The latest trend in the debate on Israeli-Palestinian peace is to trumpet the inevitability of a one-state solution. The recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel by the administration of US President Donald Trump has depressed many involved in the peace process.
Saeb Erekat, the main Palestinian negotiator, responded that it was time to “struggle for one state with equal rights for everyone living in historic Palestine, from the river to the sea.” Several veteran participants in the peace process agree that a one-state solution is increasingly likely.
This narrative ignores both what Israel wants and what it can do. Let’s start with what it wants.
State of affairs post-1967
Since occupying the West Bank and Gaza in 1967, Israel has wished to control strategic areas while incorporating a minimal number of Palestinians. As Levi Eshkol, who was prime minister at the time of the Six-Day War, explained, Israel had received “a nice dowry of territory, but along with a bride whom we don’t like.” What Eshkol, who died in office in 1969, meant by this was that control over the West Bank was necessary for Israeli security but swallowing the Palestinian population could undermine its existence.
To solve the problem, Israeli general Yigal Allon formulated the “Allon Plan” in 1967, which would see Israel annex lightly populated areas of strategic significance and return heavily populated areas to Jordan. Whatever their ideological proclivities, Israeli governments have since played variations on Allon’s theme.
The supposedly hardline Likud government of Menachem Begin (1977-83) supported autonomy in the Palestinian municipalities. Later, the purportedly dovish government of Yitzhak Rabin (1992-95) implemented a plan to establish an autonomous Palestinian Authority, while cementing Israeli control over strategic areas through settlement expansion. Every Israeli government, with no exceptions, has toyed with this logic.
Importance of the Jordan Valley
The Jordan Valley has consistently been at the center of this approach. Early on, Israel was concerned that the Iraqi military would use Jordan as a springboard for invasion. The Jordan Valley was intended for use as a natural “anti-tank ditch.”
Operation Desert Storm removed the conventional threat from the east. However, Israel became increasingly concerned about asymmetrical threats, fearing that withdrawal from the West Bank would put population centers within missile range. These security interests, along with constant settlement expansion, facilitated continued control of strategically important areas.
Israel still feels that remaining in the West Bank is an important security interest. The current government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fears that withdrawal would be followed by rocket fire into the greater Tel Aviv area and Ben Gurion Airport. Tunnels similar to those coming out of Gaza might also be built, threatening murderous infiltration.
However, the threat of a one-state solution is greater. It would likely lead to the end of the Jewish state and civil war. Israeli attempts to rule the Palestinians directly without granting citizenship would also lead to strategic disaster from the Israeli perspective. It would likely lead not only to a third Intifada but to an internal moral crisis coupled with international pressure. Israel remembers this unappetizing experience from the First Intifada (1987-93).
If forced to choose, Israel will prefer a third and less threatening option. It will unilaterally withdraw from remaining positions near Palestinian population centers, while annexing the settlements in the West Bank.
Naftali Bennett and his Jewish Home party ran on this platform successfully in the 2013 elections. The plan, given the Orwellian name “the tranquilizing plan,” is no extremist fantasy. The areas surrounding the settlements contain a mere fraction of the Palestinian population but most of the strategically valuable areas, including the Jordan Valley. Israel could theoretically ravish the coveted bride while paying a sensible dowry. The Palestinians would be left to form a rump state and be given the “freedom” to live in a truncated series of municipalities.
So much for what Israel wants. But what can Israel do?
Israel is not South Africa
The argument against this option is that Israel would be creating “Bantustans” along the lines of the artificial protectorates designed by apartheid South Africa in the 1970s to deny citizenship to its minorities. The strategy was a dismal failure, and the apartheid regime collapsed within two decades.
Morally this is a strong argument. The “tranquilizing plan” would indeed be an illegal assault on Palestinian self-determination. But strategically speaking, the argument is weak.
Israel is unlikely to pay the steep price Pretoria did. There are three practical reasons for this.
First, Palestinian society cannot engage seriously in civil or violent resistance as black South Africans did in Soweto or Sharpeville. Israel benefits from the geographical ease of using the Green Line in a manner that was impossible in spatially intermingled South Africa. It can simply hide behind the security wall.
Second, the South African economy was dependent on its black workforce and could not function separately from it. For its part, Israel has decreased its dependence on Palestinian workers by bringing in workers from elsewhere. It could easily replace the 120,000 workers who continue to cross the checkpoints, and most Israelis would be happy to see them go.
