The Israeli government fell into a trap set by Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) during his visit to the West Bank last week. Khanna wanted a controversy via which to boost his anti-Israel credentials with the Democratic Party base. He wants to boost his prospects in the 2028 Democratic presidential primary.
Unfortunately, Khanna got what he wanted.
We learned this weekend that Khanna and others in his party were illegally detained by armed Israeli settlers when they visited a Palestinian settlement last Wednesday. While Khanna was in a military zone that he did not have Israeli military approval to enter, the settlers threatened the congressman. After Khanna called the U.S. Embassy for assistance, an Israeli military patrol arrived and eventually dispersed the settlers. Khanna alleges that the Israeli military then blocked the road before reopening it. Khanna is a self-interested, attention-seeking politician. Still, these settler extremists need to face much tougher Israeli action. Failing that, the U.S. government should impose its own sanctions upon them. It’s clear that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu isn’t sufficiently concerned with this situation.
Indeed, Netanyahu sought to play down the incident in an interview with NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday. Netanyahu claimed that the settler issue is centered on “150 juvenile delinquents,” which Israel holds accountable to the rule of law.
This is inaccurate. The vast majority of Israeli settlers in the West Bank are just trying to live their lives under a constant threat of Palestinian terrorism. At the same time, however, many hundreds of settler extremists act with relative impunity in terrorizing Palestinian civilians, including children, and Israeli soldiers. Sometimes, as in the raid on the Huwara settlement in 2023, settler attacks involve firebombing and even murder. Senior Israeli commanders have warned their political leaders in unusually blunt terms about what’s happening.
In a March letter posted to the Israeli military website, the top regional commander, Maj. Gen. Avi Bluth, warned that “a violent group of lawbreakers is operating in the [West Bank] without restraint, in violation of the laws of the State, the values of the Jewish people, and the principles upon which Zionism is founded. These individuals harm a Palestinian population that is not involved in terrorism. … It is important to emphasize: beyond the fact that these actions are unlawful and immoral, they pose a genuine threat to the security stability of the region. … I call upon you — state leaders, rabbis, educators, and opinion leaders — to come to your senses. Do not remain silent. Do not stand aside. Do not allow. Do not cooperate.”
True, there is no comparison between the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas, and the extremist settlers who stopped Khanna. The former are devoted killers on an ordained mission to purify the entirety of Israel of Jews. Their mayhem is limited only by their limited capacity and Israel’s counterforce. Yet, even if their general tactic is intimidation rather than murder, Israeli settler extremists do not deserve Netanyahu’s tolerance. Sadly, to avoid aggravating extremist members of his coalition government, such as Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir, Netanyahu has restricted the Israeli military from robust law enforcement against these low-level terrorists. It is notable, for example, that the Israeli military did not detain any of the settlers responsible for Khanna’s unlawful detention.
Israeli acceptance of such injustice affects America’s standing, also. As the Washington Examiner editorialized in July 2025, “The close U.S.-Israeli alliance leads America’s regional allies and Muslims globally to perceive Israeli tolerance for settler attacks as American enabling of violence against Palestinian civilians. This is a significant source of anti-American propaganda and an enduring tool for terrorist recruitment by groups seeking to do harm to the U.S.” The same negative impact is delivered by unrestrained, rather than carefully measured, Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank.
WHY DESTROYING OR SEIZING KHARG ISLAND IS A BAD IDEA
Again, there are numerous major distinctions between Israel and the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza. But one of the most important is Israel’s rule of law. But some Israeli citizens are breaching that law in blatant ways that undermine the credibility of Israeli justice and perceptions of Israel abroad.
Netanyahu must confront this challenge with new urgency.