Mohammad and Khalid Mahmara’s recent attack in Tel Aviv is just another of these endless acts of despair committed by a population that has been colonised for nearly 50 years. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed it was “a terrorist attack similar to what Daesh commits elsewhere”. He just seems to forget that such “terrorists” often become “national heroes”, once independence is obtained — and isn’t colonialism another form of “continuing violence”, which can be assimilated to terrorism?
Since the “knife war” started a year ago, 34 Israelis and 207 Palestinians have been killed. One Israeli for every six Palestinians; not every life has the same weight. The destruction of the attackers’ houses and their corpses not being returned, the erection of the Wall, repeated curfews and other assets frozen did actually very little: Violence has become unpredictable and sudden. There is indeed no future, no hope but a total despair.
The whole world is at war with Daesh (the self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant). These criminals explode bombs in Brussels and Istanbul. But in Palestine, the situation hardly moves. Netanyahu is obviously hostile to the existence of a Palestinian state and the international community doesn’t want to acknowledge it. The return of Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s Defence Minister, makes this government one of the most extremist Israel has ever known. The United States continues to pay billions of dollars supplying arms to Israel and the last Arab attempt to do something concrete goes back to Jordan’s offer to former prime minister Ariel Sharon, 14 years ago.
Meanwhile, Israel goes on deploying a policy that makes the issue even harder to settle, such as the continuing illegal colonies and the destruction of European Union-sponsored villages in zone E1.
The June 3 Paris International Conference is another illustration of Israel having nothing to fear from the rest of the world. A bungled event supposed to gather 30 countries (although not attended by Israelis and Palestinians, nor by Russia), it quickly revealed itself as a mock event invented by a deliquescent diplomacy, with the shabby intent to make those 2 per cent of the suburban voting population remember that French President Francois Hollande is not pro-Israel (in the forthcoming presidential election, each percentage has a value). As to a possible freeze of Israeli colonies in the West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem, it was not even mentioned in the final communique “because Israel opposed it”.
In the region also, Israel goes on advancing its pawns, with the ultimate goal remaining unchanged: The dismemberment of any strong Arab entity. It already occurred in Iraq and they still think it can happen in Syria (with regional consequences that would probably put the whole region under fire). Israel goes on interfering in Lebanon (see its role in the US-sponsored Hezbollah Preventive Financing Act), even though the country sometimes manages to resist other manoeuvres (French telecom operator Orange being boycotted because of its supposed links with Tel Aviv).
On the communication side, it is a ‘global war’ as usual, with pro-Israeli journalists dominating the western scene. It is so easy to assimilate Palestinian fighters with Daesh criminals. Some Arab personalities, voluntarily or stupid enough, do not even see the risk of appearing on TV shows (Israeli channel I-24 News recently invited Lebanese novelist Ameen Maalouf). On the French stage, the matter is not mentioned. The words ‘lobby’ or ‘anti-Zionism’ are obviously banned and nobody will take the risk to wonder at former minister Jean-Francois Coppe giving an interview to the same I-24 News, a media tool of the Israeli Likud party.
So, is everything lost for the Palestinian people? The deafening silence of the Palestinian National Authority, contrasting with the growing croaking of those who want to substitute its head; the Israeli manipulation of the Gaza Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas; and the lack of interest of too many Arab leaders in this long and painful cause, which is not seen as a priority anymore, would make one believe it is so.
Actually, and the Israelis for once might be right, a significant part of the issue lies with the Palestinians themselves: Are they able to look forward and turn the page of an era that has passed away, as did their illustrious historical leaders? The Israelis claim that there is nobody to discuss with on the Palestinian side — and contemporaneously, keep Marwan Barghouti under close control in one of their most secure jails.
Throughout this, young Palestinians go on throwing stones against bullets or brandish cold steel against automatic rifles, as the world looks the other way. As French philosopher Montaigne recalled four centuries ago, “One of the greatest wisdom of military art is never to push his enemy to despair”.
Luc Debieuvre is a French essayist and a lecturer at Iris (Institut de Relations Internationales et Strategiques) and the Faco Law University of Paris.
