The Middle East has been engulfed in war over the last two years. The spark that lit the fire was cast with the Hamas massacre of Israelis on October 7, 2023. The war rapidly metastasized: to Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Iran.
Yet, for all this, notably absent from the list of fronts were the two possible arenas most geographically and politically linked to Gaza – namely the West Bank, and the Arab Israeli population. What explains this curious and notable absence? And where may things be headed in this regard?
First of all, its important to note that it was not inevitable, nor was it predictable that it would be so. In the now largely forgotten previous round of fighting between Israel and Hamas-controlled Gaza, in May 2021 there were ominous signs that the exchanges of fire between Hamas and the IDF might spark a more general uprising and insurgency, taking in both the West Bank and involving even some Arab-populated parts of Israel.
The unifying issue of al-Aqsa mosque and supposed Israeli threats to it stood at the centre of those events. Hamas launched missiles at Israel supposedly in al-Aqsa’s defence. Protests took place at over 200 sites across the West Bank and in parts of Israel. 11 days of unrest followed.
It all seems rather distant now, and on an impossibly small scale, compared to what followed. But 2021 seemed to herald a possible nightmare scenario for Israel, in which a united insurgency fueled by Islamic sentiment might become a possibility across the entire area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean.
2021 seemed to herald a possible nightmare scenario for Israel, in which a united insurgency fueled by Islamic sentiment might become a possibility across the entire area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean.
Documents found in Gaza by the Israel Defense Forces in the handwriting of the late Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar indicate that he believed a similar scenario, on a far larger scale than that witnessed in 2021, would be ignited by the October 7 attacks. This didn’t happen.
Regarding the Arab citizens of Israel, the explanation seems fairly straightforward. The Hamas gunmen on October 7 did not differentiate between Jewish and Arab Israelis. A number of Arab Israelis were murdered on that day, some in particularly cruel ways. Some others were taken hostage. Arab Israelis seem to have noted the brutality of Hamas’s treatment of their fellow citizens, and of its own rule over the people of Gaza, and to have quietly concluded that staying with Israel was the better, if imperfect, option.
Regarding the West Bank, the situation is less straightforward. Firstly, the area has not been entirely quiet throughout the last two years. In the period prior to October 7, the West Bank was the site of determined efforts by Iran and its allies to foment new armed activity. Smuggling from Syria via Jordan filled the area with illegally held weaponry. In the towns of Tulkarem and Jenin, and the Nur al Shams refugee camp, new, ad hoc militia formations emerged and began to seek to engage Israeli forces.
Israel has used the opportunity afforded by the war in Gaza to crush the incipient militias of the northern West Bank. It has done so with the tacit cooperation of the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority. The main components of the relative quiet in the West Bank over the last two years are: freedom of Israeli security action across the area in question, and the clear desire of the Ramallah Palestinian Authority not to join in its rival Hamas’s destructive war with Israel.
There are dysfunctional elements to Israel’s tacit cooperation with the PA. The latter remains the political enemy of Israel, and seeks to incite against it in international bodies. The current Israeli government, meanwhile, contains extremist and irresponsible elements and there is reason to believe that insufficient efforts are being made to curb the actions of extremist Israelis in these areas. For all this, a joint interest in keeping the lid on the West Bank has until now proved durable and is the main cause for the quiet in the area.
Israel has used the opportunity afforded by the war in Gaza to crush the incipient militias of the northern West Bank.
The PA is according to all polls not popular in the area. Palestinians, raised on a political culture that glorifies violent ‘resistance’ to Israel, are uninspired by its sluggish, corrupt and as they see it collaborationist rule. A recent poll suggested that Hamas enjoys 41% support in Gaza and 32% in the West Bank, compared with 29% and 20% for PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah movement, respectively.
This continued support for Hamas, however, does not appear to translate into an active effort to overthrow the PA, or to challenge Israel. Instead, in the West Bank there has emerged a kind of tacit version of the social contract that exists across most of the Arab world, in which the populace may dislike the governing authorities but grudgingly accepts them. The authorities, meanwhile, seek to guarantee the security of the population, while excluding them from the political and security spheres.
What might dislodge this situation? At present, imprisoned Fatah leader and convicted terrorist Marwan Barghouti according to all polls would win Palestinian presidential elections in both the West Bank and Gaza, were he to be freed and were such elections to take place.
There is no reason to suppose that Barghouti would if elected be able to exercise authority over Hamas and other Islamist factions. It is likely, however, that he would end the tacit cooperation with Israel that currently takes place on the West Bank. This in turn would open the door for a return to the situation that pertained at the commencement of the Second Intifada in 2000. For this reason, he is unlikely to be freed any time soon (Hamas, which could have included Barghouti on the list of terrorists to be released in exchange for Israeli hostages, don’t want him freed either, because he would constitute a threat to their current unrivalled popularity on the Palestinian ‘street.’)
So as of now, because of the tentative confluence of interests between Jerusalem and Ramallah, determined but focused Israeli security strategy and the tacit consent of the population, the relative and fragile quiet in the West Bank looks set to remain. Unless renewed strife is the desired objective, it would be foolish to tamper with the current arrangement.
Published originally on December 27, 2025.
