Israeli settlers besieging Palestinian families in West Bank village

Israeli settlers have been besieging two Palestinian families in their homes in the occupied West Bank since Sunday, with the families saying their supplies were running out and rights groups urging the authorities to step in.

On Wednesday Israeli security forces were reported to have withdrawn from the Jewish settler outpost in the village of Qusra near Nablus, following clashes with a crowd of extremist settlers. About a dozen settlers are said to remain at the site.

After the Palestinian homeowners made their initial report to the Israeli army, the first soldiers who arrived at the scene were filmed praying with the settlers.

The Abu Ridi and Hassan families have been posting on social media appealing for help after their water and power supplies were cut off and their food stocks ran low.

The latest developments come as a top UN official told the Security Council in New York on Tuesday that "the West Bank is at breaking point".

All settlements are illegal under international law. Outposts are set up without official Israeli authorisation.

Palestinian security camera footage shows settlers tearing down a wall outside the Abu Ridi family's home on Sunday evening and using the stones to block the road.

This left seven people - including two young girls – unable to leave their homes while other Palestinians could not reach them. They live in what is known as Area B, part of the West Bank under Palestinian administrative control and Israeli security control.

Posting on Facebook, Qusay Abu Ridi said the situation was critical, "especially as we are completely isolated."

He wrote: "We are living in our own home, on our own land, and we are asking for nothing more than the right to live safely and with dignity."

On Monday, Israeli settlers blocked Israeli journalists from the left-leaning Haaretz newspaper from trying to reach the Palestinian properties. The reporters said Israeli soldiers at the scene refused to help them when their car was blocked for two hours. They were told the area was a closed military zone, however the order was not enforced on the settlers.

A day later the Israeli human rights group Yesh Din urgently appealed to the head of the Israeli military's Central Command for the army to protect the besieged residents, evacuate the settlers' outpost and hold the settlers accountable.

Late on Tuesday, a Palestinian ambulance was finally allowed to reach the families, delivering food and taking one child away for medical treatment.

At about the same time, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) put out a statement condemning the establishment of the new outpost. It said that entering and seizing Palestinian homes was "illegal, reprehensible, and unacceptable activity".

When the head of its Central Command, Maj Gen Avi Bluth and other senior officers arrived at the scene early on Wednesday they are said to have met residents and voiced their "grave concern".

Afterwards, Palestinian security camera video shared with the BBC showed confrontations between Israeli soldiers and border police and a large crowd of settlers. The security forces used tear gas and stun grenades.

In other footage, the Israeli forces appear to have confiscated the canopy under which the settlers were sheltering, while leaving their other equipment.

"Border Police forces evacuated the tent and are working to evacuate the civilians who were staying there. The incident is still ongoing," the IDF stated.

It said it was decided that "disciplinary action would be taken against the security personnel involved, who were documented at the site several days ago".

The Palestinian village mayor, Abdel Azim Wadi, told the BBC that local residents had seen "a clear and sustained pattern of targeting Qusra". Last month a newly completed mosque was set on fire with graffiti in Hebrew sprayed nearby.

That settler attack was one of many that followed on from an incident in the Palestinian village of Tal. After Israeli settlers attacked Tal, it triggered an escalation in which six people were killed - four Palestinians and two Israeli soldiers – one of whom acted as a security coordinator for a nearby Israeli settlement.

In July, settlers also surrounded a Palestinian home in the village of Jalud, near Qusra, for more than two weeks. Afterwards, the owners fled and settlers took over the property where they remain until now.

"Settler violence has reached unprecedented levels," the UN's Deputy Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Ramiz Alakbarov, told the Security Council in a briefing on Tuesday.