The number of Jewish settler-related incidents in the occupied West Bank has reached 591 in the first six months of 2023, the UN said.

"That’s an average of 99 incidents every month and a 39 percent increase compared with the monthly average of the whole of 2022, which is 71," Jens Laerke, spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), said on Friday at a UN briefing in Geneva.

The number of such incidents, which are resulting in Palestinian casualties, property damage, or both, in 2022 was already the highest since OCHA started recording them in 2006, Laerke said.

He highlighted that Palestinian communities who rely on herding are particularly vulnerable, saying that in the last two years, at least 399 people were forcibly displaced due to Israeli settler violence targeting seven communities engaged in herding across the occupied Palestinian territory.

Three of these communities – Al Baqa’a, Khirbet Bir al Eid, and Wedadiye – have been completely depopulated due to the violence, while the rest of the communities only have a few families remaining, he added.

Numerous communities throughout the occupied West Bank are under threat of forced displacement as a result of a coercive environment created by demolitions, illegal settlement expansion, and other illegal practices enforced by the Israeli government and protected by Israeli forces.

"Israeli settlements are illegal under international law," he said. "They deepen humanitarian needs due to their impact on livelihoods, food security and access to essential services."