Finally, the international community never recognized the Bantustans as legitimate entities, but Palestinian independence is recognized almost universally. This takes a significant amount of responsibility off Israeli shoulders and has allowed it to withdraw from Gaza while suffering minimal culpability.
History is full of examples of powerful nations annexing territory and paying little for the privilege (China in Tibet and Russia in Crimea come to mind). South Africa paid for its weakness, not for its immorality.
Threats of sanctions and diplomatic isolation ring hollow. Despite decades of occupation, Israel now has better relations than ever with Russia, India, China, the US and many African states, flourishing trade with the European Union, and surprisingly close relations with several Arab states.
The international community has grudgingly accepted that Israel is likely to maintain the settlement blocs in a permanent agreement, and even the fait accompli in Jerusalem has garnered dividends.
States seldom do the moral thing, and Israel is an unlikely candidate to buck the trend. If forced to choose between a one-state solution and apartheid, Israel will choose neither, and pay a surprisingly reasonable price for doing so.
Wrong. Israel is an apartheid state. And I don’t think the Palestinians will accept being shuttered in Bantustans. If Israel does what Bennet suggests, there will be violence. Violence which, in the long run, the Israeli will not be able to withstand. ANd I hope the international community does what it did with South Africa: boycot it until Palestinians have the same rights as Israeli Jews in a single country.
Syed Abbas
I think the times of strong Israeli dependence on Western nations for defense have largely receded, and will eventually come to an end:
– Israel initially needed France so as to build its first nuclear weapons. However, they have long been totally autonomous for that
– A large part of their military hardware is locally built, generally to a high standard: tanks, missiles…
– Some of their weapons are indeed Western-made, such as fighter aircrafts or submarines. However, they maintain good relations not only with Americans and Europeans, but also with Russians and Chinese. If need be, they’ll be in a position to switch from one provider to another, like they already switched from France to America in the 1960s. Generally: if it’s a powerful nation (China, Russia, Japan, not only America and European nations), Israel has good relations with it
In the distant future, it’s possible that new major powers will emerge from Muslim civlizatiosn, powers that would be hostile to Israel. They do not exist yet. Anyway, even in that case, such a great power could not conquer Israel because of its autonomous nuclear deterrent.
For Israel to become conquerable by a new Saladin, not only would a Muslim great power have to emerge, it would also be necessary for the art of war to change totally so as to negate the power of nuclear weapons, something that nothing in the present state of scientific research points to.
If such a thing does happen, it won’t be before a distant now impossible to discern future.
Many thanks for a good recapitulation of history.
All the events you cite were systems competing against each other. Israel is different – a solution imposed by foreign guns that are now rusting.
Israel lives with strong Corporate Capitalist West, and will die with it.
I don’t believe very much in eventual calming down of tensions between Israelis and Palestinians and negotiation of any sensible final settlement. Obviously, History sometimes surprises one for the better, let’s hope there will be such a surprise. But I think the actual final settlement will rather be along one of these models:
– Not everything that has one existed can always be resumed. Constantinople was once the greatest Greek city, the westernmost part of what is now Turkey used to be populated mainly by Greeks. However, ethnic cleansing changed that beginning of the 20th century. These lands will never be Greek again: no Greek lives there in the first place.
Similarly, the entire Arab population could be vacated from west of the Jordan. And these lands being Arab would be just as over as Constantinople is over as a Greek city
– Not everything that exists endures forever. The Kingdom of Jerusalem once ensured Christian control of the Holy Land and Christian access to the Holy Sepulcher. However, eventual Muslim victory put a definitive end to the Kingdom in 1291 at St Jean d’Acre
Similarly, Israel could be defeated, and Muslim victory could lead to an end of Israel’s existence
No telling which one of those two inhuman extremes will happen. As of now, only the first is possible. In the future, both might become possible. Anyway, as time continues without any settlement, probability of either does increase.
Only one thing I’m sure: as a Catholic, I’m very happy that we no longer are in the business of waging wars (always branded "holy") for control of the Western Wall / the Holy Sepulcher / the Dome of the Rock. If our Muslim and Jewish brethren learn to refrain from holy-warring like we eventually did learn, they will do good.
