[News] Sheep, Drones and Guns: Israel’s New Model for Stealing Palestinian Land

[Anti-Imperialist News]

palestinechronicle.com
<https://www.palestinechronicle.com/sheep-drones-and-guns-israels-new-model-for-stealing-palestinian-land/>
Sheep, Drones and Guns: Israel’s New Model for Stealing Palestinian Land
August 8, 2026
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Israeli settlers are using pastoral outposts to seize vast stretches of
Palestinian land, displace communities and redraw the occupied West Bank.
(Design: PC)

*By Palestine Chronicle Staff
<https://www.palestinechronicle.com/writers/palestine-chronicle-staff>*

Armed settlers are using livestock, isolated outposts and state support to
seize Palestinian land and fundamentally redraw the occupied West Bank.

Israel’s takeover of the occupied West Bank is increasingly being carried
out not only through military orders, settlement blocs and concrete
construction, but through something considerably simpler: a tent, a herd of
livestock, a four-wheel-drive vehicle and, increasingly, a surveillance
drone.

An investigation published by Quds News Network on Saturday examines the
rapid growth of so-called “pastoral farms,” describing them as part of an
organized settlement system capable of extending Israeli control over vast
areas of Palestinian land while requiring comparatively little physical
infrastructure.

At the center of this expansion are groups associated with the so-called
Hilltop Youth, young Israeli settlers whose presence on isolated hills has
historically been portrayed as a fringe phenomenon operating outside formal
Israeli institutions.

The investigation, however, argues that the reality on the ground has
evolved far beyond spontaneous actions by rebellious settlers.

Through pastoral outposts, settlers can establish a small physical foothold
and then progressively prevent Palestinian farmers and shepherds from
reaching the surrounding land. The result is effective territorial control
without the need for an official confiscation order.

Israeli affairs researcher Dr. Adnan Naim described the mechanism as
fundamentally different from conventional settlement expansion.

“Pastoral settlement is a model that goes beyond traditional expansion. It
does not require massive investments, but begins with a tent, a caravan and
a flock of sheep, while the surrounding area gradually becomes a zone of
effective control.”

The livestock itself, he explained, is not the objective.

“The idea is not raising livestock in itself, but using grazing to impose a
fait accompli.”

Once Palestinian farmers are intimidated or prevented from reaching their
property, Naim said, the land effectively falls under settler control
“without the need for an official confiscation decision.”

The strategy, he argued, allows Israel to expand territorial control at
minimal cost while depopulating Palestinian rural areas and creating
realities increasingly difficult to reverse.

Ultimately, he said, it works toward “making Palestinian life impossible on
their land in preparation for complete expulsion.”
>From the Hilltop Youth to Government Policy

The investigation traces the ideological foundations of the Hilltop Youth
to radical currents within religious Zionism and Kahanism.

Many are young settlers, generally between 14 and 25 years old, some of
whom have dropped out of religious educational institutions before
gravitating toward isolated settlement outposts.

They are reportedly trained not only in agriculture and construction, but
in physical combat, firearms, off-road driving, livestock management and
modern surveillance technology, including drones.

But their operations, according to the investigation, exist within a much
broader political and institutional environment.

Three members of the Israeli government are identified as particularly
significant: National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, Finance Minister
Bezalel Smotrich and Settlement and National Missions Minister Orit Strock.

Smotrich oversees financial allocations, land policy and administrative
mechanisms connected to settlement expansion, while Strock’s ministry
provides government direction and financing to the pastoral-farm network,
including infrastructure, equipment and services, according to the
investigation.

The relationship between pastoral settlement and Smotrich’s wider political
project is particularly significant.

Naim linked the expansion directly to the “Decisive Plan” advanced by
Smotrich in 2017, which envisioned resolving the future of the occupied
territory by eliminating the possibility of meaningful Palestinian
sovereignty.

Rather than requiring an immediate formal declaration of annexation,
pastoral settlements can change the territorial reality first.
The Network Behind the Outposts

The system extends beyond Israeli government ministries. The investigation
identifies a network of settlement organizations involved in establishing
outposts, recruiting volunteers, providing legal assistance, monitoring
Palestinian construction and raising money.

Among them are Nahala, associated with veteran settler leader Daniella
Weiss; Hashomer Yosh, which recruits and organizes personnel to support
settlement farms; Regavim, co-founded by Smotrich and Yehuda Eliyahu;
Honenu, which provides legal assistance to Israeli settlers and soldiers;
and Amana, a major organization involved in settlement and outpost
development.

Several individual activists provide another link between political
institutions and operations on the ground.

Elisha Yered, for example, previously worked as a spokesman for Israeli
lawmaker Limor Son Har-Melech and has become a prominent media figure
associated with the Hilltop Youth.

