https://doi.org/10.1177/00113921251320087 Current Sociology 1–26 © The Author(s) 2025 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/00113921251320087 journals.sagepub.com/home/csi CS On the monopoly of violence: Ideal types of settler colonial violence and the habitus of sumud Areej Sabbagh-Khoury University of California, Berkeley, USA Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel Abstract Political sociologists have articulated state-making as the concentration of power and violence within state apparatuses. However, classical theories have often overlooked the distinctive characteristics of settler colonial nation-state formation, whose raison d’état is the preservation of settler sovereignty and supremacy, accumulated largely through practices of dispossession, appropriation, subjugation, and elimination, and whose power is dispersed at times to settler-citizens. Examining the case of Israel, and identifying divergent ideal types of settler colonial violence, the article pinpoints the unique features that define Israel as a settler colonial state. Moreover, it explores how the monopoly on violence is variably applied depending on contingent dynamics, and dialectical interactions with the indigenous and their habitus of sumud (steadfastness). The analysis delves into the themes of state violence and the state of exception, examining the case of the ‘Dignity Intifada’ in May 2021, alongside the genocidal war since October 7, 2023. By comprehending the material and symbolic processes shaping the persistence of settler colonialism in its different formations, the article contributes to a nuanced understanding how ‘war-by-other-means’ and indigenous resistance both endure. Keywords Habitus of sumud, ideal type, indigeneity, monopoly on violence, Palestine/Israel, political sociology, popular resistance, settler colonialism, sovereignty Corresponding author: Areej Sabbagh-Khoury, Department of Sociology, University of California, Berkeley, 410 Social Sciences Building, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA. Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Har HaZofim, Jerusalem, 91905, Israel. Email: areejsabbagh@berkeley.edu 1320087CSI 0 0 10.1177/00113921251320087Current SociologySabbagh-Khoury research-article 2025 Article