Hilltop Youth, Hardal: The anti-Zionist Jews threatening Israel - opinion

Since the end of the Second Intifada in 2005, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict had been largely smoldered, that was until October 7. Hamas had launched small-scale wars from the Gaza Strip, and Palestinian armed groups and individuals had carried out terrorist attacks in the West Bank and in Israel, prompting stringent Israeli military responses. Last year, however, showed an increase in a distinct type of hostility accompanied by a deadly rise of violence among Palestinians and Israelis in the West Bank.

In June 2023, dozens of settlers (Israeli civilians living beyond the 1967 Green Line) entered and attacked the Palestinian town of Turmus Ayya. Some 30 houses and 60 cars were burned. Then there was the Palestinian terror attack in the Eli settlement, which claimed the lives of four Israelis. Following the attack, roughly 20 settlers set cars on fire in the Palestinian village of Hawara.

As the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza rages on and the threat of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s “ring of fire” looms ever larger, recent weeks have witnessed a troubling resurgence of this violence in the West Bank. In the village of Wadi Rahhal, Israeli settlers opened fire, killing a Palestinian man and wounding three others. Simultaneously, a Hamas operative – recently freed in the November hostage deal – was eliminated by the IDF in Nur Shams after allegedly resuming terrorist activities. Four Jewish Israeli suspects were arrested for their involvement in a brutal assault on the Palestinian village of Jit, while a Palestinian gunman claimed the life of an Israeli civilian in a drive-by shooting. These events are not isolated; they’re part of a particular violence that seems increasingly entrenched.

One might be tempted to dismiss this phenomenon as just another sequence of violent incidents, but to grasp the issue of settler violence in the territories – often framed as “a natural act of vengeance” against Palestinian terrorists, yet more often than not involving intimidation and violence against Palestinian civilians – one must first recognize the significant changes within the settlement movement in recent years.

Since Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in 2005, a sociological and ideological shift has taken root, with some Religious Zionist circles beginning to embrace not only fundamentalist interpretations of Jewish tradition but also a rejection of both the authority of the State of Israel and the idea that the state holds any messianic significance – the latter, a notion that had been central to Religious Zionist thought since the late 1960s.

The anti-state Hardal movement and the so-called Hilltop Youth represent the latest evolution in the narrative of Religious Zionism, which can be segmented into three distinct phases: Mizrachi, Kookist, and the current era. The Mizrachi movement, initiated by Rabbi Yitzhak Yaakov Reines (1839-1915), emerged alongside the early Zionist movement. Characterized by a moderate Orthodox stance, socialist economic views, and a dovish political outlook, Mizrachi represented a pragmatic synthesis of Jewish tradition and Zionist ideals. It aimed to forge a state that integrated Jewish religious life with contemporary national and political realities. This phase sought to engage with the Zionist project while preserving Orthodoxy, positioning itself as a mediator between secular Zionists and the religious community.

Israel’s stunning victory in the Six Day War catalyzed a profound shift within Religious Zionism, giving rise to the Kookist theological framework as its dominant ethos. Named after Rabbi Zvi Yehuda Kook (1891-1982), who expanded upon the nationalist and messianic interpretations of his father, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935), Kookism redefined the religious significance of the post-1967 settlement project. According to this worldview, the war was not merely a political or military achievement – it was the very manifestation of God’s will, a tangible step in the divine process of redemption. In the Kookist framework, the State of Israel transcends its secular, civic identity to become a holy vessel, the earthly embodiment of divine will. The expansion of sovereignty over the entire Promised Land is viewed as the fusion of divine reality with the human world, a redemptive process initiated by God Himself. This deterministic perspective leaves no room for retreat; once the process is set in motion, it is believed to be irreversible. This is known as the “statist” approach, which posits that the Israeli state, despite its secular nature and population, is the “seat of God” on Earth and the primary instrument through which divine will – and ultimately, humanity’s redemption – is realized. According to this view, territorial decisions are matters of theological significance, not political.

However, over time, the messianic fervor that once fueled Kookism began to wane, as the movement encountered a series of setbacks. The withdrawal of Israel from the Sinai Peninsula as part of the peace agreement with Egypt in 1982 marked the first significant blow to the Kookist vision. This was followed by the retreat from Palestinian population centers in the West Bank under the Oslo Accords in the mid-1990s, the pullout from southern Lebanon in 2000, and, ultimately, the dismantling of settlements in Gush Katif during the Gaza Disengagement in 2005. Each of these events represented a profound theological crisis for Kookism. The Gaza Disengagement in particular dealt a fatal blow to some Religious Zionists, who began to view the democratic and liberal State of Israel as suspect – if not outright worthless – as an instrument of divine redemption. Rabbi Kook’s teachings, once a powerful ideological framework, lost their relevance, and no new unifying vision emerged to replace them.

