For the past six weeks, I engaged full time in protective presence with Unarmed Civilian Protection in Palestine (UCPiP) in Ras Ein al-Auja in the West Bank, documenting settler violence and military activity and attempting to de-escalate that violence.
Toward the end of my time there, I started joking to the other activists that I regret learning Arabic, because it gave me extra work. I was the one constantly answering phone calls from residents of the village. I said this tongue-in-cheek: I love languages, and learning Arabic has been a beautiful way to expand my worldview, bond with new people, and increase the solidarity I am able to offer Palestinians as an activist. But sometimes my ability to speak Arabic made my time in Ras Ein al-Auja harder—not because I was the one translating for journalists and other visitors, passing along messages from activists about what we could or could not help with, or receiving dozens of phone calls a day from Palestinian villagers asking for increased activist presence. That was difficult, but part of the job.
What was torturous was speaking to the villagers after January 8, the day nearly thirty families were expelled from their homes in Ras Ein al-Auja, fleeing the violence and harassment they were receiving from settlers who had set up a makeshift outpost inside the village a week prior. After this, speaking to anyone from Ras Ein al-Auja felt like making small talk at a funeral.
One day after the expulsions had started, a woman from the village asked me how I was doing. I reflexively answered that I was fine, the way one does when asked a small talk greeting. She looked at me and said, “No, you’re not.” The grief was pervasive and palpable. I have done protective presence in other West Bank communities, and usually, even though Palestinian residents are under horrible conditions, with no state-provided water or electricity and constant settler attacks, there are short respites from the violence, moments of levity when you joke with a local, play with the children, or share a cigarette and coffee. And while we did all of those things in Ras Ein al-Auja, they did not offer relief from the grief of the expulsion.
On one of my last days in Ras Ein al-Auja, I spent a night at a villager’s home. This villager’s neighbor had already fled, and that meant his home was now the closest to the nearby settler outpost, Avishai’s Farm. He faced constant harassment, with settlers grazing their sheep and goats on his land, filming inside homes and buildings, and even barging into Palestinian livestock tents. While I was with him, he offered me dinner and thanked me for my presence. He told me that I was a good person and that we activists are the only ones protecting him. It was a tender, validating, and vulnerable moment that I will cherish. A few days later, he and his family fled the village.
Roman Levin
The author filming a masked Israeli settler who is leaning against a Palestinian home in the West Bank, December 27, 2025.
These expulsions have a compounding effect. Every time a family leaves, the rest of the residents become more vulnerable to settler attacks. The dominoes continue to fall, and while some families are adamant that they will stand their ground, the complete cleansing of Ras Ein al-Auja by Israeli settlers feels inevitable. Since I left the village on January 16, several more families have packed up and fled. This increased vulnerability finally brought these families to their breaking point. They have all confessed they have nowhere to go, and the urban life of Jericho, the nearest city, is not conducive to their shepherding lifestyle. Most of the people who have fled will have to find a new way to provide for their families. But, as the first expelled resident told me only two days before he fled, staying awake almost 24/7 and being on constant alert, worried about when the next settler attack will come, is simply no way to live. To be sure, the emotional weight I felt watching Palestinian families flee is nothing compared to what they experienced leading up to and during their expulsion.
During my time as an activist in the West Bank, I have witnessed military raids, arrests, and home demolitions. Even before my time in Ras Ein al-Auja, I have seen settlers build outposts inside Palestinian villages. All of that is terrible, but none of it could have prepared me for witnessing ethnic cleansing in real time. These forms of violence are all means towards an end: ethnic cleansing and complete occupation of Palestinian land. Usually, even after a home is demolished, there is a small hope that community members will find a way to take care of the people affected and eventually attempt to rebuild. But with expulsions, which occurs when a family flees the village entirely, settlers achieve their goal. Ras Ein al-Auja will join the too-long list of ethnically cleansed Palestinian communities in the West Bank. The clock is ticking before a new Israeli settlement is built on the ruins of Ras Ein al-Auja. As the villagers flee to the cities, an entire culture rooted in agricultural and pastoral lifestyle is being erased. Meanwhile, the settler project will move on to its next target.
The expulsion of Ras al-Ein is a sober reminder that time is running out. For those who care about the Palestinian struggle for liberation, the time to act is now. Organizations like UCPiP, International Solidarity Movement, and Faz3a continue to bring international activists into the West Bank to engage in protective presence. Those unable to travel to the West Bank can get involved in local Palestinian solidarity organizing and pressure elected officials to force Israel to uphold international law. We can do our best to make sure as few people as possible experience the pain and heartbreak the people of Ras Ein al-Auja experienced, which one villager called “even worse than the Nakba [of 1948.]”