The American Secretary of State must go to Jerusalem and Ramallah.

Antony Blinken called on Israelis and Palestinians in Cairo on Monday for "calm" and "de-escalation".

This visit, planned for a long time, took a different turn with a new spiral of Israeli-Palestinian violence.

"We call on all parties for calm and to ease tensions," Antony Blinken said at a press conference alongside his Egyptian counterpart Sameh Choukri, who pleaded for "a just solution" to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict more than never deadlocked.

An outbreak of violence

Egypt, its diplomacy and especially its intelligence services, are regularly called upon to intervene in the Palestinian question: the first Arab country to have signed peace with Israel in 1979, and a neighboring state in the Gaza Strip under Israeli blockade for more than fifteen years, Egypt has received Israeli heads of government as well as the leaders of the various Palestinian parties.

Again, the Egyptian presidency assured that "Egypt had made efforts in recent days to try to control the outbreak of tensions".

Because once again, the deaths on the Palestinian and Israeli sides have multiplied in recent days: attacks, shootings, air raids and punitive measures continue to respond despite international calls for “restraint”.

Punishment Raids

In the wake of anti-Israeli attacks, Benjamin Netanyahu's government, the most right-wing in Israel's history, announced measures aimed at punishing those close to the perpetrators of the attacks.

On Sunday, Israeli forces sealed off the home of the family of a Palestinian man who killed six Israeli men and a Ukrainian woman on Friday in East Jerusalem, the Palestinian part of the Israeli-occupied Holy City, with a view to destroying it.

The home of a Palestinian man who injured two Israelis, a father and his son, also in East Jerusalem, was also to be sealed off on Saturday.

Israeli guards on Sunday killed a Palestinian in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory colonized by Israel since 1967. On Monday, Israeli forces killed a Palestinian in Hebron in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian authorities.

The anti-Israel attacks came after Israel's deadliest raid in years in the West Bank with ten Palestinians killed in Jenin, followed by rocket fire from Gaza into Israel and retaliatory Israeli strikes.

The fear of a new gear

This violence raises fears of a new spiral and Antony Blinken must once again reiterate the American call for restraint on Monday with Benjamin Netanyahu and then with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

If the United States and Egypt, one of the main recipients of American military aid, are important diplomatic actors, the fact remains that for the experts, the room for maneuver of Antony Blinken seems limited.

Washington has condemned an "appalling" attack in East Jerusalem and Antony Blinken will urge Netanyahu and Abbas to "take urgent steps towards de-escalation" according to the State Department.

But, in private, American officials do not hide their frustration with the escalation and impasse in which the Israeli-Palestinian conflict finds itself.

If little progress is expected on the de-escalation front, Washington is above all trying to reconnect with Benjamin Netanyahu, according to analysts.

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