After decades of the “two states for two people” blueprint more or less dominating proposals for Israeli-Palestinian peace, a new paradigm is gaining momentum. Under this model, Israel absorbs the West Bank and its 2.5 million Palestinians, while Hamas-run Gaza becomes a separate entity aligned with the Middle East’s rising Islamist powers.
Such a development could potentially improve stability after decades of unresolved conflict, but it represents a blow to Palestinian statehood aspirations as well as to Israelis who see a Palestinian state as essential for their own security. Gaza militants’ firing of more than 70 rockets and mortars into Israel today emphasized the security risk posed to Israel by a rogue neighbor that neither it nor the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority (PA), can control.
A visit to Gaza yesterday by the emir of Qatar, a key member of the region’s emerging Islamist alliance and the first leader to make a state visit since Hamas took over in 2007, underscored the fact that Gaza and the West Bank have since become two distinct – and potentially irreconcilable – entities. Unless or until that split is resolved, Palestinians can’t present a united front at the peace table with Israel.
“It’s a wonderful excuse … to say, ‘Until you settle things with yourselves and we have one address and we can talk to the new leadership [peace talks will be postponed],’ ” says Alon Liel, a veteran Israeli diplomat who now works in the private sector. “And you hear more and more people speaking about the possibility of annexing the West Bank or at least finding an agreement that in practical terms will be one state while Gaza will stay on its own or have an agreement with Egypt.”
Israeli Jews have long eschewed the possibility of a single binational state out of fear that it would sooner or later result in an Arab majority, undermining their ideal of a state that is “Jewish and democratic.” While the removal of Gaza from the equation would allow Jews to retain a clear majority, the democracy question is more controversial. Many Israeli Jews support “apartheid” policies if Israel were to annex the West Bank, according to a poll published by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz yesterday.
Most significantly, 69 percent said they would not want Palestinians to be allowed to vote in national elections. Other policies include separate roads for Palestinians and Israelis (74 percent); preference for Jews over Arabs for government jobs (59 percent); and separate classrooms for Jewish and Arab children (42 percent).
“In practical terms, we already have one state,” says Mr. Liel, who had a hand in the poll, but, unlike many respondents, would support a single state only if it were democratic. “The Palestinian Authority is not an independent political unit. It is dependent on Israel for everything, including security. So … many Israelis feel we don’t have negotiations, we don’t have real pressure from outside world to negotiate, on the ground … it’s quiet. So why not continue?”
Gaza’s secessionists
The split between Gaza and the West Bank goes back to 2007, when Hamas – which had won an overwhelming victory in 2006 parliamentary elections – violently ousted its secular rival Fatah from the Gaza Strip following a year of rocky relations as the two parties tried to govern together.
Egypt has mediated reconciliation talks for years, at times appearing close to reaching an agreement, and Qatar has tried to bridge the gap as well. But many say that after five years under Hamas rule, Gaza has become a fundamentally different place than the West Bank under the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority (PA), making reunification nearly impossible.
“This split is irreversible in this phase of our history,” says Ghassan Khatib, who until recently served as PA spokesman. “The factors that led to this split are still in effect.”
Among those factors, he says, are Iran’s encouragement of Hamas, attempts by Israel and the US to discourage reconciliation, and Hamas leaders “waiting to see the Arab Spring settle in the favor” with support from Islamist leaders.
“Hamas, since they won, is a secessionist movement – not just in rebellion to the government of the Palestinian Authority,” says Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor. “It’s making Gaza a secessionist territory and a de facto state that breaks away from the Palestinian state in the making. That’s a reality that cannot be ignored.”
Especially yesterday. The emir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, arrived in Gaza to great fanfare, thanks to his pledge of $400 million in reconstruction aid to the tiny coastal territory. His visit not only underscored Gaza’s emergence as a statelet unto itself, but was widely interpreted as a slight to the cash-strapped PA in the West Bank, which he declined to visit.
While some expressed dismay with funneling such significant funding to a terrorist group, others say that support from Qatar, plus heightened engagement from Egypt and Turkey, could actually help prevent Gaza from being a more radicalized and desperate place.
