PODCAST. War in Israel and Hamas: the diplomatic wall

As the Israeli offensive intensifies on the town of Khan Younes, pressure is growing from all sides to try to obtain a ceasefire and progress in the post-war period. But the Israeli government remains impervious and is putting up a diplomatic wall facing Europe and the United States.

“We go up to the hill of Mount Herzl in Jerusalem, this is where the largest cemetery in Israel is located” : Faustine Calmel, senior reporter for Radio France, has been traveling through Israel and the occupied territories for a week with Eric Audra. “This is where the burials of the 21 reservists who died in the collapse of a building in Gaza have been taking place for two days now.” These reservist soldiers, that is to say from civil society, died in the explosion of a building, indirectly targeted by a Hamas rocket. The building was filled with explosives. The Israelis were preparing its destruction to expand the buffer zone with Gaza to one kilometer.

This is the heaviest loss announced by the emblematic army spokesperson Daniel Hagari since the start of the war. It comes at a time when American intelligence services estimate that Hamas still has the means to resist for months. “These 21 deaths will cause a shock in Israeli society todayexplains Pierre Haski, editorialist on France Inter, interviewed Tuesday January 23. And it’s quite a strange situation, generally in times of war you have a sort of national unity, you put aside differences and you fight the conflict head on. There, every day, yesterday you have families of hostages who invaded Parliament, you have members of the War Council committee insulting each other on television, the supporters of Benny Gantz against those of Benjamin Netanyahu. It’s very strange and all of a sudden, this electroshock of this assessment will exacerbate all these debates on strategy, on ending the war, on the post-war which are at the heart of Israeli society today and on which there is no consensus in Israel.”

“We have to bring him down.”

Like a slow fuse, protest movements are taking place in several places to challenge the Israeli Prime Minister. There are tents in front of Benjamin Netanyahu’s personal residence in Cesarea, people in front of his office in Jerusalem, demonstrators on the roads in Tel Aviv. On one side, the anti-Netanyahu, on the other, the families of the hostages. Each has its own places of action, each has its own message. What they share is this feeling that this war at all costs is dragging them down. “He won’t leave, said a demonstrator in Jerusalem. We must bring him down by holding demonstrations by forming any coalition against him. We don’t know what will happen. It’s very sad.”

Prisoner of his far-right coalition, the Israeli Prime Minister resists all pressure. To the American president, he says he refuses to consider Palestinian sovereignty in exchange for a normalization of Israel’s relations with the major Arab countries. To Israelis, he assures that there is only one path: high-intensity war.

“In exchange for the release of our hostages Hamas demands an end to the war, the withdrawal of our forces from Gaza. If we accept this, then our soldiers will have fallen in vain.”

Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Prime Minister

As if it came out of an old trunk in which it had been forgotten, the two-state solution is at the center of discussions in Brussels. But Israel avoids the subject of the post-war period. The blockage is total. The Israeli government is building a diplomatic wall without seeming to fear the growing isolation, regrets Joseph Borrel. “The Israelis need to come here and talk with usbelieves the head of European diplomacy. What are the other solutions? Make all the Palestinians leave? Kill them all? The way they are trying to destroy Hamas is not the right way.”

The United States is also trying to extract concessions. Emissary Bret McGurk is in the region to try to move forward on a truce, which would allow the release of new hostages. But Benjamin Netanyahu is straining relations with Qatar, a pivotal country in these discussions, which he now accuses of financing terrorism.

In Khan Younes, “they shoot at everything that moves”

After Gaza City, the war caught up with civilians in Khan Younes. The Israelis surrounded the city. Hundreds of thousands of people are trapped in the fighting. The main UN center which serves as a refuge for the displaced was hit by tank fire according to the United Nations. According to a final provisional report, 13 people died. A large part of Amjed Tantech’s family, moved further south, is in this establishment. “Everything around is a death zonesays Amjed. They shoot at anything that moves.”

The question now arises as to where the Israeli army will stop. Further south, in Rafah, the density is extreme. The distress affects all families. Léo Cans works for MSF. Questioned on France Info, he has just left Gaza. “In all hospitals the scenes of devastated families, of children who have lost their parents, are repeated“, he explains.

He too left Gaza, and a window on this war is closing. Photographer Motaz Azaiza has been in Qatar for a few days. His coverage of the fighting and the daily lives of Gazans was followed by 18 million subscribers on social networks. He had succeeded in embodying the suffering of civilians in this conflict which remains inaccessible to international journalists.

The need to move towards the creation of a Palestinian state

Charles Enderlin, correspondent for France 2 in Jerusalem for three decades, believes that “for the government of Benyamin Netanyahu, there is absolutely no question of moving towards the creation of a Palestinian state. It is however necessary, otherwise the conflict will continue, one could almost say eternally. But the government in place is absolutely opposed to any territorial concession to the Palestinians. And this coalition, we can almost say, is solid. The worse its polls are, the less this coalition will take the risk of organizing elections. It will certainly be necessary to reform the Palestinian authority, its problems of gerontocracy. Then Palestinian elections should be organized. It is essential to review the way in which the Palestinian authority functions.”

In this episode: Faustine Calmel, Eric Audra
Director: Étienne Monin, Pauline Pennanec’h, Chérif Bitelmaldji