This marked the beginning of the third period of Religious Zionism, characterized by the movement’s fragmentation and the dispersion of its adherents into various ideological currents. Some interestingly gravitated toward progressive liberalism, embracing feminist and pro-LGBTQ+ rights. Others veered in the opposite direction, aligning with anti-liberal nationalist ultra-Orthodoxy (the Hardal), while some turned to libertarianism, or Kahanism, settler vigilantism, or neo-Hassidism.

As the movement splintered, mainstream Religious Zionists increasingly integrated into the broader Israeli society. Their interests and identities shifted, and Halacha (Jewish law), once central to their lives both socially and politically, began to recede in importance. What was once a cohesive movement driven by a messianic vision became a diverse and divided community, reflecting the complex and often contradictory forces at play within Israeli society itself.

The Hardal movement and the Hilltop Youth

This is the political and social context that gave rise to the two groups discussed here. Departing from the Kookist approach, the Hardal (National Religious Haredi) movement does not offer unequivocal support to the Israeli state and its secular institutions. While not sociologically part of the haredi community, Hardalim embrace the strict observance and rejection of modernity characteristic of ultra-Orthodoxy. These Hardalim are typically found in hardline settlements like Beit El and Kedumim and are politically represented by Israel’s current finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich.

The second group, known as the Hilltop Youth, refers to decentralized communities of teenagers and young adults in the territories. They generally reject both the political and religious establishments, incorporating hassidic teachings and practices while adhering to their own standards of “authenticity.” Their residence in outposts deemed illegal even by the State of Israel highlights their rebellious and fringe ethos. They do not recognize the authority of the Knesset, effectively transforming their parents’ Religious Zionism into a form of fundamentalist anti-Zionism. Zvi Sukkot, a current member of Knesset, originated from these groups but is now viewed by them as a “traitor” due to his political role with the state apparatus.

These two groups embody a new strain of nationalism that is extremist and anti-Zionist. Their members base their connection to the Land of Israel on a literal and exclusivist reading of the Bible, outright rejecting the liberal order, its values, and democratic mechanisms. Their ultimate aim is to dismantle Israel’s democratic and secular public sphere and replace it with a halachic theocracy. This is exemplified by the case of Meir Ettinger, a leader of the Hilltop Youth who was arrested in August 2015 by Israel for his support for religious terror and the eventual replacement of the “secular state” with a religious state, called The State of Judea.

It is important to note that in both its statist and non-statist versions, the Hardal does not amount to more than 15% of Religious Zionists – around 1% of all Jews in Israel. One could argue, however, that its advantage over the rest of Religious Zionism today is its certainty, the clear answers it gives to the question of identity, and its uncompromising confidence in its vision. In the scattered landscape of Religious Zionism, following the downfall of Mizrachi and Kookism, such fundamentalists stand out not only for their right-wing and reactionary politics but also for their theological decisiveness.

Significantly, these fundamentalist conceptions of Judaism leave little to no room for other Jewish identities. Indeed, even while being no less selective than other groups in their interpretation of the scriptures, the Hardal and Hilltop Youth presume themselves to hold the final, exclusive, and definitive understanding of Judaism, viewing other Jewish groups as erroneous and temporary mishaps, if not deliberately heretical saboteurs. Despite their small size, at this time these groups are at the height of their political influence in Israel, with a prominent minister representing one (Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich), other ministers (such as the Kahanist National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir) extremely sympathetic to the other, and the entire political system subject to significant levels of pressure that these parliamentarians exert on it.

More than posing a threat, violent at times, to the lives and ways of life of others, these fundamentalist Jewish groups twist the Jewish tradition into an abominable chimera, mixing biblical literalism, ethno-nationalism, and theological obsessions similar to those of American evangelical Christians, morphing Judaism into a toxic creed that is unrecognizable and unapproachable by the vast majority of Jews living in Israel and abroad. Don’t be fooled by their size or into thinking that the violence in the territories does not have the potential to turn inward to the heart of Israel, its institutions, and the state. We already saw just a glimpse of it outside the Sde Teiman military base. These are not patriots nor Zionists. They are, in fact, the antithesis. ■

The writer is a Fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI).