Settler attacks threaten the West Bank’s final Christian village

(RNS) — In early August, Joseph Hazboun visited a newly built home among the fields near Taybeh, considered the last Christian village in the West Bank. Its owner, a local Palestinian Christian, claimed he could not access his property safely because of intimidation by Israeli settlers.

As Hazboun inspected fencing that was reportedly cut to allow settlers’ sheep onto the land, a settler approached him driving a tractor at full speed, he said, an attempt to intimidate and chase him and his group away.

“I witnessed firsthand how this settler terrorizes the local community,” Hazboun said, adding that the man carried a gun concealed beneath his shirt. The intervention of two Israeli peace activists prevented the confrontation from escalating.

Hazboun is the regional director for Palestine and Israel for the Catholic Near East Welfare Association, a papal agency that supports Eastern churches and vulnerable communities and reports to the Vatican. A CNEWA delegation visited Taybeh and nearby properties on Aug. 5, investigating what the organization described as the “systematic intimidation” of Palestinian families by Israeli settlers.

CNEWA documented portions of Hazboun’s…