Unsettled ground

The world is focused on Gaza. But the situation in the West Bank is also deteriorating View in browser Fred Harter • Tuesday 22 July 2025 Dear friend, Welcome to today's Sensemaker. Long stories short The UK said it would abolish the water regulator Ofwat (more below). Twenty-eight countries accused Israel of "drip feeding" aid into Gaza. Divers found a WWI ship more than 100 years after it was sunk. Unsettled ground The US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, this weekend called an arson attack on an ancient church in the West Bank an "act of terror". A few days earlier he asked Israel to "aggressively investigate" the killing of a Palestinian American beaten by settlers. So what? Attention is understandably focused on Gaza as Israel opens up a new front in the city of Deir al-Balah. But Huckabee's comments are uncharacteristic given he is an ardent supporter of West Bank settlements. They speak to a deteriorating situation that has seen the IDF turn refugee camps into closed military zones; Israeli settlers ramp up violence in the name of expansive land claims; and Palestinians in the territory displaced at their highest levels for nearly 60 years. Backstory. Abutting the Jordan River, the West Bank is home to more than three million Palestinians. Under past peace plans, the territory has been earmarked as the core of a future state with East Jerusalem as its capital. Trump's proposal from 2020 would have given the Palestinians 70 per cent of the West Bank, with the rest going to the Israelis. Then. Israel calls the territory Judea and Samaria and has occupied it since the Six-Day War of 1967, when the country more than doubled the amount of territory under its control. Settlers rushed in, seeing the area as part of the Jewish people's biblical homeland. Now. Some 700,000 Israelis live alongside the Palestinians in 150 settlements and a similar number of outposts. The latter are collections of houses, or sometimes caravans, set up without permission in the hope of eventually gaining Israeli government approval. Lawbreakers. Settlements are illegal under international laws that ban occupying powers from transferring their own civilian population into occupied territory. But the Israeli state gives them funding and support. Michael Lynk, a former UN special rapporteur, said this was part of a strategy to "demographically change" the West Bank so it "reflects the rest of Israel". Escalation. Armed Israeli settlers have stepped up attacks in the West Bank since October 7, with rights groups accusing the IDF of participating in violence. By the numbers: 964 – Palestinians estimated to have been killed in the West Bank since October 2023, alongside 35 Israelis. 1,420 – settler attacks against Palestinians last year, the highest on record. 30,000 – Palestinians uprooted from their homes in the West Bank since January. Iron Wall. In January, Israel began a new military operation in the territory that it said was designed to root out militants. It has since issued demolition orders for roughly 1,400 homes. Expansion plans. In May, Israel approved 22 new settlements in the West Bank, thought to be the largest increase in decades. The far-right finance minister Bezalel Smotrich has said he wants a further 500,000 settlers to move into the territory. Frontline. A woman displaced at the start of this month from near Jericho said settler attacks caused "chaos and terror". She told The Observer: "They burned down our homes, poisoned our sheep, attacked our school, students, and teachers, terrifying the women and children." Part one. On 9 July, there was an arson attack near the 5th century ruins of the Church of St George in the West Bank town of Taybeh. Local residents accused settlers of starting the blaze. The response. Huckabee, an evangelical Christian, visited the church on Saturday and said people needed to pay the price for destroying something that "belongs to God". Senator Lindsey Graham, who is staunchly pro-Israel, said yesterday that he was "incredibly upset". Israel has not commented but previously said any acts of violence by civilians were unacceptable. Part two. On 12 July, a US dual citizen called Sayfollah Musallet was beaten to death during an alleged confrontation with settlers on a hilltop. He ran an ice-cream shop in Florida. The response. Huckabee has called the killing of Musallet a "criminal and terrorist act". Israeli authorities arrested several people, who have since reportedly been released. Fade to nothing. According to the Israeli rights group Yesh Din, 93 per cent of police investigations into offences committed by Israelis against Palestinians in the West Bank are closed with no indictment filed. What's more… Democrats and Republicans have repeatedly opposed Israel's settlements without ever forcing meaningful change on the ground. Despite Huckabee's stern words, it was Donald Trump who removed Biden-era sanctions against settlers accused of violence. The Observer News Matrix The Nibs Capital Economy, business and finance Great stink The UK government said it would abolish the water regulator Ofwat and replace it with a new watchdog to "prevent the abuses of the past". This comes after a major report by the former Bank of England deputy governor Sir Jon Cunliffe, who compared the current moment to the