Beyond “relative humanity” to a secular democratic state

The two-state solution for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is finally dead and we can all move on and explore the more just, moral and therefore enduring alternative for peaceful coexistence between Jews and Arabs (both Muslims and Christians) in Mandate Palestine: the one-state solution.

We are witnessing the demise of Zionism. Nothing can be done to save it if Zionism is intent on killing itself (and I, for one, support euthanasia). Going back to the two-state solution would preserve it. But even then, in the best-case scenario, if UN Resolution 242 were meticulously implemented, it would have addressed most of the legitimate rights of less than a third of the Palestinian people over less than a fifth of their ancestral land.

But no one is offering the “best-case” scenario. Rather, the best available current proposal falls significantly short of 242 – not to mention basic principles of morality. After decades of convincing the Palestinians to surrender their rights to the properties they lost during the Nakba (1948 catastrophe of dispossession and exile) in return for a sovereign, fully independent state on all the territories that were occupied in 1967, including East Jerusalem, Israel has shown it has no intention to relinquish these occupied lands.

http://www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article-2-97-1842.jsp

"The two-state solution for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is finally dead "

basically I think it is, the wall and settlements have killed it

If they don't want their own state, then too bad because they sure in hell won't become citizens of Israel.

That means Israel has absolutely no motivation to do anything to change the situation.

The Southerners thought alot like you. Besides if you wanted them to have a state you would give them enough land to put one on.

Thinking like me would give the Palestinians a state(s) that is composed of most of the West Bank and all of Gaza.

Anything more than that and they can get it from their Arab brothers who have lots more land and money than Israel.

requires that Sharon gives them the West Bank?

That is just accepting reality. A reality I agree with.

Where the border is drawn is open to negotiation when or if the Palestinian leadership ever sets aside terror and decides on peace.

. They should give israel the finger. Israel had peace, and an opportunity to create two states. It is over now. They should work for voting rights. If the Israelis want to act like Jim Crow white people that is their problem.

Arafat declared Intifada.

If the Palestinians want perpetual war and no state, that is there choice. They will suffer the worse for it.

But they won't get your one-state fantasy solution.

see for yourself

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article518.shtml

They weren't even getting most of the land.

In negotiation, most people respond to an offer they don't agree with by counteroffer, not terrorism.

.

Please look at the link even if muddle ignores it.

that the PFLP have been supporting for years. It would be ironic in the extreme if it ended up being implemented, don't you think?

I have always preferred a 1-state solution intelectually, but as the will of the majority of the Palestinian people has been for a 2-state solution, I support it out of solidarity. It will be interesting to see if the Palestinian public opinion ever gets behind the 1-state solution...

V

They can lobby all they wish, but they won't get a one-state solution.

If you'd told someone in 1984 that ten years from then the USSR would be no more, apartheid would be no more and Germany unified they would have laughed at you. The one certainty is that heavy-handedness ensures reciprocation on your opponents part should the balance of power ever shift.

V

Aren't exactly living in the now and able to help the Palestinian people.

http://www.one-democratic-state.org/articles/said.html
I cannot imagine what is so wrong about one democratic secular state for the israelis and palestinians to live in together

Come to mind. We have two groups who can't even live together NOT in the same state and you expect them to do so in one?

I have two words for you: "Civil war."

And two more: "Never happen."

the right of the other group to live on the land. Opinions can change over time. Already without trying almost a third of Israelis would like this option. If Bush accepts settlements on the West Bank it is a sure bet that the movement will be on to convince another 20%, since the two state solution can't happen without the west bank.

And the two state solution won't happen, btw.

Opinions can change, but states don't like to fall on their sword and self destruct.

I think you're probably right re: one-state solution. But * appears determined to press on, negotiating only with one side.

Furious Palestinians Reject Bush Pledges to Israel
Palestinian leaders denounced President Bush's pledge to Israel on Wednesday that it could keep parts of the West Bank as a rejection of Palestinian rights that endangers the region's future.
"Bush is the first U.S. president to give legitimacy to Jewish settlements on Palestinian land. We reject this, we will not accept it," Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie told reporters at his West Bank home. "Nobody in the world has the right to give up Palestinian rights," the moderate premier said in reaction to what appeared to be a historic policy shift -- Bush's implicit recognition of Israel's right to retain settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Bush referred to the sprawling suburban settlements as "new realities on the ground" that made it unrealistic for Israel to retreat to the borders of 1967, the year it captured the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the Middle East war.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon won the commitment from Bush as part of his plan to "disengage" from conflict with Palestinians by pulling settlers out of Gaza and cementing a hold on West Bank settlement blocs behind new security lines.
<more>
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=4829316§ion=news

One side has repeatedly supported our enemies. Most states find that an easy choice.

Then there is also the unrealistic nature of the binational fantasy, but hey even * can be right sometimes.

perhaps because the politics here are quite convoluted or perhaps because my response supra was unclear.

I presume to guess that you intend to say that the Palestinians repeatedly support our enemies and that we should take this into account in negotiations, in which case I differ: there is a gigantic diplomatic puzzle here, not a gordian knot to cut. If by "binational fantasy" you mean "two state solution unlikely to succeed," then we agree on this point, but perhaps only because I have an ideological commitment to secular states and a lingering distaste for apartheid-like arrangements.

I might add that I never thought Israel was supporting my "friends" when they were allied with the Afrikaaner government of S. Africa.

I agree * might be right sometimes, and in this matter I might even fervently pray that he is right, because I consider the issue here critical. Unfortunately, it looks to me like the indifference to careful diplomacy that has characterized his entire tenure in office.

"Israel itself has finally gotten around to releasing a solid number
regarding the Israelis that live abroad - 760,000 - now that the
Finance Ministry is considering cancelling their financial benefits.
760,000 Israelis have left the Promised Land
http://194.90.101.50/gsnlib_a/GSN2003/2003_11/20031119/226333.html

So, what do we have here...

6,600,000 Approximate number of Israelis
- 1,200,000 Israeli Palestinians
--------------------------------------------------------
= 5,400,000
- 760,000 Israeli emigres
--------------------------------------------------------
= 4,640,000 Israeli "Jews" (incl. at least 500,000 Russian Xtians)

Compared to:

3,800,000 Palestinians in the OPTs (1996 census + natural growth)
+ 1,200,000 Israeli Palestinians
---------------------------------------------------------
= 5,000,000 Palestinian Arabs

Resident "Jews" (including all the Russian Christians) are already a
minority in Israel/Palestine. Apartheid is here and completely
undeniable."
11/2003