Is a Two-State Solution The Answer to the
Israeli-Palestinian Conflict？
Introduction to Two-state solution
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-state_solution
Debate: Two-state solution to Israeli-Palestinian conflict
Path of Least Instability
◎Shibley Telhami
Updated September 15, 2011, 07:36 PM
Shibley Telhami is Anwar Sadat Professor at the University of Maryland and a nonresident senior fellow at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy of the Brookings Institution.
Experts and outsiders may agree or disagree on the viability of Israel without a Palestinian state, but in the end, Israelis will always think they alone know what's good for them. How do Israelis feel about this issue? Although they vary in their support for a two-state solution, most are pessimistic about its likelihood. And yet, a majority of Israelis believe that without a Palestinian state, there will either be intense conflict for years to come or the status quo will continue, with only a few believing that the Palestinians would eventually give up their aspirations.
Interestingly, Arab public opinion in the six Arab countries in which I conduct polls (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Jordan, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates) showed even more pessimism about the alternative to the two-state solution in 2010, with only 10 percent expressing the view that it would lead to a one-state solution.
In fact, this uncertainty is what's still keeping the two-state solution alive in Arab (and Israeli) minds: On the one hand, majorities express support for a two-state solution based on the 1967 boundaries; on the other hand most believe it will never happen. But since majorities also think that the alternative will not be one state but protracted conflict, they are reluctant to give up the two-state solution.
Would Palestine be a stable state? The first measure is if it would be more stable than the alternatives. Instincts of both the Arab and Jewish publics are about right: The alternative would probably be more unstable and, importantly, more destabilizing, particularly for neighboring states. The stability of a small Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza would depend less on Palestinian internal divisions and economic viability than on the stability of the political and security arrangements with Israel, Egypt and Jordan.
Sure, the economy of such a state will face challenges and may in the end have to be interconnected to the economies of Israel and Arab neighbors, but that is not a bigger challenge than the current situation or than the one many states face. Palestinians are divided politically, but so too are most governing bodies, including Israel's.
Israel's Fate Is Not on the Line
◎Aaron David Miller
Updated September 15, 2011, 07:36 PM
Aaron David Miller, a former U.S. negotiator for Republican and Democratic administrations, is a scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He is the author of "The Much Too Promised Land."
The bottom line on Israeli survival and the Palestinians is this: even without a settlement, Israelis will keep their state; the problem is that the Palestinians (and Arabs) will never let them completely enjoy it.
Let’s be clear. The creation of a Palestinian state is no panacea. Proximity and concern about Palestine's stability will mandate a cooperation and dependency that will constrain Palestinian sovereignty and likely generate Israeli-Palestinian tensions.
Still, without a two state solution Israel’s situation will be worse. Palestinian demographic advantage, continued Israeli occupation and deteriorating relations with its Arab neighbors will undermine Israeli security, not to mention the threat posed by a potentially nuclear Iran.
But let’s not go overboard. The notion that Israel will inevitably disappear or be converted into an apartheid state just doesn’t add up. Palestinians are weak and divided, split into at least five constituencies. Israel fully controls only one, the 300,000 Palestinians of East Jerusalem; and a good many of them would choose to live under Israeli control as permanent residents rather than in an ill-managed Palestinian state. Israel has removed itself from Gaza and Palestinians govern themselves in a large part of the West Bank. The chances that Palestinians would demand or be expected to receive citizenship in an Israeli state is highly unlikely.
Moreover, Israel is a regional superpower: it enjoys a vibrant high-tech sector, and 120 of its companies’ stocks trade on American exchanges. The nation also possesses one of the world’s finest militaries, has a close alliance with America and has nuclear weapons.
Yes, as John Maynard Keynes argued, in the long run we’ll all be dead; who knows where Israel will be 50 or 100 years from now? But states just don’t disappear. And for the foreseeable future — with or without a solution to the Palestinian problem — Israel will not only survive, but also is likely to prosper.
The Middle East Has Changed
◎Rashid Khalidi
Updated September 15, 2011, 07:36 PM
Rashid Khalidi is the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University. He is the author of "Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness."
There are only two genuine threats to Israel’s survival. One is its continued subjugation of the Palestinian people. The other is its failure to realize that it lives in a very different Middle East from that of Herzl or Weizmann or Ben-Gurion. That was a region dominated by outside powers that blandly accepted Herzl’s idea of Israel as a colonial outpost of the West, and the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians in 1948. Such things are inconceivable in a Middle East where popular sovereignty is finally beginning to have an impact on the foreign policy of states like Turkey and Egypt, and where peoples like those of Libya and Syria are wa
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