Why There Has Not Been an Agreement for a Palestinian State
If your solution to the problem is “get rid of Israel,” you can stop reading right here. I’m going to explain why the situation is complicated and what issues would have to be resolved to reach an agreement. This is not about a unified Israeli-Palestinian state either; I’m addressing the obstacles to the two-state solution.
1. Jerusalem: This city has holy sites sacred to Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Any final settlement will have to address access not just by Israelis and Palestinians, but for people from all over the world. The Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa Mosque are built on top of the Second Jewish Temple, so that area can’t be divided between the two sides. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is also nearby. The best option would be to place the Old City under joint Israeli-Palestinian administration. It could also be placed under the control of an international coalition, but it’s unlikely that either side would agree to this.
2. Settlements: The West Bank settlements are a complex issue. The West Bank covers the historical areas of Judea and Samaria. Judea was originally a Jewish polity; the words “Jew” and “Jewish” have the same root as “Judea” (Samaria was the land of the Samaritans). Jews have lived in this area since antiquity. In 1948, Jordan captured the West Bank, and de facto annexed it in 1950, expelling its Jewish residents. Israel recaptured it in 1967.
Article 49 of the 4th Geneva Convention prohibits settlement of lands captured in war. This is generally the argument against the existence of settlements. The counter to this is that Jordan’s capture and annexation of the West Bank was illegal, so Israel re-capturing it was effectively liberating it from Jordanian rule.
Legal or not, there are close to 150 settlements in the West Bank with around half a million residents combined. Dismantling these and moving them into Israel proper would be a much larger undertaking than it was to dismantle the settlements in Gaza in 2006. That doesn’t mean it would be impossible, just difficult. The settlers could also be given the opportunity to move on their own or become residents of the future Palestinian state.
3. Borders: Linked to the above concern is where the border between Israel and Palestine would be drawn. One proposal is to draw it at the Green Line, or the 1967 border. The 2003 proposal included land swaps, where settlements close to the Green Line would be part of Israel, while Gaza would get more land in other areas to make up for it. This also included a secure highway between the two areas.
4. Refugees: In 1948, around 700,000 Arabs were either expelled from what is now Israel or left voluntarily. Since then, they have been treated differently from any other group of refugees, with their own United Nations agency specifically for them (the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East or UNRWA). They have also been prohibited from becoming citizens of the countries they reside in. The result of this has been to grow their numbers to around 6 million people today as they enter their fourth generation. Their situation is unique in that the goal of other refugee assistance organizations is generally to reduce the number of refugees, either by returning them to their country of origin, or aiding them in settling permanently in their host country or elsewhere.
The “Right of Return” is the demand that they be allowed to return to their ancestors’ homes in Israel as part of a peace agreement. Israel has resisted this as it would be the end of Jewish self-determination in Israel. Like it or not, sovereign countries are entitled to control who is allowed to immigrate into them for whatever reasons they choose. Past attempts to create a Palestinian state were derailed by this issue.
5. Security: The year after Israel pulled out of Gaza in 2005, Hamas was elected and began using it as a staging ground for attacks. Understandably, Israel doesn’t want to create the same situation in the West Bank. A future Palestinian state would very likely have to be demilitarized. The Palestinian leadership has shown that it either cannot control this violence, or in the case of Hamas, they’re instigating it. Israel providing security for the Palestinian state would also be unacceptable. One proposal is for a coalition consisting of Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia to provide security for Palestine, with the goal of handing power over to the Palestinians once they demonstrate their willingness and ability to live in peace with their neighbors.
I’m fine with any disagreements with any of the above points as long as they’re not just “Israel has no right to exist” or “everything is Israel’s fault.” I’m also aware that the current Likud government is opposed to a Palestinian state. However, one role the US could play would be to push Israel to work toward solutions to the above obstacles, but that would require not just the cooperation of Israel and the Palestinians themselves, but also the other countries currently hosting Palestinian refugees or providing military assistance to Hamas and other groups.