“We have a new Egypt now, with an entirely new situation of a new Egyptian-Turkish alliance,” says Liel, who adds that Qatar is part of this new Sunni Islamist bloc. “Having them involved in Gaza can moderate the Gaza leadership, can create in Gaza … religious leadership aiming at modernization, which would be an unbelievable development. But we have to see if it happens.”
Possibility for future peacemaking
Mr. Palmor of Israel’s Foreign Ministry says the problem of negotiating with the Palestinians before a Hamas-Fatah reconciliation was addressed at the 2007 Annapolis peace talks, with the Israelis accepting that implementation on the ground would happen gradually.
Then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni understood that any peace deal “wouldn’t be automatically and enthusiastically adopted by Hamas,” but would rather be implemented where possible, says Palmor. “The idea was, we will negotiate with those who are willing to negotiate. We will reach an agreement. And when we reach that point, maybe it will create a new dynamic that will change reality.”
While the outlook for the two-state solution envisioned at Annapolis appears bleak, Liel holds out hope that the Palestinian bid to upgrade its status to a “nonmember state” at the United Nations next month could create new momentum in that direction if a majority of European nations backed the motion, indicating substantial international support for the Palestinians’ right to a state of their own.
“We know it doesn’t have a practical meaning but it is of a huge symbolic meaning and a huge legal meaning and I think it could reverse the momentum toward the one-state reality,” says he says. “I think it can change the atmosphere among Palestinians, maybe even in Fatah-Hamas relations. It can definitely change the mood inside Israel.”
History repeats itself:
The Partition plan and the presently proposed plan (is there a name for it?) Both were and are unacceptable, both were and will be rejected by Arabs, that will finally regret it, and will end up being the losers. So, Don’t you worry, it is not going to happen.
Jordan IS Palestine.
@ Bernard Ross:
As the africans rejected the return of gaza to their control within the carter agreement let the u.n. take full trusteship of gaza.
If and when they clean the place up they can then return the area to ISRAEL as a full province of the state.
IL will need to wait for a genetic mutation before the Muslims see the light.
Mutations are unpredictable and do not occur every day.
This will be the future…Gaza will become “free” Palestine LOLLL and J+S will be an integral part of Israel and Catherine ASSton can jump the cliff, together with her PIMP Falk !!!!
Momentum builds. Hallelujah!
@ Laura:
Laura Said:
Turkey has not managed to become a jihadist regime – yet.
They are slowly but surly moving towards that direction. I remember having read that Turkey is the world champion in imprisoned journalists.
Up to Erdogan’s ascendance to power, the Turkish Army was enforcing a secular character on Turkey. But with Erdogan, the Turkish public had a chance to express their true self, the islamist one.
You are right, Hamas will not become more moderate due to Turkey’s involvement, rather it is Turkey that will become more radical.
And something irrelevant, Turkey is bulling us, Greeks, not to drill for oil and gas in the Mediterranean. There seem to be complicated legal disputes, but the gist is that Greece dares not drill because Turkey is far more powerful.
@ Arnold Harris:
Very well said, Arnold.
Aren’t Egypt and Turkey themselves ruled by jihadist regimes? So why would their involvement in Gaza lead to moderation? Why do Israeli and western officials continually indulge in the fairy tale of moderate islamic leadership?
Israel needs to keep up the pressure and let the world know that ‘enough is enough’. There is NO other country in this world that would tolerate this. Who cares if there are U.S. elections looming. Does the U.S. really think that Israel should ‘hold off’ just because the U.S. doesn’t want Israel to rock the boat and it is not good timing? Too bad. Who is really rocking the boat here anyway? Who is firing the rockets?
@ SHmuel HaLevi:
SHmuel, you had mentioned a meeting you had planned for yesterday. Any thoughts you’d like to share?
Please research who are Liel and Palmor and then lets go over the true undercurrent.
I do agree on that Aza will revert or remain on its ancestral mode and that Yehuda and Shomron will return to the Jewish fold. But that will require significant leadership and government system structural changes in Israel.
The drift of the Azans into Sinai is significant as many Azans are originally tribal and Hamula linked to each other.
Anyone that served in reserve duty in Aza knows that their links are with the Sinai people and not with the Arabian, Syrian, Sudanese and other Hamulas in Y & S.
