In recent days, reports circulated on Palestinian social media claiming that Jewish “settlers” had set fire to an abandoned car lot near the village of Ein Yabrud in the Binyamin area. However, footage from the scene presents the opposite picture — the Palestinians themselves started the fire.

According to findings from the scene and a video published by Army Radio, several Palestinians from Ein Yabrud attempted to set fire to an access road leading to a nearby outpost. During the incident, they lost control of the flames, which quickly spread toward the nearby car lot.

The footage shows the Arabs attempting unsuccessfully to extinguish the blaze before being forced to flee the scene.

Shortly later, accusations blaming Jewish hilltop residents for “setting the car lot on fire” quickly spread online.

The IDF said that security forces and trackers who arrived at the scene determined, based on the findings, that the fire had been set by Palestinians. Security forces are working to locate those responsible and bring them to justice.

Jewish residents of the nearby yishuv of Kfar Ana said: “We’re seeing yet another blood libel as part of the ‘settler violence’ campaign that has been disproven. This is a systematic, deliberate, and false attempt to smear the hilltop settlers — something that, unfortunately, sometimes succeeds and even receives cooperation from Israeli media outlets.”

“This time, by a neis, we managed to document the incident from beginning to end and disprove the despicable accusations, but that is not always possible because of the terrain and the complexity of such incidents.

“This is the time to remind Am Yisrael: If you encounter a report about ‘settler violence,’ take it with a grain of salt and check carefully to make sure you are not falling easy prey to a malicious and antisemitic campaign.”

(YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)