Israeli settlers detain US congressman Ro Khanna in occupied West Bank

Armed Israeli settlers detained US congressman Ro Khanna for about 90 minutes during a visit to the occupied West Bank on 8 July, according to The Guardian. Khanna said settlers carrying US-made rifles surrounded the delegation’s van near the Palestinian village of Khirbet Zanuta in the southern West Bank, and that Israeli soldiers did not intervene.

The episode is a small incident with a large footprint: it places a US lawmaker inside the daily ambiguity of authority in parts of the West Bank, where settlers, soldiers and police can be physically present at the same scene while responsibility remains contested. Khanna said the group continued only after contacting the US embassy and Israeli police, while the Israeli military told reporters that troops and police responded to a report of settlers obstructing vehicles near Khirbet Zanuta. The gap between those two versions is not about whether the road was blocked, but about who is expected to clear it when the people doing the blocking are Israeli civilians with weapons and the people being blocked include Americans.

Khirbet Zanuta itself has become a shorthand for how quickly facts on the ground harden into permanence. The Guardian notes it is a Palestinian hamlet whose residents were forced to leave after violent settler raids following Hamas’s attacks on Israel in October 2023. Khanna said settlers had previously destroyed a school and a village in the area he visited. More than 700,000 Israelis live in settlements across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, according to figures cited by the paper, and the United Nations considers the settlements illegal.

For Washington, the incident lands at a moment when US engagement is often expressed through statements and aid packages rather than enforceable constraints. Khanna’s account describes soldiers “siding with the settlers” and showing “no respect” for the presence of Americans. Even if Israeli forces dispute that characterization, the practical result was that a visiting delegation was immobilised until outside calls were made. In a territory where Palestinians typically cannot call an embassy to unstick a checkpoint, the mechanism that ended the standoff is part of the story.

The Guardian reports that Khanna has said he is strongly considering running for president and that the trip increased his resolve. The van eventually moved on; the settlement map around Khirbet Zanuta did not.