Hilltop Youth
Template:Short description Template:Pp-extended Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox militant organization
Hilltop Youth (Template:Langx, No'ar HaGva'ot) are extremist Hardal settler youth operating in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. They are known for establishing outposts without an Israeli legal basis and conducting settler violence against Palestinians.<ref name="Byman" /><ref name="BBC-1">Template:Cite news</ref><ref>'Ex-Shin Bet chief: Government does not want to deal with Jewish terror,' Ynet 8 August 2015.</ref>
The Hilltop Youth often grow their hair into long, wide sidelocks (payot) and wear large knitted kippahs. They have been involved in numerous violent incidents,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> including the Duma arson attack, Kidnapping and murder of Mohammed Abu Khdeir and Church of the Multiplication arson attack.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
They were sanctioned by the European Union and Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on 2024.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Overview
The movement is based on the ideology of Kahanism,<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> which advocates for the expulsion of Palestinian Arabs from both Israel and the occupied territories. Members linked to the group have engaged in Israeli settler violence against Palestinians, as well as against Israeli soldiers.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
The acts of settler violence includes vandalism of Palestinian schools and mosques, stealing sheep from Palestinian flocks and the destruction of their centuries-old olive groves, or stealing their olive harvests.<ref name="Byman"/> In the most notable attack, members of the groups perpetrated the 2015 Duma arson attack against a Palestinian family, burning their 18-month-old baby alive and injuring the parents.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Though the group has no strict hierarchy Israeli authorities believe Meir Ettinger to be its leader and Elisha Yered to be its spokesperson.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In 2024, following rising settler attacks, the European Union put Hilltop Youth as well as the related Lehava groups on its asset freeze and visa bans, declaring them to be extremist organizations.<ref name="tg1"/>
Origins
On 16 November 1998, in what was viewed as a declaration intended to thwart peace talks, and in particular the implementation of his political rival Benjamin Netanyahu's Wye River agreement with the Palestinian National Authority,<ref name="Kershner" /> the then-Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon urged settler youth to "grab the hilltops", adding,
"Everyone that's there should move, should run, should grab more hills, expand the territory. Everything that's grabbed will be in our hands. Everything we don't grab will be in their hands."<ref name="Smith1">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="La Guardia" />
People proceeded to heed his exhortation and outposts proliferated, in a practice often called "creating facts on the ground",<ref>Deborah Campbell This Heated Place: Encounters in the Promised Land, D & M Publishers, 2009 p.89.</ref> but many would later feel betrayed by Sharon when the Israeli West Bank barrier he devised in 2005 cut off many of the illegal communities from the expanded Israel Sharon envisaged at that time.<ref name="Kershner" >Isabel KershnerBarrier: The Seam of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Macmillan, 2014 pp.184-185.</ref>
The example of figures like Netanel Ozeri, who moved his family out of the safety of Kiryat Arba's perimeters to build an outpost, Hilltop 26, on nearby Palestinian land, was also important: Ozeri was later shot dead by Palestinian gunmen.<ref name="La Guardia" >Anton La Guardia, 'NS Profile - The Israeli Settlements,' New Statesman 26 May 2003</ref><ref>https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/israel/etc/script.html Israel's Next War Frontline, Produced and Directed by Dan Setton PBS 2005.</ref>
Ideology
According to terrorism expert Ami Pedahzur, ideologically, Hilltop Youth espouse a Kahanist worldview, favouring "deportation, revenge, and annihilation of Gentiles that posed a threat to the people of Israel".<ref name="Pedahzur">Template:Cite book</ref>
