dSince George W. Bush launched his “global war on terrorism” “, the United States has abandoned any serious desire to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Even Barack Obama, after some initial hesitation, granted without the slightest compensation, in 2016, military aid to Israel for an unprecedented amount of 38 billion dollars (36 billion euros) in ten years. As for Donald Trump, his first visit to the White House was accompanied by the recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and the transfer of the United States embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, while the American consulate in East Jerusalem, until now focused on the Palestinian population.
Joe Biden not only did not return to any of these fait accomplis, but he provided massive support, both military, diplomatic and financial, to the war that Benjamin Netanyahu has persisted in waging against Gaza since October 2023. The appointments already announced by Donald Trump, who the Republican majority in Congress will probably not question, nevertheless predict an administration even more hostile than the previous ones towards the Palestinians and their rights.
A completely renewed team
Trump did not hire any of his 2017-2021 aides to manage the Middle East, either specifically or as part of a broader portfolio. Even his son-in-law Jared Kushner, whom he had commissioned to develop “the business of the century » from 2020, is not renewed. This agreement, signed only between Trump and Netanyahu in the White House, reduced the future Palestine to being nothing more than a state reduced to a portion of the West Bank and without any territorial continuity. The American president did not fail to highlight the opportunity that such an “agreement” offers to his friends who promote it, due to the complex network of bridges, tunnels and ring roads that this division of Palestine makes possible. But Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, dared to reject a plan negotiated without him and against him. As a result of this failure, Donald Trump has just appointed special envoy to the Middle East, not his son-in-law, but his golf partner, Steven Witkoff, a real estate developer without the slightest diplomatic experience. There is no doubt that “the art of the deal”in which Trump claims to be an expert, this time with Witkoff in charge, will lead to an even more brutal diktat being imposed on the Palestinians than in 2020.
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