The World’s Last Samaritans, Straddling the Israeli-Palestinian Divide

Up a mountain in the West Bank, several hundred villagers practice an ancient Israelite religion while maintaining an ambiguous national identity.

MOUNT GERIZIM, West Bank — In the occupied and largely segregated West Bank, Jews live in gated Israeli settlements and Palestinians live in Arab cities and towns. And then there are the 440 residents of the mountaintop village of Al Tor, who float between both worlds. As children, they grow up speaking Arabic. As teenagers, they study at schools run by the Palestinian Authority. As retirees, many regularly smoke shisha in the Palestinian city of Nablus, farther down the slopes of Mount Gerizim. But they also hold Israeli citizenship, often work in Israel, pay for Israeli health insurance and visit relatives in a suburb of Tel Aviv. In Israeli elections, several say they vote for the right-wing, pro-settler Likud party. Yet the Samaritans are still represented on the dormant council of the Palestine Liberation Organization.