Jewish settlers Photojournalist Ed Kashi captures the defiance of the West Bank's Jewish settlers Daily prayers at Bat Ayin, held at sundown, attended by male adults and some of the children. While Hamas and other Arab terrorist groups wage war on the peace process from without, a group of extremist Jewish settlers, unmoved by their government's policies or public sentiment, are waging war within. Over the past two years I have been documenting the lives of these settlers. Yeshiva students here take self-defense as seriously as Torah studies. A simple trip to nearby baths or vineyards is an armed excursion.
Mobile homes are crane-lifted into place in defiance of Israeli law.
I plan to return to the West Bank at least twice a year for the next few years to record the settlers' reactions as the West Bank is relinquished to the Palestinians. This project also examines the broader question of identity. Like the Catholics and Protestants in Ireland, the Hutus and Tutsis in Rwanda, or the factions in Bosnia, the Jewish settlers define themselves by their enemies, or who they are not. Fear of extinction makes them prisoners of their own history.