Rubio says US wants Israel to ‘crack down’ on settler violence in West Bank

The United States wants Israel to do more to deter attacks committed by settlers in the West Bank, US secretary of state Marco Rubio said on Saturday.

“We’re very disturbed by those images and what we’re seeing,” Rubio said. “We’ve asked the Israelis and continue to ask them to crack down on that stuff.”

His comments to reporters came after the widespread dissemination of video showing multiple individuals attacking Heidi Levine, an American photojournalist with the Washington Post. Levine was one of at least two people injured in the Friday incident, which took place as Israeli settlers attacked Palestinian civilians.

European ‌diplomats and a French mayor also were attacked in the occupied West Bank, Belgium’s foreign minister said.

The US state department, Rubio said, has inquired about the event that included Levine’s attack. Rubio, who spoke to reporters before boarding a flight to Uzbekistan, said he expects to hear back from the US Embassy in Jerusalem by Sunday.

Israeli settlers in the West Bank have been involved in at least 170 attacks on Palestinians since Sept 27, around the start of the annual olive harvest, according to Yesh Din, an Israeli settlements monitoring group.