A rock came through the car window as Fleur Hassan-Nahoum was telling the camera that her group was surrounded and under threat. In footage broadcast by Kan News, a voice tells the passengers to duck a moment before the stone strikes, shattering the glass. Minutes later, Hassan-Nahoum held the rock up to the lens. “This kills. It’s not just throwing stones; this kills,” she said.
Hassan-Nahoum, a former deputy mayor of Jerusalem and number five on the Amcha Yisrael (People of Israel) party list headed by Ofer Winter, was attacked on Monday along with a delegation of pro-Israel influencers from the United States and South America near the entrance to Turmus Ayya in the Binyamin region. The delegation of social media influencers, bloggers, and content creators was on a fact-finding tour organized by Regavim’s International Department. Alongside Hassan-Nahoum, participants included influencers Bellamy Belucci, Hallel Silverman, Golda Daphna, Jessica Cohen, and Avi Abelow.
The tour was designed to challenge the prevailing international narrative about Judea and Samaria. Participants were scheduled to see Palestinian luxury estates that contradict the image of poverty under occupation, severe environmental pollution that Regavim calls environmental terrorism, the Palestinian Authority’s illegal construction aimed at establishing a de facto state, and the “settler violence” narrative that has driven sanctions and political pressure against Israel.
As the delegation approached the entrance to Turmus Ayya, dozens of Arab rioters descended on the vehicles, according to Regavim. They hurled rocks and tried to block the delegation’s passage with cars. Participants said children and teenagers were among the attackers. One vehicle’s windshield was shattered, and content creator Cindy Seni suffered minor injuries. Regavim field coordinators alerted Israeli security forces, who arrived within minutes.
Seni credited the group’s driver with saving their lives. “We were just in our car minding our own business when a very aggressive man speaking perfect English started harassing us and being aggressive,” she said. “He forced us to leave by blocking the entry, and as we were leaving, we had this concrete thrown at us. If our driver hadn’t told us to lower our heads, I don’t know where we would be today. He saved our lives. This is the reality that we face in Israel every day, but you’ll never hear it in the news.”
Hassan-Nahoum said the attack showed what Jewish residents of the region live with. “It was horrifying to be attacked by a group of terrorists for the mere fact that we were there. This is the reality that the residents of Judea and Samaria experience on a daily basis,” she said. In a video recorded after the attack, she held up the rock and mocked the common description of stone-throwers as innocent 12- and 13-year-olds. She vowed that “Palestinian terrorism will not deter us,” and said she would continue to fight for Israel’s name around the world.
Regavim called the assault “a deliberate attempted lynching targeting civilians and an international delegation that came to see the reality of Judea and Samaria for themselves.”
“The fact that children and teenagers were among those involved in this attack is particularly disturbing,” the movement said. “The sight of young people participating in such violence should raise serious questions about the hatred and incitement to which the next generation is being exposed.”
Regavim said the delegation became victims of the very violence it had come to investigate. “For years, the international conversation about Judea and Samaria has been dominated by allegations of ‘settler violence,’ while attacks against Israelis receive far less attention,” the statement read. “Today, a group of international influencers came to examine those narratives firsthand and found themselves on the receiving end of the very violence that is so often overlooked.”
The movement called on Israel’s security forces to bring those responsible to justice and vowed to continue its tours. “Violence and intimidation will not deter us from that mission,” Regavim said.
Hassan-Nahoum is one of Israel’s best-known English-speaking advocates. The Gibraltar-born lawyer, daughter of Gibraltar’s longtime chief minister Sir Joshua Hassan, served as Jerusalem’s deputy mayor in charge of foreign relations, co-founded the UAE-Israel Business Council after the Abraham Accords, and has served as the Foreign Ministry’s special envoy for trade and innovation. Israelis go to the polls on October 27.
A village with a record
Turmus Ayya, a village under Palestinian Authority control northeast of Ramallah, is home to many residents who also hold American citizenship. That gives incidents there outsized attention in the American press. Regavim has long challenged the village’s image as a peaceful community under siege. In an op-ed this year, Naomi Kahn, director of Regavim’s International Division, noted that the village had dedicated a park to Amar Rabi, a local terrorist killed by IDF soldiers while attacking Israeli motorists, and wrote that residents make no secret of their support for Fatah and for terrorism against Israel.
In May 2021, Muntasir Shalabi, a Palestinian-American from Turmus Ayya, opened fire at the Tapuach Junction and murdered 19-year-old yeshiva student Yehuda Guetta. In August 2023, an Israeli man who mistakenly drove into Turmus Ayya was surrounded by residents who stoned him and torched his car before IDF soldiers rescued him.
Monday’s attack came at the end of a week when the same area drew international condemnation over violence by Jewish extremists. On October 16, during the olive harvest, cars were burned near Turmus Ayya and a Washington Post photographer was injured nearby. The next day, Western diplomats were attacked near Taybeh. On Monday, Israel Police announced the arrest of 10 suspects in those attacks. As of Tuesday morning, no arrests had been reported in the attack on Hassan-Nahoum’s delegation.
