ISRAELI settlers and state forces have killed more Palestinian children in the West Bank in the past three years than in the 17 before that, according to new research.
An analysis of United Nations data conducted by Oxfam found that 1036 Palestinians – including 225 children – had been killed by Israeli forces or settlers between 2006 and the end of 2022.
However, in the last three years, from 2023 to the end of 2025, 1244 Palestinians – including 268 children – have been killed.
Oxfam said that in the 20 years since 2006, more than one in five (22%) of those killed by Israeli settlers and state forces have been children.
For the same periods analysed, in the 17 years between 2006 until the end of 2022, Oxfam found that 86 Israeli settlers, including 12 children, were killed.
In the last three years, from 2023 to the end of 2025, 43 Israeli settlers have been killed, including 10 children.
In the first three months of 2026 there were more than 540 Israeli settler attacks, 33 Palestinian people killed, and more than 2200 people displaced.
Elsewhere, the analysis also found that a record number of Palestinians in the West Bank – nearly 46,000 – have been forcibly displaced over the last three years, compared to just over 13,000 for the previous 14 years combined by Israeli military operations, settler violence, demolitions, and access restrictions.
Saed (not his real name), a 50-year-old Palestinian man forced out of his home in the Ein Samya community, said: “We used to deal with settlers all the time, but over the past three years, settler violence has increased massively. Eventually we had to leave and now a settler is staying in my home …
“We went to another community in Jericho, but it did not stop there. Settlers closed the roads, carried weapons, harassed and terrified our children on their way to school, and grazed their livestock inside our community, next to our houses. In the worst cases they would steal our livestock under the protection of the army and police.”
The Oxfam analysis comes 24 hours after a major new report from Amnesty International concluded that the annexation of the West Bank – which is illegally occupied under international law – is being driven by the Israeli state and not rogue extremist settlers.
On Tuesday, the UK Government joined five allies – Australia, Canada, France, New Zealand, and Norway – in sanctioning five organisations and one individual over their involvement in the illegal Israeli annexation of the West Bank.
However, no action was taken against the Israeli government – which has been widely accused of committing genocide in Gaza, including by the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS), the world’s leading group of experts on the topic.
Bushra Khalidi, Oxfam International’s humanitarian policy lead, said: “The mounting killing of civilians in the West Bank is tragic and horrifying. While the eyes of the world have been on Gaza, attacks in the West Bank have been accelerating.
“Since the atrocities committed by Hamas and other armed groups in 2023, Israel has committed genocide in Gaza while also enabling an unprecedented surge of violence across the West Bank.
“Oxfam works with Palestinian families whose lives have been destroyed. It is devastating that scores of children are being killed. This is the human cost of impunity, Israeli violence and cruelty in full view, while world leaders look the other way.”
