\n<\/p>\n
The US congressman Ro Khanna says armed Israeli settlers detained him during a visit to the Israel-occupied West Bank recently, describing the experience as a first-hand view of the realities faced by Palestinians living under occupation.<\/p>\n
In an interview with Reuters<\/a> on Thursday from a Palestinian village, the progressive US House Democrat from California said his detention happened the previous day while his delegation visited an area of the southern West Bank that has experienced repeated attacks by Israeli settlers.<\/p>\n Khanna recounted how settlers carrying US-made M4 rifles surrounded the group\u2019s van.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were at a village that Israeli settlers had destroyed \u2013 they had destroyed the school, they had destroyed that village, and we were just looking at it,\u201d Khanna said.<\/p>\n Referring to the Israel Defense Forces, which are funded in part by US military aid, Khanna continued: \u201cAnd these hoodlums \u2026 detain us. They block off the road. And then they call the IDF and the IDF is on their side, not on the side of the Americans.\u201d<\/p>\n Khanna also told Reuters: \u201cI saw the arrogance in the eyes of those settlers, 21- and 22-year-olds with guns, laughing that they had detained us, the arrogance of those young IDF soldiers that my tax dollars are funding \u2013 having no respect for the fact that they were detaining Americans, no respect that there was an American congressperson in that bus, and laughing when our translator told them that there are Americans there and the American embassy is concerned.\u201d<\/p>\n Khanna aide Cameron Kasky wrote<\/a> on X that he was there when the congressman\u2019s group was detained, saying: \u201cThe IDF showed up to back up the settlers, not the US congressman.\u201d<\/p>\n Khanna added that the encounter illustrated \u201cthe arrogance of power \u2013 of a power that has had no accountability, total impunity \u2013 and it\u2019s created a toxic culture of oppression\u201d.<\/p>\n The New York Times<\/a> first reported Khanna\u2019s account on Saturday morning. He told the outlet: \u201cI felt powerless in that situation, which is not an easy thing, as I have a lot of privilege in life.<\/p>\n <\/span>Israeli settlers block Ro Khanna\u2019s convoy in Khirbet Zanuta, according to his press team, during a visit to the West Bank on 8 July 2026.<\/span> Photograph: Ro Khanna\u2019s press team\/Reuters<\/p>\n \u201cImagine how people feel every day, Palestinians under the occupation, if they could make an American congressperson feel powerless for 90 minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n Khanna said he and his group were ultimately able to continue traveling after contacting the US embassy and Israeli police.<\/p>\n The Israeli military said troops and police responded after receiving a report that settlers were obstructing vehicles near Khirbet Zanuta, according to Reuters.<\/p>\n Khirbet Zanuta is a Palestinian hamlet whose residents were forced to leave in the wake of violent settler raids after the Hamas attacks on Israel in October 2023.<\/p>\n Asked by Reuters whether he intends to run for president, Khanna replied: \u201cI\u2019m strongly considering it. And I\u2019m more resolved to consider it after this trip.\u201d<\/p>\n More than 700,000 Israelis reside in settlements across the occupied West Bank including East Jerusalem. The United Nations considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank to be illegal, and Israel has faced repeated criticism over violence and other actions by settlers in the territory.<\/p>\n Since Israel took control of the West Bank in 1967, restrictions imposed there have prevented the territory from developing a self-sustaining economy. Those restrictions intensified significantly after the deadly 7 October 2023 Hamas attacks on Israel.<\/p>\n Nearly 300,000 Palestinians have lost employment in the West Bank and Israel.<\/p>\n A June report issued by a UN independent international commission of inquiry concluded that \u201cIsraeli authorities and security forces have deliberately targeted Palestinian children resulting in genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes in the Gaza Strip and war crimes in the West Bank\u201d.<\/p>\n According to data from human rights organisation Yesh Din, no Israeli has been indicted for the killing of a Palestinian since October 2023.<\/p>\n Khanna has been one of the most outspoken critics in the US Congress of the war in Gaza and the occupation of the West Bank, often clashing with his own party\u2019s establishment. In May, he released a video<\/a> criticizing the Democratic National Committee\u2019s incomplete postmortem report on the defeat that the party suffered at the hands of Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election.<\/p>\n The postmortem did not mention Gaza. In his video, Khanna said: \u201cAs someone who campaigned in Michigan and Wisconsin, let me tell you \u2013 one of the reasons we lost is our blank check to Israel and [prime minister Benjamin] Netanyahu while they committed genocide in Gaza.<\/p>\n \u201cWe must speak and confront hard truths if this party is to win\u201d the 2028 presidential election, he added.<\/p>\n Reuters contributed reporting<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The US congressman Ro Khanna says armed Israeli settlers detained him during a visit to the Israel-occupied West Bank recently, describing the experience as a first-hand view of the realities faced by Palestinians living under occupation. In an interview with Reuters on Thursday from a Palestinian village, the progressive US House Democrat from California said 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NEWS<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"The US congressman Ro Khanna says armed Israeli settlers detained him during a visit to the Israel-occupied West Bank recently, describing the experience as a first-hand view of the realities faced by Palestinians living under occupation. In an interview with Reuters on Thursday from a Palestinian village, the progressive US House Democrat from California said…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35357"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35357\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35359,"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35357\/revisions\/35359"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/design-providers.com\/rise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}