Amid outrage, Netanyahu claims no ‘compelling evidence’ settlers attacked European diplomats

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed on Saturday night there was a lack of “compelling evidence” surrounding a violent settler attack on European diplomats in the West Bank earlier in the day, appearing to suggest the incident was part of a “coordinated smear campaign.” Vehicles belonging to diplomats from France, Belgium, and Poland were attacked by masked settlers, with footage showing one of the vehicles was pelted with stones and had its window smashed. According to testimonies, seven masked settlers surrounded the diplomatic vehicle and demanded identification documents before attacking the car. Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prevot said that the Belgian consul general, French and Polish diplomats, and a French mayor were among those attacked, while a Belgian vehicle was damaged. Despite the images from the attack, which took place less than a day after settlers violently assaulted and injured a Washington Post journalist , Netanyahu issued a lengthy statement referring to the “alleged attack on European diplomats” and said it was too early to draw conclusions about what occurred. “We urge caution before drawing conclusions from today’s reports that European diplomats were attacked by masked Israelis in Judea and Samaria,” read the statement published by the Prime Minister’s Office, which referred to the West Bank by its biblical name. “Any violence against diplomats is unacceptable. The more serious the accusation, the greater the demand for compelling evidence.” Get The Times of Israel's Daily Edition by email and never miss our top stories Newsletter email address Get it By signing up, you agree to the terms The statement laid out a series of facts about the incident — alleging that the diplomats “entered a sensitive area with a history of confrontations without prior coordination with the IDF”; that the delegation included Communist French Mayor Bernard Baudoux, a vocal advocate for Palestinians; that footage shows masked individuals approaching a diplomatic vehicle, while other images show a broken window and someone — Baudoux — lying on the ground. “These images alone do not establish the complete sequence of events or individual responsibility,” said Netanyahu’s office. “Those circumstances remain under investigation.” Netanyahu’s office stressed that Israeli police were investigating “to establish the facts and identify those responsible.” Advertisement The prime minister also suggested the incident could be part of a “coordinated campaign to smear Israel and the Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria during the annual olive harvest.” The Prime Minister's Office: ALLEGED ATTACK ON EUROPEAN DIPLOMATS: SERIOUS ACCUSATIONS REQUIRE SERIOUS EVIDENCE. We urge caution before drawing conclusions from today's reports that European diplomats were attacked by masked Israelis in Judea and Samaria. Any violence against… — Prime Minister of Israel (@IsraeliPM) October 17, 2026 In contrast to Netanyahu’s response, both the Israel Defense Forces and Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, who is a member of the ruling Likud party, condemned the “severe” attack. Advertisement The military, which referred to the assailants as “Israeli rioters,” lamented, that security forces were not informed of the visit ahead of time, saying that “such coordination is important to prevent incidents of this kind.” Sa’ar published similar criticism, saying it was “unfortunate that the visit was not coordinated with the IDF in advance. Such coordination could have helped safeguard the visitors’ security.” He said however that the Foreign Ministry was assisting law enforcement authorities to “identify the attackers and bring them to justice.” אירוע חריג ביותר בכפר הפלסטיני טייבה בבנימין – בעת מסיק הזיתים: רכבים של דיפלומטים מצרפת, בלגיה ופולין – הותקפו לפני זמן קצר בידי יהודים. מעדויות שהגיעו מהשטח וכן מתיעודים שהגיעו לידי גלי צה״ל, עולה כי אחד הרכבים הדיפלומטיים הותקף באבנים ושמשתו נופצה. בנוסף, אחד הקונסולים נצפה… pic.twitter.com/x30kCvyKbO — דורון קדוש | Doron Kadosh (@Doron_Kadosh) October 17, 2026 The incident was met with outrage from the countries whose diplomats were attacked, with Brussels promising that it would work to ensure consequences for the attackers. Belgian Foreign Minister Prevot condemned the attack “in the strongest terms,” and vowed to press the European Union to impose sanctions on those responsible for the violence. Advertisement “A French mayor was assaulted and a Belgian vehicle damaged. Our team is safe,” he wrote on X. “Palestinians face this violence every day. Settlers also target journalists reporting on it and diplomats. Harvesting olives, reporting the news or carrying out diplomatic duties should never put anyone at risk of attack,” he continued. “As the occupying power, Israeli authorities must protect Palestinians, ensure the safety of diplomats and journalists, and bring those responsible to justice. Impunity for violent settlers must end,” he said, adding that “Belgium will continue to press for EU sanctions against those responsible for this violence and those who support them.” Settler violence against Palestinians has soared this year and spiked further in the weeks leading up to Israel’s October 27 election, coinciding with the annual olive harvest, a period that frequently sees clashes and attacks around Palestinian farmland. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot demanded that Israel crack down on “criminal violence” after Baudoux “was violently assaulted by extremist settlers.” “The Israeli authorities must arrest those responsible for these revolting acts and take them to justice. They must urgently halt this criminal violence and guarantee the safety of civilian populations, as they are compelled to do under international law,” he stated on X. The Polish Foreign Ministry, meanwhile, said it was “deeply outraged” by the incident, and demanded that Israel provide “urgent and detailed explanations, identify those responsible and ensure that they are held accountable.” A convoy carrying members of the diplomatic corps, including Polish diplomats, was attacked in the West Bank. According to preliminary information, Israeli settlers may have been responsible for the incident. The Polish diplomats were unharmed. Based on the information currently… https://t.co/GDJN3bZIsX Advertisement — Ministry of