Northern Israeli settlement severs ties with Tel Aviv, demands army withdrawal: Report

The Cradle, May 27, 2024 — 

Under constant fire from Hezbollah, settlers in the north accuse their government of failing to protect them.

The local authority in Israel’s northern settlement of Margaliot has announced severing communication with the Israeli government and has called on the army to withdraw from the area in protest of Tel Aviv’s inability to protect settlers in the north from Hezbollah. 

“The local authority in Margaliot in the Upper Galilee announces the cessation of communication with the Israeli government. The local authority in Margaliot asks the army to withdraw its forces in protest of the government’s neglect of the residents of the north,” Al Jazeera’s correspondent reported on 27 May. 

“The Margaliot settlement has decided to sever contact with the Israeli government and withdraw all soldiers from Margaliot. A notification has been sent to the termination officer. Additionally, we are closing the settlement’s operations center and gates. No one, including the military, will be allowed to enter or leave the settlement. The emergency squad will find another place to stay,” said Eitan Davidi, Chairman of Margaliot settlement.

“Margaliot does not need protection from Hezbollah but from the Israeli government, which is crushing the settlement with its decisions. Margaliot is directly harmed by the government … decisions, causing more damage than Hezbollah’s anti-tank missiles,” he added.

The report comes as Hezbollah continues to target the settlements and military sites in Israel’s north in solidarity with the Palestinian resistance and in response to Israeli bombardment of the south of Lebanon. 

Hezbollah attacked on 27 May “a building used by enemy soldiers in the Margaliot colony” and “achieved confirmed injuries,” the resistance group said in a statement on Monday. Hezbollah also announced a guided missile and artillery shell attack on the Malikiya site in the Galilee that day. 

Fires had broken out and spread for over an hour near the Malikiya site on Sunday afternoon after an attack launched from Lebanon. 

The Lebanese resistance has stepped up its operations in recent days, as tens of thousands of Israeli settlers from the north remain dispersed across hotels and apartments across Israel. 

The heads of local councils in the northern settlements have been increasingly frustrated with the army’s inability to push Hezbollah away from the border and deter its attacks – which the group has said it will not stop until the war in Gaza is brought to an end. 

Settler communities from the north announced earlier this month a plan to secede from Israel and establish an independent State of Galilee in protest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s lack of urgency in returning them to their homes. 

The frustration has been building for several months. Businesses in the north have been shut down, and the Israeli economy has suffered significant losses.

The head of the Mateh Asher settler council in the Galilee, Moshe Davidovitz, said on Sunday after Hamas’ Qassam Brigades fired rockets towards Tel Aviv: “Ten rockets fell in the center of the country, and the media is in an uproar – the country is in turmoil. Every day, dozens of rockets are fired towards the … conflict zone settlements and the Galilee, including anti-tank missiles and suicide drones, and the country remains silent. Once again, it’s proof that the north is not being counted.”