The youth are influenced by religious Zionist ideals, which include a dedication to building and farming the land, as well as devoting time to learning Torah.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> Many have studied in the Od Yosef Chai yeshiva under Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh,<ref name="Gershuni">Gershuni, Hillel 'A Jewish ISIS Rises in the West Bank,' Tablet 11 January 2016</ref> who developed the metaphor comparing Israel to a "nut" which had to be cracked in order to allow the fruit, the people, out.<ref name="Byman">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="Gershuni" /> In 2019, he published an essay Time to Crack the Nut updating this metaphor.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In addition to basing their ideals on the teachings of prominent rabbis such as Avraham Yitzchak Kook and Rabbi Shmuel Tal,<ref name="Gershuni" /> some regard Avri Ran as a spiritual leader, or "father", of the movement,<ref name="Byman" /><ref>Chaim Levinson, Israeli 'hilltop youth' accuse their former hero of stealing settlers' land, at Haaretz, 31 January 2013.</ref> though he does not see himself as such. The philosophy of some in the movement is expressed by a mixture of distrust of the Israeli government and a desire to re-establish the Ancient Kingdom of Israel.<ref>Ben Caspit, 'Who are Israel's Hilltop Youth?,' Al-Monitor 15 December 2015.</ref>
Activities
The Hilltop Youth are a "loosely organized, anarchy-minded group", of some several hundred youths around a hard core of scores of violent activists often noted for establishing illegal/disputed outposts outside existing settlements.<ref name="Gershuni" /><ref name="BG-1">Template:Cite news</ref> According to Danny Rubinstein they are formed into private militias.<ref>Danny Rubinstein, 'Le tribù d'Israele non si parlano,' in Lucio Caracciolo (ed.), La Questione Israeliana, Limes 11 June 2021 ppè.47-52 p.50</ref> Their numbers (2009) are estimated to be around 800, with approximately 5,000 others who share their ideological outlook.<ref name="Byman" /> They completely dissociate themselves from Israeli institutions, and identify themselves with the Land of Israel.<ref name="Gershuni" /> They settle on hilltops in areas densely crowded by Palestinians.<ref name="Byman" />
Violence
Members linked to the group have been accused of engaging in Israeli settler violence, including vandalism of Palestinian schools<ref name="JP-2">Template:Cite news</ref> and mosques,<ref name="HRTZ-1">Template:Cite news</ref> stealing sheep from Palestinian flocks and the destruction of their centuries-old olive groves, or stealing their olive harvests.<ref name="Byman" /><ref>Lila Perl, Theocracy, Marshall Cavendish 2007 p.128.</ref><ref>Daniel Gavron,The Other Side of Despair, Rowman & Littlefield 2004 p.194.</ref> This last practice was endorsed by Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu on a visit to a hilltop outpost, Havat Gilad, where he issued a rabbinical ruling that, "The ground on which the trees are planted is the inheritance of the Jewish people, and the fruit of the plantings was seeded by the goyim in land that is not theirs."<ref>Uri Ben-Eliezer, Old Conflict, New War: Israel’s Politics Toward the Palestinians, Palgrave Macmillan, 2012 p.189.</ref> They seize land not by any official method: they claim a hilltop by setting up an encampment, and then claim the land nearby, whether under Palestinian cultivation or not, or by uprooting Palestinian trees and shooting in the air if any Palestinian comes near to the new outpost.<ref>Samantha M. Shapiro, 'The Unsettlers,' New York Times, 14 February 2003.</ref>
Settlers have long been accused of carrying out what are called "price tag attacks", a term used for targeting Palestinian property in revenge for outposts demolished by the Israeli military, although no one as yet has actually been convicted of having been involved in such vandalism.<ref name="Gershuni" /><ref name="NPR-1">Template:Cite news</ref>
In May 2025, during the demolition of three illegal structures in the West Bank, Hilltop Youth members threw stones at a bus carrying Israel Border Police officers.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In 30 June 2025, A group of extremist settlers, many identified with the Hilltop Youth, attacked an Israeli military base at Kafr Malik and destroyed military equipment at the place. IDF forces dispersed them with stun grenades.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Labor
Many of the Hilltop Youth feel that the mainstream settler movement has lost its way, opting for cheap housing close to major cities, built by local Arab labor, with tall fences and no space between their homes. The Youth often engage in organic farming<ref name="ICG-1">'Israel’s Religious Right and the Question of Settlements,' Template:Webarchive International Crisis Group Middle East Report N°89 – 20 July 2009 pp.8-9.'Many hilltop youth farm organically, and maintain autonomous self-defence groups.(p.9).</ref> and shun Palestinian labor in favor of Hebrew labor. 2.5% of eggs consumed in Israel are calculated to be produced on the outposts run by the Hilltop Youth leader Avri Ran.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Tamara Traubmann, It’s organic, but where was it grown Haaretz 2 August 2007</ref>