Foreign Affairs ???????? (@PolandMFA) October 17, 2026 “Poland has consistently opposed violence perpetrated by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank. Attacks against members of the diplomatic corps are absolutely unacceptable,” it said. French mayor kicked to the ground, left shaken but unhurt Baudoux, the mayor of the northern French town of Aulnoye-Aymeries who was a member of the delegation to Taybeh, charged that the incident showed a tolerance by Israel’s government for settler violence. “I think that if settlers are behaving like this, there is a tolerance on the part of the Israeli government,” Baudoux said. “The whole world needs to know what’s happening there. For me, I’ll go back to my country and everything will be fine. Those who continue to suffer the most are those who are here.” The left-wing French mayor said he was visiting Taybeh with the French consul general in Jerusalem and a priest from his home parish to sign a goodwill cooperation agreement between his city and the largely Christian Palestinian town. He said that two to three cars suddenly arrived and settlers came out shouting incomprehensible insults about France. Aulnoye-Aymeries’ Mayor Bernard Baudoux reacts after the cutting of the ribbon for the inauguration of the Aulnoye-Aymeries police station in northern France, on November 3, 2025. (Francois Lo Presti/AFP) The mayor, who had put on a sash in the French tricolor, said the settlers kicked him and beat him with iron bars, throwing him to the ground. “It’s the gratuitous nature of the violence that stuns me,” Baudoux said. “They arrived completely enraged.” “It’s absolutely incredible that settlers can behave like this,” he said, predicting the attack would go unpunished despite quick Israeli promises of an investigation. He said his parish priest helped him up and that they rushed off in a car. He ultimately did not suffer serious injuries and was able to continue his visit to the town. Israeli activists say settlers threatened to kill them The accounts of the French and Belgian officials were confirmed by Amit Orpeli, an activist with the Torat Tzedek organization, which assists Palestinians in the Taybeh area. He told The Times of Israel that he was in the area on Saturday afternoon with a fellow Israeli activist, when they received a report of settlers disrupting olive harvesting in Area B of the West Bank, which dozens of families were taking part in. When they arrived at the scene, they saw the settlers. “At that point, the Palestinians were fleeing for their lives, and then the settlers attacked us. They banged on our car, broke a headlight, and said — and this wasn’t captured in the videos — that they would kill us,” Orpeli recounted. According to Orpeli, they managed to get around the settlers’ roadblock and then encountered Belgian and French diplomats who also had been attacked. “We could see they had already been attacked. One of the car windows was already shattered, and then the same settlers showed up again. Two Palestinians who hadn’t managed to escape got into our car, and the diplomats and we fled back to the village of Taybeh,” he said. Orpeli confirmed that Baudoux was seen lying on the ground following the attack, but that he was not physically injured. ‘Jewish terror under the auspices of the government’ Slamming the attack, Israeli opposition leaders accused the government of enabling settler violence and allowing it to flourish in the West Bank. Yashar chair Gadi Eisenkot, a former IDF chief of staff, denounced the violence as “Jewish terror under the auspices of the government of Israel.” “Once again, within a single day, squads of violent lawbreakers attack foreign citizens — and this time, diplomats and official officeholders,” he said. The attacks, Eisenkot said, are “burning up the last shreds of legitimacy the State of Israel has left, endangering security forces, and harming the settlement enterprise in Judea and Samaria, and national security.” Likewise, left-wing Democrats chair Yair Golan accused the “Netanyahu-Smotrich government” of “drowning all of us in a sea of terror.” “My position is clear: We must fight Jewish terror with an iron fist, just as we fight against Palestinian terror. Return to the use of administrative detention against dangerous Jewish terror operatives, in accordance with the law; terror hubs must be dismantled, illegal outposts evacuated, rioters arrested and brought to trial,” he wrote on X. On the right, the head of the Yesha Council settlements umbrella group alleged that it was Palestinian rights activists who were sowing violence in the West Bank. “In the last two days, groups of provocateurs and terrorists are sowing chaos using the olive harvest as an excuse,” said Israel Ganz. Ganz, who also heads the Benjamin Regional Council settlement authority, claimed that such people go to “friction points” to “stir up the region and create confrontations.” “In many situations they are the actual aggressors, go wild, and harm Israelis,” alleged Ganz, and said their activities must be stopped. Ganz was referring to Israeli and foreign organizations and activists who carry out so-called protective presence activities in which they accompany Palestinian agricultural workers onto their land to assist them when confronted by Israeli security forces and document violence by settler extremists. There is very little documentation of such activists engaging in violent acts, however, despite Ganz’s claims. Ganz issued qualified criticism of extremist violence, saying that “Israelis using violence play into their hands and harm people, the settlements, and the state.” He called on the police to “take responsibility” and impose order. “A police force which knows how to deal with organized crime must stop stone throwers, and organizers of disturbances of the public order which are known ahead of time, Israelis, Arabs, and foreigners alike, instead of sufficing with condemnation and a claim that an investigation has been opened after the incident has ended,” said Ganz. Emanuel Fabian and Jeremy Sharon contributed to this report. Help us report truthfully on social media As a multimedia journalist, my job is to take the quality, fact-based journalism produced by The Times of Israel newsroom and make it accessible across every platform — from Instagram posts to podcasts to short-form videos. This is how many, especially young people, consume news these days. 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