The report says he uses digital platforms to depict Palestinian shepherds
as aggressors while recruiting young Israelis and raising funds for
settlement activities.

Other figures include Gabriel Kalish, Zohar Sabah, Yinon Levi and Eliav
Liebman, who have been involved in establishing or administering pastoral
outposts.

One description contained in the investigation perhaps captures the
strategy more succinctly than any government policy paper.

Explaining how an informal path can eventually become permanent
infrastructure, Liebman said:

“After the donkey comes the bulldozer.”

“The place where the footpath passes,” he continued, “is the same place
where the paved road will later pass.”

“This is how Zionism works, and we work hand in hand with the State of
Israel.”

How the Expansion Is Financed

Pastoral settlement also depends upon a financing system extending beyond
the occupied West Bank.

According to the investigation, digital crowdfunding platforms and
tax-exempt organizations in the United States and other Western countries
are used to finance infrastructure and equipment.

The purchases range from bulldozers and other heavy machinery to livestock,
four-wheel-drive vehicles, surveillance drones, night-vision equipment,
communications devices, caravans, solar panels and water tanks.

Livestock has particular territorial importance.

Rather than occupying only the small area on which an outpost physically
stands, grazing allows settlers to move across substantially larger areas,
progressively restricting Palestinian access.

The report consequently describes livestock as a form of “soft army”
through which the geographical footprint of an outpost can expand far
beyond its handful of structures.

International sanctions imposed on violent settlers and settlement
organizations have not necessarily dismantled these networks.

Instead, according to the investigation, some sanctioned activists and
organizations have portrayed international measures as a badge of honor and
used them to mobilize additional financial support from far-right
constituencies in Israel and abroad.
82 Communities Displaced

The territorial consequences are already substantial. Figures cited by the
investigation indicate that more than 200 new settlement outposts have been
established since the beginning of 2026.

Twenty-nine were established in July alone across nine West Bank
governorates, with eight in Nablus and five in Ramallah.

The same month saw 798 direct settler attacks. Most significantly, the
expansion of pastoral settlements and accompanying attacks have contributed
to the complete displacement of more than 82 Bedouin and pastoral
communities since the beginning of 2026, according to the report.

The numbers illustrate why the significance of pastoral settlements cannot
be measured simply by counting buildings.

A tent may occupy only several square meters. A herd protected by armed
settlers, however, can effectively deny Palestinians access to kilometers
of surrounding land.

The investigation also points to what it describes as a division of roles
between settlers and Israeli institutions: settlers establish facts on the
ground, while Israeli soldiers protect them during confrontations and
arrest Palestinians who attempt to defend their land and property.

Israeli police, meanwhile, frequently close cases without prosecution,
while far-right politicians provide public political support to settlers
accused of violence.

“Settler terrorism is no longer isolated individual behavior,” Naim said,
“but part of a system in which ideology and politics intersect.”
Redrawing the West Bank without Declaring Annexation

The significance of the pastoral-farm strategy ultimately extends beyond
individual communities.

By expanding from isolated hilltops and restricting Palestinian access to
the countryside surrounding them, these outposts can progressively sever
geographical links between Palestinian population centers.

The investigation argues that this process is particularly consequential in
Area C, while also threatening the territorial divisions created under the
Oslo Accords.

For Palestinians, the effect is cumulative: grazing areas disappear,
agricultural access contracts, communities become increasingly isolated,
and remaining on the land becomes progressively more difficult.

The Palestinian Authority, meanwhile, remains constrained by the
administrative architecture established under Oslo, limiting its response
largely to documentation, international appeals and, where funding permits,
partial humanitarian compensation.

Naim argued that confronting the process requires moving beyond documenting
each attack individually toward understanding the territorial strategy
behind them.

“The confrontation begins with understanding the nature of the danger.”

What is required, he said, is an integrated strategy based on “protecting
the land, supporting farmers, strengthening presence in threatened areas,
documenting crimes legally and through the media, and building a
Palestinian discourse directed toward the world in the language of rights
and international law.”

“The land,” he concluded, “is not preserved by complaining about losing it,
but through direct presence on it and by building popular and political
tools to protect it.”

What is unfolding across the hills and valleys of the occupied West Bank,
therefore, is not simply the proliferation of unauthorized structures or
the actions of a handful of extremist settlers.

It is a territorial method in which ideology, political protection,
financing, armed intimidation and settlement infrastructure intersect.

And its effectiveness rests precisely on its apparent simplicity: a tent
establishes the foothold, livestock expands the territory, armed settlers
deny Palestinian access, and infrastructure follows.

The geography can be transformed long before annexation is ever formally
declared.

*(Quds News Network, PC)*
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