Expulsion
In 18 May 2025, settlers from Hilltop Youth built an illegal outpost 100 meters from Al-Mughayyir, Ramallah.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Five Days After Building an Outpost on the Edge of a West Bank Palestinian Village, Israeli Settlers Drove Locals Out, by Hagar Shezaf. May 26 2025, Haaretz</ref> The 150 Palestinian inhabitants were forced to leave their homes. The settlers harassed and threw stones at the Palestinian villagers as they tried to take their belongings and dismantle the buildings. Police and soldiers were present in the village but did not intervene.<ref>Israeli settlers force about 150 Palestinians to leave their West Bank village, by Quique Kierszenbaum in Mughayyir al-Deir and Emma Graham-Harrison in Jerusalem. May 23 2025, The Guardian</ref>
Government response
The Hilltop Youth has been condemned in the past by figures within Israel's government, with Former Prime Minister Ehud Barak referring to the group as unacceptable "homemade terror, Jewish-made terror".<ref name=NPR-1/>
In August 2024, The Israeli Security Agency's head Ronen Bar wrote: "The 'hilltop youth' trend has long become a bed of violent activity against Palestinians … it's the use of violence to create intimidation", to "fear monger, meaning terrorism."<ref name=Lis>Template:Cite news</ref><ref name=Jterror>Template:Cite news</ref> Such acts were now "broad, open activity", wrote Bar, now "using weapons of war. Sometimes using weapons that were distributed by the state lawfully … attacking the security forces … receiving legitimacy from certain officials in the establishment".<ref name=Lis/> As a result, the hilltop youth experienced "loss of fear of administrative detention due to the conditions they get in prison and the money given to them upon their release by MKs, together with legitimization and praise".<ref name=Jterror/>
In 1 July 2025, following Hilltop Youth violence against IDF soldiers, Israel Defense Minister Israel Katz declared that violence by Israeli citizens against the IDF or state property is a "red line".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Notable members
Meir Ettinger
Template:Main Meir Ettinger (born 4 October 1991), the grandson of Meir Kahane, previously resided at Ramat Migron outpost, and later the Givat Ronen outpost near Har Brakha, was subsequently deported, by administrative order, from the West Bank and Jerusalem, taking up residence with his family in Safed. He has attracted many followers and in addition to public speaking, he has published a blog at the pro-Hilltop Youth website "The Jewish Voice" (Hebrew: הקול היהודי). He was arrested for the "spy affair", when settler youths were accused of maintaining an "operation room" to monitor IDF movements and warn outpost settlers of impending evacuations. After violating his house arrest terms, he was held in jail until the end of his trial, in which he was convicted following a plea-bargain for conspiring to gather military intelligence and sentenced to time served, approximately 6 months.<ref>3 Months imprisonment for accused in "spy affair", Arutz7, June 2013</ref><ref>Plea Bargain and Light Sentences for Right Wing Activists who Tracked IDF Forces, Ha'aretz, December 2012</ref> In August 2015, following the arson at the Church of the Multiplication in June and the Duma arson attack,<ref>Elisha Ben Kimon, 'Amiram Ben-Uliel: The handyman accused of Duma murders,' Ynet 3 January 2016.</ref> he was placed under administrative arrest for 6 months, which was extended by an additional 4 months.<ref>Oded Shalom and Elior Levy, 'West Bank inches closer to boiling point,' Ynet 8 August 2014.</ref> During his incarceration, he staged a hunger strike. In June 2016, following his release, he returned to reside in Safed, and is barred by administrative order from entering the West Bank, Jerusalem, and Yad Binyamin. In addition, he is forbidden, by administrative order, from contacting 92 people.<ref>Jewish extremist freed after 10 months behind bars, Times Of Israel,
June 2016</ref>
Sanctions
In 2024, responding to rising Israeli settler attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank, the European Union put Hilltop Youth as well as related Lehava groups on its asset freeze and visa bans, declaring them to be extremist organizations.<ref name="tg1">Template:Cite news</ref>