Isreal has better relations with nation from Russia to India.Yes.But it is on the back of USA.With decline of USA, which is imminent, as the super power the equation will change.
R.c. Hanbali that means so much coming from a jew-hater like you.
Clayton Miller I’m amazed reading your shallow and one track minded replies to the deeply thought and meaningful posts by Steve Smith
So, total ethnic cleansing it is. What a plan.
Steve Smith and people wonder why there will never be a nation called Palestine.
Islam’s political cleavage of Fatimite (now Shia, Alevi, Ismali) & Umarite (now Sunni, Wahabbi) is same as Demos (5% moneyed males) / Republicans in Athens.
Like Socrates, Mohammed, a small businessman in 7th century Trading Arabia faced his Demos – Big Business Umayyads, Bankers Banu Abbas, Trade Monopolists infidels, and Tribe of Judah. Socrates’ lost but Mohammed defeated his Demos with a superior socio-economic package and set up a Secular Republic a la Socrates with rights for all.
Mohammed could not have won without timely Christian help. After him Islam split politically in 2.
A: pro-Christian, the vast Medinan Majority wanting to continue Mohammed’s Secular Socratic Republic – pro-Woman, pro-Progress, pro-Peace, helping poor and weak, led by his daughter Fatima.
B: Anti-Christian, the miniscule Meccan Male Moneyed Minority wanting Theocratic Kaliphate – anti-Woman, anti-poor, anti-Progress, anti-Peace, for conquest and colonialism, neocons led by his companion Umar, whose minority won with strong arm tactics.
Fatima died/was murdered within 70 days. The Kaliphate undid all Mohammedan reforms – Universality, Peace, Women’s rights, Justice, Meritocracy, Free Enterprise and Free Trade.
After 1300 years a Fatimite Mustafa bin Ali Reza (Ataturk) buried Umarite Kaliphate. Ataturk and another Fatimite Jinnah founded secular Republics in Turkey and Pakistan.
Islamists today fight not in name of Mohammed but Umar Farooq al Khattab who has emerged as the patron saint of jihadi terror. Mulla Umar, Sheikh Umar, Khattab in Chechnya, Umarov in Dagestan, Farooq Training Camps … Now as ISIS Umarite Kaliphate raises its ugly head only a Christian-Fatimite alliance can defeat it as Russia and Iran.
While Salafis are core neocons Kaliphate Lovers, mainstream Sunnis, uneducated, unskilled, are a confused lot. With education they will be forced to abandon Umar. There is no alternative in coming era of Globalization and Free Trade.
In 200 years time i doubt any human will be alive at all on planet earth, let alone the useless and worthlless diatribe between the isreali and the arabs.The whole planet will be repopulated by Artificial Intelligent Robots, and humans will have to vacate the whole earth to the new masters and head towards the grave whether they like it or not.
Clayton Miller
Not sure what your difficulty is in recognizing the essential truth of my last post.
Israel wants a one-state solution BUT without a substantial Palestinian population inside the expanded Israeli state, so they are looking at ways of getting rid of the Palestinians by "buying them out" or by giving them some form of pseudo-autonomy in isolated, open-air prison camps–essentially mini-versions of Gaza.
Hence, my point that all these schemes for (1) transferring Palestinians outside of historic Palestine, (2) using the bait-and-switch of an "autonomy" that would given them no real independence and also, critically for the Likudniks, no voice within the Israeli state, and (3) driving down the Palestinian birth rate while driving up Palestinian emigration rates are all, in fact, being undertaken in pursuit of a one-state solution that is acceptable to Israel, in which the Jews take all or almost all of the land and separate the Palestinians from it.
Again, not sure what you don’t understand about that.
Allan Jeffreys
I read Shaun Narine with relish in the NY Times as well. Well meaning and humanistic he can be forgiven for his tenderness. He feels for the Tibetans and Crimeans, history be damned.
I left teaching after experience at 3 Canadian universities, both English and French. I regret to say that Asia has left North America far behind in erudition.
Steve Smith
Many thanks for your kind words. I am a Syed (look up in Google). The Tribe of Judah is our cousin. I always say to this family black sheep of the family that when all doors will be closed to them because of their misdeeds, the door of Mohammed’s family will always be open. Blood is thicker than water after all.
Steve Smith It would be difficult to find anything remotely accurate in your reply. I suspect all of that spoiled pork you ate has given you psychosis.