Can a two-state option be revived?
JVL Introduction
In the midst of the bloodiest outbreak of violence seen in Israel/Palestine in recent times, something strange is happening: the idea of a two-state solution is re-emerging as a focus for political discussion at the international level
This is because it is the agreed international position, even if it had been left to rot for the last decade and in apparent terminal decline in the decade before that.
Given the genocidal views now dominant in Israeli society the likelihood of one peaceful democratic state becoming an option acceptable to all parties in the near future seems slender.
But are two states any more plausible? Harriet Sherwood investigates.
RK
This article was originally published by the Observer on Sat 4 Nov 2023. Read the original here.
Israel-Palestine: Is the two-state solution the answer to the crisis?
The bloodiest fighting for decades has revived an option once thought dead as the last hope for peace. But how it would look and whether the will to achieve it exists remain unclear
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“In the US, traditionally the driver of the Middle East peace process” – this sentence alone damns the article for what it is – the usual pathetic Guardian/Observer view. Really, the US is the “driver for peace in the Middle East”? Asking us to “look at [Ukrainian president Volodymyr] Zelenskiy.” as a model of the kind of leadership that is needed. Some of us have looked and don’t particularly like what we see. If there is a lack of leadership on the Palestinian side could it be because viable leaders have been killed or imprisoned and replaced by co-opted corrupt leaders like Abbas? The penultimate para really was the final straw – “In the runup to Oslo [the historic 1993 peace accords], there was total opposition to any contact with the PLO [Palestine Liberation Organisation]. Once the agreement was signed, there was huge support.” If I recall the only place there was huge support was in Israel and its US masters in Washington for what was a disastrously bad deal for the Palestinians. A fact that is borne out by the facts on the ground of Israel’s ever increasing land grab – 60% – of even the pathetic 22% of original Palestine that they settled for.
Can a two-state option be revived?
No. Whats needed is one democratic state, where all are equal, regardless of religion or ethnicity.
Was the 2-state-solution ever really an option ? How would it actually work out in practise ? The only way forward is for one state for all, and free from imperialism.
Dodo or unicorn? Like the dodo, the two state solution is dead and it’s not coming back: the truth is it was always a unicorn, a wishful fantasy that never really existed.
Nobody has expounded this more coherently than Craig Mokhiber in his resignation letter to the UN last week.
Not only does he say that the emperor has no clothes, but he offers the path forward. I believe this the most powerful document concerning the Israel/Palestine situation circulating today.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24103463-craig-mokhiber-resignation-letter
The two state solution is paraded around the debate by appeasers of Israel, who know damn well that the aim of the current Israeli government is to obliterate Palestine, and the thought of Palestine. The two state no longer exists except as a phrase, something that liberals can wring their hands about, or supporters of Israel can cite as a (non) aspiration. It’s camouflage for what has been happening for decades – Palestine is disappearing … look at a map.
I think we need an ICC investigation to be happening and perpetrators of the criminal war acts like Natanjahoo and co need to be pulled up for their role in it. These people need to be barred from any active involvement in politics for the rest of their lives and made to face the consequences of their actions. This could also be considered for fence sitter and condoners in the west and mainstream media for war mongering. But that is in the future. For the present time we badly need a cease fire, the bombs falling being stopped and, with the bombs falling, the mass murder of civilians. We all must learn from this to ensure that Never again actually means Never again.