Slaughter in Samaria: How Safe are Jewish Settlers?

CBN News interviewed David Rubin, the former mayor of Shiloh, Samaria, about the safety of Jews who live in the territory ruled by the Palestinians. Watch above.

The murders of three Jewish settlers has Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria "on edge," a community leader told CBN News.

Friday, the Jewish Sabbath, a Palestinian man stabbed to death a 70-year-old man and his two adult children as they celebrated the birth of the family's newest grandson.

CBN News spoke with David Rubin about the safety of Jews living in the territory ruled by the Palestinians. Rubin lives in the Jewish community of Shiloh in Samaria, in the territory the mainstream media calls the West Bank. 

"Every time that there's a terrorist attack -- the people of Samaria, the biblical heartland of Israel -- everyone's nervous; everyone is on edge because we know that it could happen to us," Rubin told CBN News.

"Every single community in Samaria has been afflicted in some way by the so-called Palestinian terrorism, and the Islamic terrorism knows no bounds; it knows no end," he said.

Related Link: Defying Terrorism: A Playground in Israel's Heartland

"And in fact, it doesn't seem to understand that when a terrorist kills a family, that when a terrorist kills two policemen on the Temple Mount that they're paying the terrorists, and they have the nerve to complain about Israel putting some security measures into effect," Rubin continued.

Israeli officials point out that security measures are standard practice all over the world, even in Mecca in Saudi Arabia. But Islamic officials who administer the Temple Mount protested, and Palestinian Authority officials called for more protests. 

"We are moving toward an escalation," one P.A. official said. "The Israelis are moving toward an escalation, and we have no problem on our part that there will also be an escalation from the Palestinian side."

Rubin said the safety of Jews in Samaria is uncertain.

"I'm proud to say that we do protect ourselves," Rubin told CBN News. "Many of us are armed, and we do have security, but there is a very precarious situation."

"We're here living in Samaria in the heart of Israel because we want to raise our children; we want to rebuild the land that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob gave us," he went on to say. 

"But we're being confronted with a Muslim enemy that wants to kill every Jew, or at least force every Jew to be frightened and to leave," Rubin continued. "Well, I got news for them -- we're not leaving."

A security officer at a settlement in Judea posted a video on Facebook while he was riding on patrol after the murders of Yosef Salomon, 70, his daughter Chaya, 46, and son Elad, 35. Watch below.

Rubin is the founder and president of the Shiloh Israel Children's Fund, which helps children who are the victims of terrorist attacks.

"I was wounded in a terrorist attack; my three-year-old son was shot in the head by terrorists," Rubin said. "We have seen so many terrorist attacks in the time that I've been living here."

"I had to open up a therapy center -- my Shiloh Israel Children's Fund opened up a therapy center to heal the trauma of terror victim children," he continued. "We have so many that it's such a disproportionate amount of terrorist attacks here."