Australia not ruling out sanctions against Israeli settlers as concerns grow over ‘troubling’ behaviour

Israeli checkpoint in Qalandia, in the occupied West Bank. Australian officials say a secure future for Israelis and Palestinians will ‘only come from a two-state solution’. Photograph: Zain Jaafar/AFP/Getty Images

The Australian government is increasingly alarmed at Israel’s “troubling pattern” of behaviour and has not ruled out a more assertive response, including sanctions against settlers.

In the wake of a sweeping international court of justice ruling read out in a courtroom in The Hague late on Friday that said the continued Israeli occupation of territory seized in 1967 was illegal, a senior Australian government source said the advisory opinion “can’t be ignored”.