Six countries sanction settler-violence networks and ban Smotrich: accountability, or anti-Israel bias?
Six Western countries — including the UK, France, Canada and Norway — imposed sanctions on networks financing and enabling settler violence in the occupied West Bank, and France barred Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, four settler-group leaders and 21 violent settlers from entry. They cite record settlement expansion and rising violence; Israel condemns the move as anti-Israel and warns it will fuel antisemitism.
The summary above is a neutral framing. Below, each side reports the same story in its own words — judge for yourself.
The six nations say they are targeting the networks that finance and enable settler attacks, acting in response to record illegal settlement expansion and rising violence in the West Bank — and warn of further measures if Israel fails to rein in the situation. France's foreign minister singled out Smotrich for promoting annexation.
Israel reacted with anger, accusing the countries of advancing antisemitism through anti-Israel policies and defending its ministers and settlers. Smotrich and the government cast the sanctions and the entry bans as unjust political pressure on a sovereign ally.
