The recognition of the State of Palestine by those countries that support the two-state solution but have only recognized one of the states is long overdue. I never understand how a country with integrity could say that they support the two-state solution but refused at the same time to actually do something concrete to demonstrate their support for both the Jewish people and the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination. Any country that supports the two-state solution has a political and a moral obligation to recognize both states.

    A few years back, at a dinner at the home of one of the European ambassadors in Herzliya, while discussing the issue of Palestinian state recognition, one of the ambassadors challenged me (rather naively) with a question: tell me please, what are the borders of the State of Palestine? I looked him in the eyes directly and said: tell me what are the borders of the State of Israel, and I will tell you what are the borders of the State of Palestine! By Israel’s own definition, it has no permanent legal borders. This has never stopped those European and other OECD countries from recognizing Israel. When Yasser Arafat declared the independence of the State of Palestine on November 15, 1988, and added a political statement confirmed by the Palestine National Council that the State of Palestine was being established in the Palestinian territories occupied by Israel in 1967, all of the countries in the world that supported the two-state solution should have then immediately recognized the State of Palestine. Even the best friends of Israel should have then recognized Palestine, and if they haven’t done it until now, they must now recognize the State of Palestine.

This Must be the Last Israeli-Palestinian War

    The recognition of the State of Palestine is an affirmation that the war in Gaza must be the last Israeli-Palestinian war. It is an affirmation that even after the most horrific of all Israeli-Palestinian wars, there remain seven million Israeli Jews and seven million Palestinian Arabs between the River and the Sea. Recognizing both states is a strong assertion that both peoples living on the same piece of land, the same homeland, for both, must be the place where both peoples express their national-ethnic identity on a part of the territory that they both claim as belonging to them. It is a shared homeland and there is no choice but to recognize that both sides have been willing to fight, to die, and to kill to have a territorial expression of their identity. There is no one state solution, because both sides have demonstrated their determination to attach their national-ethnic identity to the land and to claim that they take their identity from the land and give their identity to the land. Living in a non-national-non-ethnic state of the ‘United States of Israel-Palestine’ does not address the root cause that underlies this conflict. The one-state solution is a nice idea, but it is detached from the reality of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and from what most Israelis and most Palestinians genuinely want. Today there is a one state reality and in the form of Jewish supremacy over the entire area “between the river and the sea” which can only exist in an apartheid-like reality.

    At a time when the international community has organized itself into a ‘Global Alliance for the Implementation of the Two-State Solution’, and when there is a French-Saudi initiative to push even faster forward with bringing about the two-state solution, it is essential that we realize that even if 192 member states of the United Nations recognize the State of Palestine, but Israel does not, the reality on the ground of occupation for the Palestinians remains unchanged. Only once Israel recognizes the State of Palestine, the reality of Palestine becoming an independent state will be realized. There is still great importance in achieving the universal recognition of the State of Palestine in order to give the people of Israel the understanding that the reality of Palestine and the right of the Palestinian people to statehood and self-determination is the most necessary political event that will provide Israel with security. Israelis and Palestinians must understand the mutuality of their need for security, freedom, self-determination and dignity. If one of the two sides is denied these essential needs, the other side will not have them either.

    Therefore, beyond the need for every country in the world to recognize both states, is the need for Israelis and Palestinians to come to terms with the national existence of each other and the recognition that they are both connected to the same piece of land. Palestinians may never be able to recognize the legitimacy of Zionism, but they must come to terms with the existence of Israel and the fact of the connection of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel. Likewise, whatever Israelis think about the legitimacy of the existence of the Palestinian people and the Palestinian national movement, they must come to terms with the facts and the reality of Palestinian existence and the connection of the Palestinian people to the Land of Palestine. 

Palestinians Must Focus Their Efforts on Increasing Israeli Support for a Two-State Solution

    The Palestinian National Movement and the supporters of Palestine should be investing the lion’s share of their efforts to increasing Israeli support for the recognition of the State of Palestine, living in peace next to Israel. The fastest way of doing this is by recognizing the Jewish people’s connection to the Land of Israel. There is a very simple political-psychological wisdom to understand that granting legitimacy and recognizing agency to someone else is much easier after the same legitimacy has been granted to you. The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs would benefit much more with outreach offices all around Israel then having tens of embassies in Africa and Asia. Ultimately, it is the Israel people who we need to convince in order for the State of Palestine to become real.

    One final thought, the vision of two-state, which is something that I have worked for since 1975, for me was never a vision of “us here and them there.” The paradigm of separation that developed out of the failed Oslo peace process is not a recipe for peace, but a means of sustaining the conflict. The two-state reality will only succeed and lead to genuine peace if the vision is one of open borders and very deep cooperation and even inter-dependence. This might take a long time to achieve, but the vision of two states living side-by-side in true peace must be our compass for how we need to proceed and how we need to present the two state solution.