No state has a “right to exist”

JVL Introduction

“Do you support the right of Israel to exist? is the media’s favoured go-to when out to discredit any interviewee.

Nick Robinson duly rolled it out recently against Zack Polanski after the Green Party conference adopted its Zionism is Racism motion.

As Cook makes clear,

Peoples have a right to exist. When that right is abused, it invariably involves very serious violations of international law – often through crimes such as apartheid, ethnic cleansing or genocide.

States, by contrast, don’t have a “right” to exist. They simply do exist as a matter of fact – until they suddenly don’t. Like apartheid South Africa. Like Rhodesia. Like Czechoslovakia. Like Yugoslavia. Like Nazi Germany.

Furthermore,

Israelis have a right to exist – they have a right not to be oppressed, ethnically cleansed, genocided – and the state that represents them is legitimate so long as its role is to protect them from these kinds of threats. So long as it provides them with a degree of dignity and security.

But Israelis lose the right to maintain their state as it is if that state is used to oppress, ethnically cleanse or genocide another people, like the Palestinians. Then it becomes an illegitimate state, just like apartheid South Africa or Nazi Germany. It must be reconstituted in ways that regain its legitimacy.

This article was originally published by Jonathan Cook's Substack on Mon 12 Oct 2026. Read the original here.