While the human tragedy in Gaza is ongoing and the de facto annexation of the West Bank is being carried out at breakneck speed, it is necessary to identify and gain a commitment to a long-term, just, and sustainable solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict. With a vision for the future supported by the driving forces behind peace, the immediate goal of a ceasefire will hopefully come closer.
The solution established in international law is the so-called two state solution. As early as 1937, the Peel Commission concluded that the League of Nations mandate for Palestine had become unworkable and recommended a division into a Jewish and an Arab state: “An irrepressible conflict has arisen between two national communities within the narrow bounds of one small country.” Whereas the response of the Arab parties was clearly negative, the Zionist response to the plan was divided and ambivalent. The final decision, however, was that it was a starting point for further negotiations.
In his book Chances for Peace. Missed Opportunities in the Arab Israeli Conflict, Elie Podeh considers the period 1936-1938, which includes the Peel Commission and its conclusions, to be an example of a lost opportunity for a peaceful solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict. Podeh draws on, among other things, historian Avi Shlaim, who in his study Collusion Across the Jordan: King Abdullah, the Zionist Movement, and the Partition of Palestine, writes that “Had the Zionist movement accepted the proposal [i.e. the Peel Commissions’ partition plan] spontaneously and without delay, and had it mobilized its support behind a clear-cut, straightforward policy in favour of partition, it is quite conceivable that it might have been implemented.”
Since then – for almost 80 years – Peel’s Partition Plan has been the international community’s view of how the conflict must be resolved. The central starting point for recurring votes in the Security Council was the UN partition decision in accordance with UN General Assembly Resolution 181 in November 1947. At that time, it was decided to divide the British Mandate over Palestine into two parts, one Jewish and one Arab, with Jerusalem under international administration. That the area should be divided is of course a central issue, but even more important for the viability of implementing the decision is perhaps how it should be divided. There have been many proposals for territorial division, but the principle based on international law that the country should be divided was established early on.
The two-state solution was most recently brought up in the “New York Declaration” on the “Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine and the Implementation of the Two-State Solution,” which was adopted on July 29 at the UN. It combines the urgent and short-term goal of ending the war, ending the famine, and releasing the hostages with the long-term goal of establishing a Palestinian state alongside Israel. By bringing together the 22 member states of the Arab League and the 27 EU member states, as well as 17 other states, the declaration is the latest in a series of affirmations that the two-state solution has a strong foothold in the international community.
The “One-State Declaration” Challenged the Idea of Partition
At the same time, serious doubts have been expressed about both the justice and the possibility of implementing the two-state solution. The parties representing the Palestinian Arabs at the time of the Peel Commission agreed on a proposition of their own that opposed the Commission’s recommendation for partition. Instead, it called for the formation of an Arab state in the entire Mandate with guaranteed rights for the Jewish minority. This is a view that is still widespread among pro-Palestinian debaters; for example, many of the leaders of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement have supported the “One-State Declaration” issued on November 29, 2007, in Madrid which calls for “a democratic solution that will offer a just, and thus enduring peace in a single state.”
The message of the “One-State Declaration” is based on the experiences of the Arab-Palestinian population in the course of Zionist history even before the formation of Israel and wants to repair the setbacks of the Arab population that occurred with its solution: “The historic land of Palestine belongs to all who live in it and to those who were expelled or exiled from it since 1948, regardless of religion, ethnicity, national origin or current citizenship status.” This position leaves no room for the Zionist perspective, which in its simplest form is based on the notion of “a Jewish homeland.” Not necessarily a state in all of Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel), not even sovereign statehood in the area. The concept of a Jewish homeland could also be understood as self-government on equal terms with other ethnic and religious groups within the borders of Palestine, in its most modest form.
Other objections to the two-state solution focus on facts on the ground, i.e. the accelerated consequences of the occupation since 1967, and the fact that the integration of the occupied areas into Israel in effect means that development has gone too far and made partition impossible. This has resulted in so many questions but very few clearcut answers: What should be done with the refugees? How will the settlements and their populations be dealt with? How should the situation of the Arabs in Israel be handled? What status should Jews have in a future Palestine? The difficulty of defining pragmatic and just measures to resolve these difficult issues and then implementing them have led to a reluctance to address them at a concrete level among proponents of the one-state solution.
The “Facts on the Ground” Challenge to the Two-State Solution
Author and researcher Yousef Munayyer is clear in his opposition to the partition proposal. “… When it comes to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian issue, the two-state solution, which has dominated mainstream discourse on policy toward this issue, is primarily a solution to a problem: Israel’s problem,” Munayyer writes in The New Yorker on September 20, 2013. He argues that two states in the context where it is still the dominant discourse imply a Palestine that does not meet the criteria for a sovereign state:
“In the best-case scenario, a Palestinian state would be demilitarized and have not a semblance of the sovereignty afforded to every other state in the international system. It would, more or less, be under glorified occupation. Palestinian refugees would not be permitted to return to their homes. The status of Jerusalem, having become so marred by Israeli settlement-building, would likely be indivisible and largely off limits to the Palestinian statelet.”
With the knowledge we have today about Israel’s development and exercise of power in relation to the Palestinians, we cannot have higher expectations of a future Palestinian nation than the dysfunctional pseudostate that Munayyer describes. But it cannot be described as a best case scenario precisely because it is far from the solution that corresponds to the demands of the international community — demands that in the future must be forced on Israel and, realistically, also its counterparts for any solution to be possible at all. That is where we are. For the foreseeable future and since the return of Benjamin Netanyahu to power in 2009, Israel has proven itself incapable of making independent decisions that lead to peace and justice. Israel has shown that every step it takes is a step away from “a solution where the two peoples can live in complete equality and in a situation of justice,” as Rashid Khalidi put it just over a year ago.
