” programs for the Hilltop Youth. Among other things, responses to freedom-of-information requests reveal that in 2022, the Welfare Ministry allocated ₪1,860,000 and the Education Ministry ₪10million.

In 2024, the Education Ministry allocated ₪10 million, and in 2025, ₪12 million. In July 2025, following another incident in which Hilltop Youth attacked security forces and the resulting public outcry, Defense Minister Israel Katz announced that he would move to allocate ₪50 million for educational programs for the Hilltop Youth.

There is no professional or practical logic in investing tens of millions of shekels in educational and rehabilitation programs without physically removing Hilltop Youth activists from the outposts and farms. In fact, instead of using the legal authority to address “at-risk youth” in a way that would enable them to break out of the cycle of hatred and violence and provide them with life skills and tools for emotional and social adaptation for the future, the state has become a funder of the Hilltop Youth’s presence there – and, indirectly, a funder of the terror acts they carry out.

While the Hilltop Youth phenomenon is not new, there is no doubt that the far-right government, which took office on December 29, 2022, contributed to its legitimisation.

Even before being appointed Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben-Gvir promised to represent the interests of the Hilltop Youth. For example, ahead of the April 2019 elections, the Knesset candidate Ben-Gvir reached out to Hilltop Youth and their families, asking them to vote for him and promising to ensure their criminal immunity, stating that “prosecutors who have declared war on the settlements will have to find new jobs.” In addition, he posted on Facebook that “the Hilltop Youth are the Zionists of our time.”

Since Minister Ben-Gvir quickly gained control over the police, he was in a position to fulfill his promises to the Hilltop Youth. For example, on November 23, 2023, journalist Ilana Dayan revealed a report from the head of the Shin Bet and the Central Command Chief stating that “the police are not enforcing the law against Jewish terror elements in Judea and Samaria [the West Bank, as referred to by the occupying Israeli authorities] due to directives from Minister Ben-Gvir.” In his response, Minister Ben-Gvir did not deny issuing such a directive.

The change in the status of Hilltop Youth activists can also be observed in their technological habits. Whereas in the past they relied on “dumb” phones – out of fear of surveillance and self-incrimination – today, many use smartphones and apps such as WhatsApp and Telegram.

Given this grim reality, the “Hilltop Youth amnesia” is more convenient than ever for the Israeli public and media.

Attorney Eitay Mack, together with the Tag Meir Forum, supports Palestinian victims of Hilltop Youth terror.

The Wire is now on WhatsApp. Follow our channel for sharp analysis and opinions on the latest developments.