Israel – Palestine: Two-state solution is dead

Why in news?

U.S. new administration has refused to endorse the two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Why Israel and Palestine are fighting?

• Though both Jews and Arab Muslims date their claims to the land back a couple thousand years, the current political conflict began in the early 20th century.
• Jews fleeing holocaust in Europe wanted to establish a national homeland in what was then an Arab and Muslim majority territory in the Ottoman Empire.
• The Arabs resisted, seeing the land as rightfully theirs. An early United Nations plan to give each group part of the land failed, and Israel and the surrounding Arab nations fought several wars over the territory.
• Today's lines largely reflect the outcomes of two of the wars waged in 1948 and in 1967.
• The 1967 war is particularly important for today's conflict, as it left Israel in control of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, two territories home to large Palestinian populations.

What is the two-state solution?

• The two-state solution would create an independent Israel and Palestine, and is the mainstream approach to resolving the conflict.
• The 1993 Oslo Accords marked the first time that the State of Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) formally recognized one another and publicly committed to negotiate a solution to their decades-long conflict.
• That two-state vision requires Israel to abandon its opposition of Palestinian claims (to national sovereignty).
• Ever since the Oslo Accords, giving statehood to the Palestinians has been the bedrock of any proposal to solve the conflict as it is considered the internationally acknowledged solution.

What is the U.S.’ role?

• For decades, the U.S. has played a partisan role in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
• After the failed 2000 Camp David summit, Washington never made any meaningful attempt to push the Israelis to accept the two-state proposal.
• The 2007 Annapolis conference was a failure too. The previous U.S. administration launched a peace bid which also collapsed at an early stage.
• Over the years, Israel steadily expanded the settlements in the West Bank, thus effectively killing the two-state solution.

Would a Palestinian state ever come up?

• Land grabbing has been a fundamental element of Israel’s approach towards the Palestinians. They also used force against both Palestinian civilians and militants.
• And, Israel never came under significant international pressure to revert this settlement policy.
• International conferences were held to bring about a “peaceful two-state solution”, but in reality the occupation only deepened.
• So, for the average Palestinians, statehood remains elusive.

What is the alternative?

• One is to retain the status quo. That is, a militarized Jewish state permanently occupying the Palestinian territories, without giving full citizenship rights to the Palestinians.
• The other one is to have a single democratic federal state with equal rights to Jews, Muslims, Christians and others.
• It is time for international actors who care about the situation of the Palestinians and start pushing for the latter solution.

Source: The Hindu