Nachala (organisation)

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Nachala (Hebrew: עזה) is a radical Israeli settler organization^[1] that aids younger settlers and builds new Israeli outposts in the West Bank.^[2] Their ambition is for Israel to annex both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.^[3]

Funding

In September 2015 the organization created the "National Fund for the Building of Eretz Israel", with the launch event attended by many ministers, members of the Knesset, and other right-wing public figures including Israel Katz, Miki Zohar, Uri Ariel, Rabbi Eli Ben Dahan and Daniella Weiss. The fund was reportedly to collect and then disburse funds to Jewish settlers in order to purchase Palestinian land in the West Bank and Jordan Valley.^[4]

A member of Nachala reported that they have sent representatives to Florida to help raise money for the organization, and receive funding from several groups in the United States including Americans for a Safe Israel.^[5] They have raised funds for settlements using the Chabad crowdfunding platform, with a reported 5 million shekels ($1.4 million USD) raised in three days for unauthorized outposts in the West Bank in 2022.^[6]

Background

During the Trump administrations discussions of a peace plan between Israel and the Palestine Authority in 2019, the organization set up a protest camp in front of the Prime Ministers home in Jerusalem. The protest called to repel any plan the included the withdrawal and instead highlighted the former Likud Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir's plan to establish new settlements in the West Bank and settle some 2 million Jews there.^[7] Shortly after they published a document signed by dozens of right-wing ministers and members of the Knesset, where they pledged to work towards the realization of the Shamir plan and the cancelation of the two state plan.^[8]

In July 2022, the group announced that they would be creating three illegal outposts in the West Bank via a video post by then director Tzvi Elimelech Sharbaf. He stated: "We are making a clear demand. Say ‘no’ to Arabs taking control of open spaces [in Area C of the West Bank], and say ‘yes’ to Jews taking control of all these open spaces."^[9] Members of the group were evacuated from areas in the West Bank after they had been declared as illegal, after hundreds of settlers including families with small children set up tents in numerous areas around the West Bank. While a settler leader indicated that the plan was to continue moving sites, they had been warned by Public Security Minister Omer Barlev, the police and IDF that their actions were illegal and would lead to arrest.^[10]

Shortly after the 7 October attacks, the organization tweeted on X (formerly known as Twitter) placing the blame of the attacks and violence on the lack of settlement in Gaza, with an invite to the proposed January 2024 conference.^[11] In January 2024, the organization hosted a conference where they petitioned for the creation of Israeli settlements in Gaza after the Israel-Hamas war ends. Daniella Weiss, the director of the organization, told reporters that the 7 October attacks had changed history and that "It's the end of the presence of Arabs in Gaza. It's the end....Instead of them, there will be many, many Jews that will return to the settlements, that will build new settlements."^[12]

In late February 2024, the organization promoted illegal settlers who had attempted to settle in northern Gaza after breaking through the Erez boarder crossing between northern Gaza and Israel. The organization called the attempted erection of buildings the New Nisanit settlement, and posted multiple pictures of the building and activists.^[13]

Reception

The initiative has drawn controversy among the settler community.^[2] The organization has received significant backing from many right-wing and religious public figures, including former ministers, rabbis, settlement mayors and Military Police Corps.^[9] Israeli interior minister Ayelet Shaked called them "wonderful youth" and "a real inspiration".^[1]

The group has been involved in at least one killing.^[14]

See also

• Proposed Israeli annexation of the West Bank
• Gush Emunim - prior Israeli ultranationalist settlement movement

References

External links

• Official website