Munayyer’s justified criticism of the weaknesses of the two-state solution in the shadow of Israel’s development leads to a solution that is desirable from a humanistic and human perspective but that completely lacks a plan for implementation. Neither he nor anyone else has shown that coexistence in a state is possible after so many years of armed conflict, growing hatred, and an ever-growing accumulation of injustices. It is this objectively existing lack of trust and growing distrust that makes separation necessary, regardless of the opinions within organized politics. It is not primarily the nationalist ideologies that are an obstacle to coexistence in a state but the gaps that have been built up between the peoples. The parties must be separated to achieve the faith in the future that is necessary to build a functioning state.
The feeling that the realization of the two-state solution is becoming increasingly distant and impossible to achieve is growing in step with Israel’s de facto annexation of the occupied territories and the destruction of Gaza. It is not only that the political will and commitment to a two-state solution need to be strengthened, but also new thinking is needed on how a two-state solution should be shaped. In 2020, Peter Beinart wrote: “The painful truth is that the project to which liberal Zionists like myself have devoted ourselves for decades — a state for Palestinians separated from a state for Jews — has failed. The traditional two-state solution no longer offers a compelling alternative to Israel’s current path. It risks becoming, instead, a way of camouflaging and enabling that path. It is time for liberal Zionists to abandon the goal of Jewish–Palestinian separation and embrace the goal of Jewish–Palestinian equality.”
Alternatives to the “Traditional” Two-State Solution
The key word here is “traditional,” Beinart and others point out that the two states must have a close relationship that allows for exchange, cooperation, and mobility of residents. These ideas have been developed in the “A Land for All” movement, which strives for “two sovereign states in Eretz Yisrael/Palestine, where both nations can fulfill their right to self determination, but without strict physical and demographic separation. In other words: Political separation — yes. Geographic and demographic separation - no. Mutuality, partnership, and equality — yes.”
“A Land for All” has defined the goal as “recognized borders, right for self-determination, equal rights, and security for both peoples - two independent states in a confederal model.” A confederation reflects mutual dependence and belonging to the same country regardless of which side of the border it is on. But it is based on the establishment of two sovereign states. A border runs through the homeland. As I envision the agreements that lay the foundation for the confederation, it can be allowed to evolve and need not be fully functional upon separation. The definitive form and scope can evolve as the two states stabilize.
In today’s political reality, with an Israeli Government that views and portrays a two-state solution as suicide and an existential threat, two states are as distant as a single, just, and equitable state. On July 18, 2024, the Israeli parliament passed a resolution that rejected the establishment of a Palestinian state. The resolution passed in the Knesset with 68 votes in favor and nine against. The opposition decided to leave the session to avoid supporting both the statement and a two-state solution. The delegates from the Arab parties remained to vote against the resolution. The elected officials and the electorate seem to move in the same direction. The latest Pew Research Centre opinion poll among Israeli citizens showed that confidence in a two-state solution was historically low — only 21% of the Israeli population, with a higher percentage among Arabs in Israel. Undoubtedly, this reflects to some extent the lack of political leadership on the issue, but it is also an expression of popular distrust between Jews and Palestinians in Israel.
At present, then, it is not a choice between a pragmatic and feasible solution on the one hand and one that is utopian on the other. Both alternatives are idealistic visions that require new thinking in all areas, enormous efforts and perseverance to become reality. Considering the alternative – continued war between Israel and Palestinian armed factions, displacement and genocide of Palestinians, the return of systematic Palestinian attacks directed at Israeli civilians, a contagious breakdown in international law spreading to international and ethnic conflicts all over the world, a painful, growing gap between the global North and South, the eventual transformation of Israel from a state that was once legitimate and a consequence of history to the status of pariah and rogue state – I conclude that it is a necessary effort.
Global Backing for a Two-State Solution Is Crucial
A prerequisite for us to be able to choose that path is massive international support that does not splinter off in different directions. Global backing for the two-state solution will be absolutely crucial to achieving peaceful development. In the absence of the parties’ own will or capability to seek peaceful solutions, the international community must force the unwilling parties to accept a division of the country into two independent states. With patience, creativity, and the threat of a breakdown in the process hanging over them, they must guide every step of a solution: the demarcation of borders, equal treatment of minorities, security arrangements, cooperation between the two states, the reconstruction of Gaza, the evacuation of settlements, and so on.
In the absence of superpower support, it is the determination and demands of the UN, the EU, and the Arab League that can make a peaceful future possible, since the parties themselves do not want to live together or as equals. Without the expectations and demands of governments, international agencies, and the UN system, Palestinian Arabs and Jews in Israel are at the mercy of each other in a bitter relationship that will be marked for decades by distrust, hatred, and propagandistic historiography.
It is far from an unimportant argument for two states that the countries of the world – on all continents and in both the North and the South – have supported the solution to the conflict that the UN decided on in the Partition Plan of 1947. The effort it has taken to bring the global coalition together, not least the Arab states who were strong opponents of the two-state solution up until the 1970s, but have remained loyal to the Saudi Peace Initiative since 2002, cannot be overestimated. It is an investment in legitimacy and diplomacy that must not be undone and that the directly affected parties, during periods of functioning peace efforts, also accepted. It must be pursued, however impossible it may seem at the moment.