Opinion
Vigilante violence in Judea and Samaria desecrate our holy history
Violence by even a few Jews must be stopped and punished. It is not Zionism. It is not Judaism. It is a desecration of God’s name.
I have always supported, visited, protected and promoted the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria. These are not “outposts” or “settlements,” as the world cynically calls them. They are the living continuation of the Jewish story; the heartland of our people, the very ground where our forefathers walked and where the covenant between God and Israel was first lived.
From Hebron (Israel’s first capital) to Beit El, from Shiloh (where the Tabernacle stood for 369 years) to Ofra, and from the valleys of Judea to the ridges of Samaria, this is not foreign soil; it is the cradle of Jewish life, matched only by Jerusalem itself. To claim Jews cannot live here is racist, antisemitic and a denial of 3,000 years of Jewish history.
But because these lands are sacred, I must speak out against the small group of radical Jews desecrating all that is holy by attacking innocent Palestinians.
The residents of Judea and Samaria have endured a century of massacres and terror. They have been slandered as land thieves when, in truth, every community was built on barren terrain or land purchased openly and legally. Every visit I make there, I meet families who have buried sons and daughters murdered by terrorists. Their suffering is beyond words.
Yet, none of that excuses violence against innocents. Any Jew who harms an innocent Palestinian betrays Judaism and Israel alike. The Torah, Jewish values and Jewish history utterly forbid such acts. Ours is the only nation in history never to launch an unprovoked war.
It is the job of the Israel Defense Forces and the police to protect these communities, assisted by their own trained internal security, as many learned after the failures of Oct. 7. But hooliganism and vigilante justice defile Israel’s moral core. Too many leaders stay silent.
Israel’s quarrel is not with Arabs or Palestinians as a people. Nearly two million Muslim citizens live peacefully within Israel’s 10 million population. That alone refutes the vile libel that Israel is an apartheid state.
Our struggle is with the malevolent regimes and terror movement—Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad—not with ordinary Palestinians who want peace and dignity. Violence by even a few Jews must be stopped and punished. It is not Zionism. It is not Judaism. It is a desecration of God’s name.
The moral foundation of Jewish life is justice: Tzedek, tzedek tirdof, “Justice, justice shall you pursue.” Not vengeance. Justice.
I will defend with every breath Israel’s right to protect its citizens and to prosper in Judea and Samaria. A Palestinian state there would endanger Israel’s very existence. But even that existential threat does not permit taking the law into one’s own hands.
When a Jew burns a field, torches a home or vandalizes a mosque, he is not defending Israel; he is desecrating it. He mocks our faith and defiles the memory of the prophets whose bones lie in those hills.
The Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria are brave, idealistic people who have built communities of beauty and hope, creating thousands of well-paying jobs for Palestinian neighbors. I have prayed in their homes and admired their courage. But courage cannot excuse cruelty. The Land of Israel sanctifies only those who act righteously upon it.
The IDF and the U.S. military are the most moral armies on earth. Leave Israel’s brave soldiers to do their job. Anyone with tzitzit who torches a Palestinian field out of vengeance defiles the Ten Commandments. Hunt and destroy terrorists, yes. Institute the death penalty for murderers, yes. But never harm innocents.
Those lacking military authority must defer to Israel’s police and army. To commit vigilante violence in the name of the God of Abraham, a God of compassion and restraint, is not Judaism but paganism. Men parading as religious Jews while acting as vandals turn Torah into idolatry.
And rabbis or leaders who remain silent share in the guilt. If our pulpits cannot thunder that such acts are assur, absolutely forbidden, then religion becomes a costume rather than a calling.
We are better than Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood. Through moral conviction, not cruelty, we will defeat them.
Every Jewish attack on an Arab bleeds Israel’s reputation. Each video of a burning field circulates as “proof” that Jews are the new aggressors—and Hamas, Iran and the BDS movement feast on it.
The Torah commands love for the stranger more than any other law. “You shall not oppress a stranger, for you were strangers in Egypt.” Our suffering was meant to refine us, not harden us.
Yes, most settlers are peaceful and upright, demonized unfairly by the world’s double standards. But even one Jew’s attack on an innocent Arab undermines our moral standing. A chilul Hashem, “the desecration of God’s name,” is the gravest sin. Violence by religious Jews is its purest form. It turns faith into tribalism.
Judaism is not a faith of conquest but of conscience. We taught the world that all humans are created in God’s image. We raise arms only in defense, never in hate. Moral people admire Israel for this righteousness; only haters, like Iran’s tyrants who torture women, despise it.
Zionism was never about domination but moral renewal, the right of the Jewish people to self-determination and the duty to embody their ethical heritage. Theodor Herzl and David Ben-Gurion envisioned Israel not as a garrison state but as a moral beacon.
The residents of Judea and Samaria embody that dream; they are people of sacrifice, faith and perseverance. Their legitimacy, however, depends on moral behavior. Expel from your midst those who violate it. The right to live anywhere in our ancestral land is sacred; don’t allow extremists to profane it.
The problem is not the Jewish presence but a tiny few blinded by rage who turn strength into savagery. They are not defending the covenant; they are desecrating it.
Yes, Israel’s enemies, Iran, the Muslim Brotherhood, the United Nations and The Hague, loathe us irrationally. But this is not about them. It’s about what God thinks. He entrusted this land to us to be a light unto the nations, to model justice, not mimic cruelty.
The IDF can defend Israel’s borders; only its citizens can defend its soul.
Take a lesson from history. The Second Temple was destroyed not by Rome alone but by sinat chinam, “baseless hatred.” Jews fought Jews while the enemy waited.
A tiny group of violent extremists in Judea and Samaria has committed the same sin. They preach holiness but sow hatred. They claim to defend the nation but corrode it from within. We are reliving, in miniature, the ancient curse of internal hatred masquerading as piety.
Israel’s survival has never rested solely on arms. The Jewish people endure because of moral might, because even enemies cannot deny our light. The moment we dim that light, we become ordinary.
The prophets did not warn of foreign armies but of moral decay. “Your hands are full of blood,” cried the prophet Isaiah. “Learn to do good; seek justice.” That prophetic call still echoes in the righteous majority of Judea and Samaria. Do not let a few rotten apples taint them.
The Jewish state was built after Auschwitz to prove that light can rise from darkness. Any act of cruelty by a Jew against an Arab mocks the memory of the Six Million martyrs.
Some will accuse me of feeding Israel’s critics by condemning Jewish violence. They are wrong. Silence is betrayal. Condemnation is loyalty—to Judaism, to the IDF, to Torah and to the true Zionism that built this nation.
The world must see that our faith polices itself, that we do not excuse evil because it wears a kipah or speaks Hebrew. We are Jews; we answer to Heaven.
When Abraham pleaded for Sodom, he did not claim its innocence but demanded justice: “Shall the Judge of all the earth not do justice?” The first Jew’s first act was a moral protest. That is our inheritance.
The hills of Judea and Samaria are holy not for their stones but for the covenant commanding us to sanctify life. The true Jew there is one who builds, prays and treats all humans as Divine creations. I have met hundreds of thousands who live this way.
That is the Judaism I know. That is the Zionism I love. And that is the Israel I will defend: An Israel that wields the sword only to protect the innocent and raises the Torah to guide its conscience.
If we forget that, we will lose not the world’s respect but God’s favor.
Judea and Samaria, with their righteous Jewish residents, must live up to the sanctity of the land where justice flows like water and righteousness like a mighty stream. The children of Isaac and Ishmael can yet learn to see each other as fellow creations of the One true God.
Let us never allow even one vigilante to undermine that holiness.
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