License to Kill: How Ben-Gvir Is Arming Jerusalem Against Palestinians

Israeli far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has turned the arming of settlers into an organized policy, serving a project of control and repression in Jerusalem and the West Bank, after previously carrying weapons was regulated under selective conditions. 

On March 9, 2026, Ben-Gvir announced that all residents of Jewish settlement neighborhoods in Jerusalem are now eligible to obtain a gun license based solely on their geographic location, adding more than 300,000 Jews to the pool of eligibility. 

This decision is part of a series of expansions in issuing licenses since Ben-Gvir assumed office, and coincides with an atmosphere of open war with Iran, Passover, and Ramadan, which gives the security discourse an additional justification.

From Exception to Generalization

In early February 2023, Ben-Gvir, after a shooting attack near a Jewish synagogue in Jerusalem, called for increasing the number of gun licenses fivefold, demanding that the weapons licensing department issue 10,000 licenses per month instead of 2,000.

Months later, with the start of the war on Gaza in October 2023, the pace of applications accelerated in an unprecedented way. 

The British news agency Reuters reported, citing officials, that 150,000 applications were submitted after the Operation al-Aqsa Flood, compared with 42 applications during the same period the year before.

The Israeli Ministry of National Security also announced the creation of what it called 527 volunteer guard units and the provision of 20,000 weapons for them, along with a request to purchase an additional 20,000 weapons.

In the following months, this trajectory shifted from accelerating procedures to geographic expansion. 

In January 2026, Ben-Gvir approved the possibility for settlers in 18 additional settlements in the West Bank to apply for gun licenses.

The figures for the new licenses were disputed. In March 2024, Ben-Gvir announced that he had granted 100,000 licenses since October 7, 2023, adding that another 80,000 licenses were later approved by the licensing department.

By March 2026, he boasted in an interview that the number of new licenses exceeded 240,000 since the start of his expansion of the policy, compared with about 8,000 annually before that.

However, the Israeli “Transparency Movement,” a group of organizations that monitor government corruption, said that 157,000 new licenses had been issued since the war, and that the total number of licenses in “Israel” had risen to 330,000, meaning it had nearly doubled.

The March 9, 2026, decision marked the peak of this generalization. Ben-Gvir announced that all Jewish settlers in 41 neighborhoods within Jerusalem had become eligible to obtain gun licenses based on their place of residence, in addition to four neighborhoods that had previously been eligible.

Through this step, the far-right minister removed the requirement of military service or volunteer service and turned eligibility into a purely geographic criterion. 

According to The Times of Israel, more than 300,000 people entered the circle of eligibility after this decision.

Ben-Gvir justified the decision in security-driven and inciting language, claiming it was necessary to protect the city from “enemies,” amid the war with Iran and tensions associated with the month of Ramadan.

However, this shift from a regulated exception to an open arming policy places Jerusalem and the West Bank before a more dangerous phase, in which individual weapons become part of the daily structure of settler crimes.

Chaos in Oversight

The matter did not stop there. The Israeli “Transparency Movement” spoke of chaos in the spread of weapons, noting that about half of the new license holders have no prior experience in using firearms.

The movement said that the practical exams have a pass rate of nearly 99 percent, indicating significant leniency in granting licenses. 

Investigations by Hebrew-language newspapers also revealed that illegal authority had been granted to employees in Ben-Gvir’s office to approve licenses.

The Supreme Court requested explanations from the government of Benjamin Netanyahu regarding the granting of some licenses without adhering to what it called “work regulations.” 

Five former employees are also under investigation on charges of “issuing illegal licenses.”

The Times of Israel website reported that the Movement for Quality Government, an Israeli organization specializing in oversight of government decisions, revealed that more than 1,100 licenses were issued illegally, and that there are concerns about family ties between beneficiaries and employees.

According to the Transparency Movement, there are only six inspectors in all of “Israel” overseeing whether license holders comply with the conditions, a number that appears almost absurd compared with the massive expansion in gun ownership. Personal interviews were also canceled and replaced with brief phone interviews.

These data indicate that the new decision is not merely an expansion of eligibility criteria, but part of a systematic policy to generalize arming and ease restrictions so that the widest possible segment of settlers can obtain weapons.

In the same context, Reuters reported that the Israeli government formed what it called “security teams” in Jewish communities and settlement towns and distributed 20,000 weapons, along with providing them with protective equipment.

This effectively means expanding the scope of the daily threat faced by Palestinians, especially in villages and towns adjacent to settlements and in occupied Jerusalem.

According to data from the Israeli Occupation Forces and the Shin Bet internal security service, 867 incidents classified as “nationalist crimes” by settlers occurred in 2025, an increase of 27 percent compared with 2024. Meanwhile, “serious” attacks, including shootings and arson, rose from 83 to 128 incidents.

United Nations reports indicated that 2025 witnessed more than 1,800 settler attacks that resulted in deaths, injuries, or property destruction across 280 Palestinian areas, while 240 Palestinians were killed in the West Bank during the same year.

For example, on March 8, 2026, settlers attacked the village of Khirbet Abu Falah near Ramallah and killed two Palestinian youths, while a third died after inhaling tear gas fired by the Israeli Occupation Forces.

What Are the Impacts?

Therefore, the expansion of arming in Jerusalem warns of rising danger and creates new possibilities for confrontation in an environment of near-permanent impunity, where Israeli police tolerate settler attacks and deal with them with a significant degree of leniency.

The media adviser to the Jerusalem Governorate, Maarouf al-Rifai, confirmed that Ben-Gvir’s decision “represents a dangerous escalation that warns of increased assaults and crimes against Palestinians in the occupied city.”

Al-Rifai told Al-Estiklal, “This decision comes within the context of a systematic Israeli policy to arm settlers and turn them into an armed force working alongside the occupation forces, as the number of individual weapon holders has increased in Israeli society since October 7, 2023.”

“The danger of the decision doubles in light of the rising crimes of settlers, which reflects the direct results of the incitement and arming policies adopted by the Israeli government.”

Al-Rifai pointed out that arming settlers is not limited to personal pistols, but also includes support for what are called “readiness teams” in the settlements.

“These groups are being supported with advanced weapons, including sniper rifles with a range of about 800 meters, in addition to assault rifles and night-surveillance equipment, which turns the settlements into armed military outposts inside and around Palestinian communities,” he continued.

Thus, expanding the arming of settlers in Jerusalem represents a dangerous step that could fuel violence and threaten the lives of Palestinians, and reflects a political orientation by the Israeli government to entrench a colonial reality based on force and racism in the occupied city, according to the Palestinian official.

Israeli affairs expert Nihad Abu Ghosh said that Ben-Gvir’s decision to allow expanded gun ownership in Jerusalem, even for those who did not serve in the army, comes within an escalatory climate through which the occupation seeks to impose a new reality on the ground through settlement expansion.

Abu Gosh added in a television interview that this decision amounts to “granting a public license to kill Palestinians and confront them with weapons,” as part of a series of assaults and violations affecting the status of citizens and their holy sites across all of Palestinian land.

“The occupation is betting on imposing a new reality, so that it will not be possible in the future to roll back any new step it takes, whether it is related to confiscating land, establishing new settlements, or even stripping the Palestinian Authority of its powers,” he added.

He explained that the occupation is betting that time will lead the world to grow accustomed to this new reality and accept it, just as it previously accepted preventing Palestinians from returning to their lands and the failure to implement United Nations resolutions.