2023-12-02 19:30:10
Since the Hamas attack, the world has had its eyes on the Gaza Strip. Next to it, the West Bank appears like a cauldron that threatens to explode at any moment. In this occupied territory, more than 230 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli settlers or soldiers since October 7. A situation which finds its genesis in the war of 1967.
Among Palestinians in the West Bank: “We are not safe anywhere”
In six days, the young Israeli state won a resounding victory which allowed it to multiply its territory by four. To the north, he conquered the Golan Heights in Syria; to the east, the eastern part of Jerusalem and the West Bank which were occupied by Jordan; to the south, the Gaza Strip taken from Egypt (as well as the Sinai desert, which was returned to Cairo in 1979). All these lands form what we will henceforth call, in international diplomatic language, the “occupied territories”.
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What should we do with it? In Israel, some, in the army or on the left, believe that they must serve as bargaining chips to negotiate peace with neighbors. Others, particularly on the nationalist or religious right, consider that these lands should make it possible to expand the territory of the State and that Israeli citizens can be settled there. This is how “settlements” are born – which the settlers who populate them (there are today some 700,000 in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem) prefer to call “settlements”.
Are they legal? How are they legitimized by those who promote them? What problems do they pose? You will know everything by listening to this new episode of “two minutes to understand”, a video by François Reynaert, alias Uncle Obs, directed by Mahaut Landaz.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict, two minutes to understand
During the last decade, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict had almost disappeared from the media radar. Since the appalling massacre of Israeli civilians committed on October 7, 2023 by Hamas terrorists and the chain of violence that followed, the entire world has once again turned its eyes to the Middle East. The region has once again become this powder keg which raises fears of a general conflagration. Failing to be able to predict the future, we can at least turn to history to try to understand, step by step, how the situation reached this point of incandescence. To this end, we are offering a new series of short videos from “Uncle Obs” which explain as simply as possible the key concepts underlying the current situation:
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