a) not marginal. they are powerful enough to create "no-go zones" for PA and to attempt executing terror acts in Israel
b) i'll suggest you to take a look how many new settlements israel build in last 20 years or so. it may surprise you
c) Fatah didn't stop armed resistance. It military wings got wiped by Israel in second intifada. And it didn't fought off Hamas. It lost to Hamas in Gaza and survived in west bank because Israel is present there
d) west bank palestinians didn't went a more pacifist route [-1]. it's just western media doesn't cover palestinian violence in west bank. as i previously suggested, check out how many new settlements were build in last 20 years.
I'm not sure why you say that it would surprise me. How many settlements do you think is okay? And more importantly, how many projected settlements are okay, in your opinion?
No, Fatah did absolutely stop armed resistance. Getting wiped by Israel hasn't been a reason for Palestinians to stop fighting or laying down the arms before. Fatah stopped fighting, in part due to Israel's military victory, sure. But also because they chose to not further entrench themselves in insurgency. Hamas has been knocked out almost into oblivion, and still manages to fight, and according to what you said, they are even gaining ground in the West Bank.
And yeah, no go zones means that the PA doesn't go there because they are against Hamas, and afaik they don't fight Israel either. Sounds like they did chose the pacific route w.r.t Israel ?
Also, any terror attacks in the West Bank itself against Israelis is by definition an attack against settlers. Rockets aren't getting thrown from there, incursions into Israel are very rare, etc. And even those aren't done by organized groups (like the Fatah used to be), except for Hamas, and again Hamas is seen as an enemy by the Palestinian authorities there. The Fatah did win in the West Bank 20 years ago, against Hamas.
I'm not sure how you are arguing against my original point though. The West Bank authorities and the majority of the people living there aren't engaging in armed resistance against Israel. Groups who do are being treated as criminals and they work with Israel to fight them off. Israel in return keeps expanding their settlements (the scale doesn't matter, that's exactly what they have been doing, and Israel had been vocally pushing for the largest expansion in settlements ever, months before October 2023).
- learning basic facts facilitates fact based discussions. you avoid going and learning facts that may not correspond to your worldview
- fatah was beaten down. it doesn't say "stopped". it says "lost". hamas wasn't knocked down into oblivion and they were always more popular than fatah
- no go zones means that PA doesn't go there because Hamas/PIJ will kill them there.
- rockets not thrown from there not because due to generosity of local population but because of work of shin bit. in fact since oct 7th there been significant increase in arms smuggling from jordan to west bank to a point that IDF is unable to prevent or monitor it. including heavier weapons. this is probably for cultivation of famously fertile west bank soil, according to you ?
- recent polling on elections: But if new legislative elections were held today with the participation of all political forces that participated in the 2006 elections, 62% say they will participate in them, and among the participants in the elections 43% say they will vote for Hamas, 28% for Fatah, 8% for third parties, and 19% have not yet decided. In the Gaza Strip, vote for Hamas among voters participating in the elections stands at 49% , and vote for Fatah among voters participating in the elections stands at 30% . In the West Bank, vote for Hamas stands at 38% and Fatah among voters participating in elections stands at 27%
- link that i posted above more certainly show that population engages in armed and not armed but violent resistance and attacks israeli population and constantly attempts to perform terror acts in Israel. and you still didn't tell me how much exactly israel expanded it settlements. you just claim that it did without any factual backing.
There shouldn't be any "israeli population" in the West Bank. To a large extent it is armed and commonly also in uniform, without being in IDF service.
From 1999 to 2018 colonial population in the West Bank grew from ~177000 to ~430000 or so. Since the current israeli government took power they've massively accelerated colonial efforts in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and also moved away from military administration in a blatant rejection of international law. I.e. before the response from Hamas in October 2023.
Hamas are popular because they've achieved results, and are perceived as relatively moderate and flexible in politics. Their main competitor, PIJ, disavows parliamentary politics entirely as long as the occupation is in place, considering it a waste of resources and naive pandering to foreign governments that they have no faith in.
This excludes a few hundreds of thousands in East Jerusalem.
According to international law all of these people must be relocated to israeli territory. If I have understood it correctly the UN GA has given Israel a deadline for this in September.
But those aren't people in Israel. They are settlers in land that they are illegally settling, outside of Israel. And you can also read the other comment, you can see that even the area has increased. Is your argument really that the Likud, the extremely pro settler party... Didn't expand settlements? You should go tell that to Netanyahu, that would be insulting to him.
And I guess this doesn't matter either, it's just the parliament of Israel showing how it treats Palestinians that stop fighting:
b) i'll suggest you to take a look how many new settlements israel build in last 20 years or so. it may surprise you
c) Fatah didn't stop armed resistance. It military wings got wiped by Israel in second intifada. And it didn't fought off Hamas. It lost to Hamas in Gaza and survived in west bank because Israel is present there
d) west bank palestinians didn't went a more pacifist route [-1]. it's just western media doesn't cover palestinian violence in west bank. as i previously suggested, check out how many new settlements were build in last 20 years.
[-1] https://www.jns.org/over-6300-terror-attacks-against-jews-in...