Ultimately, this “generous offer” amounted to turning the West Bank into non-contiguous cantons, crisscrossed by a network of settlements, roads and Israeli areas. Even the supposed “capital” of the Palestinian state would mostly be under Israeli control, with stipulations and conditions that stripped any real sovereignty from any area of the supposed Palestinian “state”. Not even the sky above Palestinian heads would be under their control, nor the water under their feet, as Israel still demanded access to water resources under the West Bank.
TL;DR Israel’s peace offers are not “generous” as often described, and they involve significant concessions that undermine the idea of a sovereign Palestinian state. The article reviews the Camp David negotiations from 2000:
- The offer effectively annexed 10% of the West Bank to Israel, with an additional 8-12% remaining under “temporary” Israeli control.
- In return Palestine gets 1% of desert near the Gaza strip.
- Israel demanded control over Palestinian airspace, 3 permanent bases in the West Bank, presence at Palestinian border crossings (presumably this references border crossings to other countries) and “security arrangements” at the Jordan border which required more territory.
- Israel was also allowed to invade at any point in case of “emergency”, with no definition of what an emergency is.
- In East Jerusalem, Palestine’s proposed capital city, Israel refused sovereignty over Palestinian neighbourhoods.
- Israel would only allow a very limited return of a very limited number of refugees over a very long period of time.
In general, the article claims that Israel’s peace offer with the establishment of a Palestinian state was not actually granting sovereignty to that state, and instead sought to legitimise the Israeli occupation.
Hamas was able to plan mass murder and kidnapping because those (while not polled) were popular, even if Hamas itself wasn’t.
This means that any kind of live-alongside-each-other situation is going to require significant security concessions from the Palestinians as part of the total package.
How does the party with no leverage make concessions?
You must have something to give something up. The Palestinians have nothing, by design of the Israeli government.
How do you squeeze blood from a stone?
They make concessions because the alternative is to have even less, which is what they’re getting as a result of the murder and kidnapping rampage by Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
Okay let’s try again with simpler words:
The Palestinians have nothing. How do you give up nothing?
Israel is fabricating consent for their genocide.
They have land. They have people. Both can be lost if they’re unable to figure out how to prevent Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and their successors from going on kidnapping and murder rampages.
Maybe if Israel stopped stealing their land and houses, bombing them, cutting off their supplies of water, food and medicine and generally wasn’t actively perpetuating a genocide, and also offered them something real, then they would be more amenable to peace talks.
It’s hard to imagine how the Palestinian people would give Israel any benefit of any doubt at this stage. Their genocidal project has been clear for decades.
And no, they won’t lose everything. That basically can’t be done. It’s fascist propaganda to imply there’s some complete final solution that can be enacted on a minority group. They’ll just keep oppressing and harming them and create a diaspora. It’s an endless project, not one that can be completed.
Would be great. How about Hamas and Islamic Jihad release the people they kidnapped and turn themselves over? It would pretty quickly get rid of Netanyahu’s political support for the use of force.
You misunderstand Netanyahu’s calculus here. He wants genocide. It HAS ALWAYS BEEN genocide from the Nakba. Bombing Gaza is a poor way of rescuing hostages, unless you plan to kill the hostages.
It would pretty quickly get rid of Netanyahu’s political support for the use of force.
You mean the “political support for the use of force” that Israel has enjoyed since 1949?
They have land.
Which Israel will be taking anyway.
They have people.
Which Israel will be murdering anyway.
Fuuuck… even just the insane hasbara narratives on here makes it perfectly clear that there can be no peaceful co-existence with Israel ever.
So… again - the people suffering white supremacist settler-colonialist genocide are the ones that must “concede” everything?
This means that any kind of live-alongside-each-other situation is going to require significant security concessions from the Palestinians as part of the total package.
Oh you mean a security concession like apartheid? Literally Palestinians have nothing to concede beyond leaving Palestine.
EDIT: Let it be clear that the first step to peace HAS ALWAYS BEEN in Israel’s court. They have to be the ones to start treating Palestinians with dignity and respect, to stop the occupation and apartheid. Palestinians have nothing left to concede other than their own destruction.
They’re also not willing to concede living in the same country with equal rights. So not many options left
And whose fault is that? I guarantee that if Israel starts treating Palestinians with respect, the Palestinians will be more amendable to a single country with equal rights. If you have lived 75 years under martial law, you will inevitably get these views where co-habitation becomes impossible. We saw it in South Africa. But look at South Africa now: the indigenous Black population and settler minorities now live together with equal rights. The end of apartheid is possible, but the initiative has to come from Israel, not the Palestinians.
So the people suffering white supreamcist settler-colonialist genocide are the ones that must “concede” everything?
The (so-called) “two-state” solution has always been nothing more than a smokescreen for the west to camouflage it’s murderous support for Israeli colonization and nothing else.
A one state solution is the only solution - and the only obstacle in it’s path is the exitence of Israel.