Great Stink of 1858, when London smelled of untreated human waste, and said a "fundamental reset" was needed. Few will disagree against a backdrop of rising bills, raw sewage and the ongoing crisis at Thames Water. But the jury is out on whether getting rid of Ofwat is enough. One campaign group said the recommendations were like "putting lipstick on a pig". There have been calls for the industry to be nationalised, which was not considered by the review. This would cost tens of billions, but without it the financial structures that encouraged past abuses will remain. Technology AI, science and new things Spinning around Plan accordingly because today is the second shortest day since records began. It will only be 1.34 milliseconds under 24 hours, but forms part of a pattern that scientists cannot explain. The Earth has repeatedly clocked in quick rotations since 2020, with the shortest day ever recorded coming on 5 July last year. The best guess is that something has happened inside the planet's liquid core, which is far too hot and deep for humans to study directly. The Earth would be moving even faster if it wasn't for the melting ice caps, which are mitigating the effect by redistributing the mass of the planet. The upshot is that the world may need to impose a negative leap second for the first time in 2029, which experts in the world's early history might consider an overreaction. About 1.4 billion years ago, a day was less than 19 hours long. The 100-year life Health, education and government Let's cargo HS2 will speed up some passenger journeys, but the golden goose is capacity. Any issue on a passenger or freight train along the West Coast mainline leads to a cascade of delays and cancellations along the rest of the line. Parallel high speed passenger services from Euston to the north would not only minimise the risk of delays, but also provide more space for freight trains to run on the existing route. Business lobbying groups yesterday made a compelling case for a revived full HS2 on these grounds. Freight trains are lucrative business for railway operators, which charge cargo firms fees to run services on the lines. The trains are more environmentally friendly than boats or lorries and have the added benefit of taking trucks off the roads, which frees up room for commuters. It's not surprising that nine in 10 manufacturers believe the original HS2 plan should still go ahead. Motorists may want to pay heed too. Our planet Climate and geopolitics Trump of Tokyo Japan's ruling coalition suffered a defeat in Sunday's elections, while far-right parties made large gains. The Liberal Democratic Party, which has ruled for most of the past 70 years, now holds minority status in both chambers of parliament, but the prime minister Shigeru Ishiba has vowed to remain in office. His coalition failed to convince enough voters that they could meet the challenges of soaring rice prices, US tariffs and an ageing population. New rightwing parties appear to have filled the void, particularly among younger voters. One of them, Sanseitō, won 14 seats by championing an anti-immigration "Japanese First" agenda. The number of foreign residents in Japan hit record levels in 2024, but only accounts for 3 per cent of the population. Sanseitō's leader is a former supermarket manager who models himself on Donald Trump. Culture Society, identity and belonging New walls please Despite the best efforts of a centenarian actress, Wimbledon has won its battle to expand into an old golf club with 38 new tennis courts and a 10-storey 8,000-seat show court. The High Court dismissed a legal challenge to the proposed development, which local campaigners fear will cause major disruption and flatten beloved green space in the area. There is still an ongoing dispute about the legal status of the land. If the scheme goes ahead, as is now expected, it will increase the land coverage of Wimbledon from 42 acres to about 99 acres. This would make Wimbledon the joint-biggest grand slam site by area, level with the Australian Open's Melbourne Park. The All England Tennis Club argues that its proposals will transform a site that was a private golf course for more than 100 years into a public space with new parkland. Campaigners say that access won't be guaranteed. Thanks for reading. Please tell your friends to sign up and tell us what you think. Fred Harter @FredHarter Additional reporting by Xavier Greenwood, Brad Gray and Serena Cesareo. Edited by Xavier Greenwood.     More from The Observer Read Hezbollah must decide: disarm, fight on or turn fully to politics Devastated by war with Israel and with its key allies in disarray, the Lebanese militant group is isolated and facing the most significant choice of its 40-year history Click here to listen → Follow Follow The Observer on social media on your preferred platform:   The Observer     The Observer Food Monthly The Observer Magazine The Observer New Review   Listen Listen for free in the Tortoise app or wherever you get your podcasts: Want to change how you receive these emails? Update email preferences Copyright © 2025 Tortoise Media. All rights reserved. Did this email get caught in your spam filter? Add editor@newsroom.observer.co.uk to your address book to never miss an email again. No longer want to receive this newsletter? Unsubscribe here.