A better weapon – Wouldn’t using something like this against Gazan terror make a difference? The annoyance factor alone among the population would be huge. Target one sector at the time, until the rockets stop.
Boeing missile flies over buildings, fries computers with microwaves – http://www.geekwire.com/2012/boeing-air-force-successfully-test-advanced-missile-change-modern-day-warfare/
Arnold Harris has some good ideas. Gaza has been a killing field throughout its history. When I read about all the rockets fired into Israel yesterday, I’m wondering if “the last straw” is approaching, and if it is, I hope Israel will bomb the mansions first.
Gaza would be a good and easy place to send annoying pals. Israel could “drop off” pal deportees to the obvious defacto palestinian state.. Israel has a lot of experience entering and leaving gaza. give the west bankers the north or middle of gaza and then hamas and fatah can continue their war there. In fact Gaza is actually “Palestine” the former home of the philistines.
First, annex Area C and parts of Area B as defined in the Oslo accords. These are areas in which the overwhelming majority of the population already is Jewish. The Arab cities, which is most of what Area A comprises, should be offered local autonomy under general control of the State of Israel.
Do not offer Israeli citizenship to hostile Arabs, a definition that would include most of them. Those who agree to live in peace with Israel should be left to live their lives without interference. Those who choose defiance should be expelled across any of Israel’s borders, with Trans-Jordan being the best choice. Those who take up armed terrorism should be killed if taken with arms in hand. Do not bother imprisoning any of them. Expulsion is the cheapest and administratively most convenient way of dealing with a hostile population.
Remember Yoram Ettinger’s quite correct demographics. The Jewish population of Shomron and Yehuda is increasing about twice as fast as that of Israel as a whole. That means the 200,000 Jews of East Jerusalem and the 370,000 Jews of Shomron and Yehuda proper, including what I understand is more than 50,000 more or less permanent Jewish religious school students resident in the territories, will double to about 1.1 or 1.2 million in about 15 years, if the same rate of expansion is maintained.
Do not forget to bolster the Jewish population of Golan. And when — not if — Syria breaks up, use that opportunity to boot out the UNO and retake control of Kuneitra and some of the mountain tops and slopes north of Mount Hermon.
Finally, all of you know as well as I do that the Moslem Brotherhood-controlled Egyptian government, backed by their own street mobs, will one day denounce the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty. When that day comes, Israel must be prepared to move heavy military forces into the Sinai peninsula, at least as far west as the Mitla Pass to the north and the Gulf of Suez to the south, and this time annex it and begin settling it, beginning with restoration of the municipality of Yamit that was destroyed by Sharon some 30 years ago.
Israel certainly make peace with individual Arabs and their families, but there never can and never will be any true peace with the Arab states, with their internal struggles between Sun’a and Shi’a Islam, which has beset them more or less since the day their prophet Muhamad died. Their writings have it somewhat mixed up. The true House of Strife (al Harb) is not the rest of the world, but that of Islam itself. They can never and shall never resolve that struggle, and they are too combative to do so in any case.
But if Israel cannot have peace, then Israel can have power through regional dominance. This will not come about overnight, but it must never be abandoned or forgotten. Remember, the empires all fade, and that is happening now in the West. Israel must never be so closely attached to any such empire so that it and the reviving Jewish nation sinks with them.
Build Jewish independence. Build Jewish strength. Build Jewish power. And never abandon HaShem to chase after the enticements — either spiritual or societal — of the dying empires.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
I don’t see the problem. The mere fact that after 5 short years the “Gazan Palestinians” and the “West Bank Palestinians” have evolved into irreconcilable “peoples” that can not be reunited, only demonstrates that the so called “Palestinian People” has been a fabrication and fraud from the start. Furthermore, with the pending collapse of the Hashemite occupation of Jordan, the long suffering “Palestinians” will have their state and any such Arabs that choose to remain in post-annexation, Greater Israel, will be welcome to stay as non-citizen residents preserving their civil and property rights as mandated by the Mandate and they can look to Jordan for their political rights just as the Mandate envisioned. No doubt as loyal “Palestinians” many will choose to return to their ancient homeland of Jordan ;>.