Louis Theroux forces Britain to face uncomfortable truth of Israeli settler barbarism
Settlers fire at Palestinians while Israeli soldiers stand by in Huwwara on 13 October 2022
Peter Oborne writes in Middle East Eye on 30 April 2025:
In February, the ultra-right Spectator magazine launched a sudden and unexpected hatchet job on filmmaker Louis Theroux. The magazine, edited by former cabinet minister Michael Gove, told readers: “Theroux is once again making a film about Jews in Judea and Samaria – the region known as the West Bank – focusing on so-called ‘settlers.’”
Spectator writer Jonathan Sacerdoti presumably used these scare quotes to signal scepticism about the mere use of the word “settler”. He then laid into Theroux’s previous film on Israeli settlements, The Ultra Zionists, released in 2011. He described it as a “documentary criticised by some for cherry-picking the most extreme and controversial voices from the settler movement to create a caricature of violent, religious fanatics. Many felt it ignored the historical and security-driven reasons behind Israeli settlement policies, overlooked the very real threats posed by Palestinian terrorism, and failed to present any real balance.”
For good measure, Sacerdoti also launched an attack on Theroux’s wife, Nancy Strang, on the basis that her views on Israel “appear to be anything but impartial”.
The Spectator’s pre-emptive strike was followed by a chorus of attacks in Britain’s right-wing press. According to the Telegraph, whose reporting on Israel cannot be described as remotely impartial, the Theroux film is “surplus to requirements”.
The Daily Mail accused Theroux of a “deep streak of cynicism”, adding: “His interviewees are carefully chosen, to reinforce the BBC narrative that Israelis are the oppressors and Palestinians their victims.” The knives are out for Louis Theroux.
Supported by the state
All three papers attack, directly or by implication, the BBC. They argue that Theroux has set out to attack Israel by picking on a fringe group of extremists and that, in the words of the Telegraph, “moderate Israelis regard the settlers as a national embarrassment”.
The argument that settlers are a fringe movement is based on an invincible ignorance that is wholly characteristic of mainstream British media when it comes to Israel. The West Bank settlers who Theroux chronicles in his film are supported in every conceivable way by the Israeli state.
Their numerous crimes against Palestinians are rarely prosecuted. In parts of the occupied West Bank, the settlers and security forces have effectively merged. Theroux’s documentary provides a vivid case in point when he finds himself trapped with a group of Palestinians under assault from settlers.
These settlers enjoy full civil rights, along with other government benefits, including soft loans. Meanwhile, Palestinians have virtually no rights at all, having been subject to a system of arbitrary military government since 1967. This is why all serious human rights organisations, including Israel’s B’Tselem, call Israel an apartheid state.
This ought to have political consequences. Why hasn’t Britain sanctioned settler leaders Itamar Ben Gvir, Smotrich and many others?