T
wo months after the October 13 Sharm el-Sheikh summit in Egypt, during which Donald Trump declared a "lasting peace" in the Middle East, doubt has now set in, for good reason. Since the release of the last Israeli hostages and the halting of the massive bombardments that devastated Gaza, the plan promoted by the US president has stalled.
The Israeli army continues to occupy half of a narrow strip of land turned into a field of ruins, where more than two million Palestinians struggle to survive in degrading conditions. Israel still denies the media free access to this territory, which continues to monopolize attention and effectively overshadow the quieter terror imposed in the West Bank by extremist Israeli settlers and an occupying army that has lost its bearings.
The meticulous account reported by Le Monde on December 10 is damning. Never before has the largest Palestinian territory experienced such a level of violence from Israel, buried so many of its dead, recorded so many wounded, prisoners – often subjected to ill-treatment – and so much destruction. The attitude of the Israeli army, in the face of ever more numerous and increasingly bloody abuses by settlers, reflects the growing influence of religious Zionists among its officers, some of whom have trained in military programs established in the heart of the West Bank. Meanwhile, the settlement policy, which continues to carve up the territory and turns every movement by Palestinians into a nightmare, is advancing inexorably. The Palestinian Authority, reduced to the status of a mere auxiliary of the occupying army, has been thoroughly discredited.
