Israël et les Palestiniens

Some twenty senior officials from all sides reveal the behind-the-scenes story of the US-led Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, whose deadlock and subsequent failure between 2003 and 2023 led to the worst-case scenario. In 2005, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon took everyone by surprise (Washington's “godfathers,” the rest of the international community, and his own Likud supporters) by announcing the withdrawal of Israeli settlements and troops from the Gaza Strip. Followed by the unexpected electoral victory of Hamas, which took control of the enclave and soon expelled the Fatah forces under the command of Mahmoud Abbas, the new president of the Palestinian Authority, this decision would prove to have serious consequences. It gave rise to insoluble Palestinian rivalries, which Israel took advantage of to extend its hold on the West Bank.

Hostilities resume: Hamas uses its tunnels to penetrate Israel, which responds with a large-scale ground military operation against Gaza and the construction of an underground barrier along the border with the enclave, costing more than $1 billion. Donald Trump's arrival in the White House in early 2017 radically changed the situation: he moved the US embassy to Jerusalem—thus recognizing the holy city, also claimed by the Palestinians, as the capital of the Jewish state—and then organized “talks” with Israel, without the Palestinians, who were incensed by his unilateral decision. ... the Israelis alone. By then promoting unprecedented alliances, known as the “Abraham Accords,” with Arab countries (the United Arab Emirates, then Bahrain) that agree to recognize Israel, his administration hopes to limit Hamas's power to cause harm to the Gaza Strip—where Netanyahu's government, officially in the name of economic survival