In Part 1, Yehudit Katsover told the story of her family’s aliyah, her years in Dimona and Kiryat Arba, and the dramatic Beit Hadassah sit-in that reestablished Jewish presence in Hebron. But the story did not end there.
After the expulsion from Gush Katif in 2005, Katsover met Nadia Matar and joined her in the grassroots organization Women in Green. Together, they launched a new phase of activism—not one of protest, but of vision. Not just defending land, but advocating for sovereignty.
This is that story.
The Turning Point
Between 2006 and 2011, Women in Green worked tirelessly to bring land back to Jewish hands. Day and night, hill after hill, they reclaimed ground from creeping foreign-backed encroachment on Israeli state land.
But in 2011, something changed.
In the middle of yet another tree planting—after Arabs had once again uprooted Jewish saplings—Yehudit dropped her tools and said:
Enough is enough!
If we focus only on settling and planting,” she said, “we are not going to win this war. The Arabs are funded by billions—Oxfam, USAID, and other hostile NGOs. They have tractors, maps, and lawyers. We’re fighting with meager tools, barely any money, and defending one hilltop at a time.
That moment, on a Judean hill, changed everything. Settlement alone was no longer enough. The next layer of action had to be political.
On that hilltop, at that moment, the Sovereignty Movement was born.
Others had spoken about sovereignty in academic and policy circles. But Yehudit and Nadia did something different: they made it the core mission.
No more treating it as one cause among many. No more settling for tents and caravans. They were no longer just activists defending the land: they were visionaries staking a claim to the future.
From Vision to Campaign
The 2005 disengagement had shown that settlement was not enough. In six days, Israel uprooted thousands of Jews and destroyed dozens of communities. Without sovereignty, Israel sends the message that its presence is temporary.
We knew the Left would never accept sovereignty so we started with the Right. Even they weren’t convinced at first. But we pushed. And we didn’t stop.
They were mocked. Laughed at. Dismissed as pests. But they persisted.
We’re mitnahalim—settlers. The word mitnahalim comes from nahala, which means ‘inheritance.’ We are the inheritors of this land.
The Real War: Maps, Deeds, and Foreign Money
Katsover and Matar saw what others missed: the war was not just on the battlefield. It was being fought in courtrooms, in NGO offices, on topographic maps.
Everywhere we looked, there were signs in English and Arabic on buildings across Judea and Samaria: ‘Funded by the Netherlands.’ ‘A USAID Project.’ ‘Supported by the EU.’ All aiding the illegal Arab takeover of Israeli state land.
That is when they got serious.
They studied land law in depth. Learned how to read maps. Distinguished state land from private land. Survey land from trust land.
We never built on private Arab land. Always and only on state land. And we used their own maps to prove it.
They fought with facts and law. And they won. Again and again.
A War We Never Finished
“From 1967 until 2011,” Katsover explained, “we created Jewish communities throughout Judea and Samaria. But how much land did we actually redeem? Maybe 3 percent.”
Nadia and I were fighting over a dunam here and another there, while the map was being redrawn behind our backs.
The deeper issue? Israel never declared sovereignty after the Six-Day War.
We won militarily in 1967 but failed diplomatically. Instead of applying Israeli law to Judea, Samaria, Gaza, the Golan, and Jerusalem, the government froze. They had not expected to win; in fact, they’d dug 20,000 graves in fields, preparing for catastrophe.
Instead of a bold political move, Israel established the Civil Administration—a military apparatus—to govern what should have become part of the state. That vacuum allowed the Arabs to claim the land. The myth of a distinct “Palestinian people” took root. And the Oslo Accords were born.
Under Oslo, Judea and Samaria were divided into three regions: Areas A and B were handed to Arab control. Even Area C, supposedly under full Israeli jurisdiction, was soon being overtaken by the Palestinian Authority, parcel by parcel, paid for by massive foreign investments intent upon constructing illegal homes and roads and developing agricultural fields on Israeli state land. This phenomenon continues to the present day.
The Collapse of the Left
A deeper shift is now unfolding.
“The Left is in ideological collapse,” Katsover said. “Their worldview was built on the idea that appeasement equals righteousness. But the Gaza massacre shattered that illusion.”
Many Israeli progressives had believed in coexistence, humanitarianism, and building bridges, even after rockets rained down from Gaza on Sderot, Ashkelon, and Ashdod. But October 7 stripped away the veil.
Those who believed in coexistence gave food, medicine, and jobs to people who raised snakes. And now they’ve realized it.
She praised figures like Idan Roll, who left left-wing institutions and acknowledged that the old paradigm had failed.
He acted bravely. Anyone who changes their position now is brave. It’s hard to say: I was wrong.
The Moral War
What troubles Katsover most is the moral confusion she sees around her.
Too many Israelis still cling to Christian-style morality: pity for the wrong side. But real morality is rooted in truth. You don’t reward terrorists. You don’t treat the enemy better than your own citizens.
“This is a war for survival,” she said. “Not vengeance. But clarity.”
Sovereignty Now, Not Just Over Area C
We don’t need sovereignty over Area C alone. We need it over all of Judea and Samaria. This is our biblical homeland: Hebron, Beit El, Shechem, Shiloh.
Tel Aviv exists because Hebron existed first.
The Oslo paradigm is dead. The time has come to finish what was started in 1967.
Just like with the Golan. Just like with Jerusalem. The State of Israel must declare sovereignty. And then, God willing, Trump will come again and place his stamp on it.
The Arab Question: After October 7?
Until recently, the plan was to offer Arabs in Judea and Samaria the same status as East Jerusalem residents: non-citizen residency, with local autonomy.
Now? Katsover is less sure.
They didn’t condemn the massacre. Many supported it. And we know they’re armed. The IDF is already operating house to house, confiscating weapons. But it’s not enough.
She does not call for mass expulsion. She calls for honesty.
We need a new approach. We need to rethink the entire region. Syria has collapsed. The Kurds want a state. The colonial borders drawn by Sykes-Picot are obsolete. We need new alliances. New maps. A new coalition of nations that still know good from evil.
The Warning
If we don’t extend sovereignty over Judea and Samaria, if we do not act decisively. we will face Gaza all over again.”
But next time, she warned, it will not be 1,200 dead.
It could be 20,000.
You can read about the plan for sovereignty here.
In Part 3, I share Nadia Matar’s story: “Sovereignty Is in the Air: A Conversation with Nadia Matar, Part 3”
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Excellent!!! I always was under the mistaken opinion that we needed to 'share the land' aka Judea and Samaria to make peace. That the 'settlers' were the issue. As I got older, I realized that we are the rightful owners, not of a corner of our house but the whole house. And while I abhor the mentality that killed Rabin z"l or that of Baruch Goldstein and his kind, I also believe in fighting for rights. Not just by the gun and violence but in law. We have the land deeds. We have the history. We are the descendants of the Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Moses and the Maccabees, not a fictional people declared so in 1964 by someone trained by the Soviets to tell the most egregious of lies and brainwash the world into their mass delusion. My heart has hardened. You want to live in peace like many of our Arab brothers and sisters do, great. No? Then go back to where your ancestors are from just like you tell us to do. Arafat was Egyptian. Am Israel Chai!!
I command you and Matar for publishing this post and your persistence on the project of sovereignty. Kudos to your work.
I'll email you a letter which was sent by Howard Grief to the Supreme Court Judge הלקח about this issue.