To analyse. Mahmoud Abbas watches for a convulsion. A living proof of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process that brought him to power in 2005, and on whose ruins he continues. That hope led the 86-year-old president of the Palestinian Authority (PA) to the home of General Benny Gantz, Israel’s defense minister. Shortly before the New Year, Mr. Abbas drank coffee at his home near Tel Aviv. He exchanged without ceremony with his wife and his son, and walked in his garden.
It should be recalled here that, for Palestinian opinion, Mr. Gantz is a war criminal: he led the last two conflicts in Gaza, in 2014, as army chief, then, as a member of the government, in May 2021. If the “raïs” took the risk of crossing his door, it is not for the few pledges of ” confidence “ which the Israeli side quickly made public. She promised to regularize the situation of thousands of residents of the territories without legal status, under the title of family reunification, and to grant permits to travel to Israel to entrepreneurs and members of the PA.
What Mr. Abbas came for was “a political horizon”, affirmed one of the two collaborators who accompany him everywhere and speak for him, Hussein Al-Sheikh, the very unpopular person in charge of security cooperation with Israel, who attended this interview alongside Majed Faraj, the head of the information. Their visit, he felt, represented a “last chance, before an explosion and we find ourselves at an impasse”.
Neither “guilt” nor “shame”
On this point, the two parties agree. The nearly bankrupt Palestinian Authority, abandoned by the Arab monarchies of the Gulf, obtusely authoritarian, is perceived by its subjects as a simple substitute for the Israeli occupier. The Palestinian question works independently of it, as shown by the explosion of Jerusalem and the mixed cities of Israel in May 2021, during the last war in Gaza. It goes beyond Palestinian institutions, as does the dogma of the two-state solution – which a majority of Palestinians no longer believe in. Mr. Abbas’ party, Fatah, appears to be brain dead. However, he will renew his senior executives in March. Mr. Abbas must give pledges.
Israel is well aware of these risks. On January 3, the Prime Minister, Naftali Bennett, made a point of recalling that he had approved the invitation issued to Mr. Abbas. Coming from the settler movement, hostile to the creation of a Palestinian state, he sees in it a ” tool “ to ensure the “stability” of the West Bank. “Economy and security, nothing political”, such are the imposed parameters of such a dialogue. This framework is known. In his time, Mr. Bennett’s predecessor, Benyamin Netanyahu, intended “managing the conflict” without hoping to solve it. He promised the Palestinians a simple “economic peace”, provided they forget their right to national self-determination.
You have 49.56% of this article left to read. The following is for subscribers only.