By Hagai El-Ad
The two-state solution? Instead of an end to the occupation, September might bring us not just more of the same, but worse: an occupied pseudo-State of Palestine, alongside a deteriorating pseudo-democracy in Israel
The expected UN General Assembly decision on the establishment of an independent Palestinian state was perhaps supposed to usher in a new spirit of optimism among advocates of human rights and democracy. Self-determination for Palestinians and an end to the Occupation ought not only to have heralded a dramatic improvement in the human rights situation in the territories; it could also shift resources previously channeled into the Occupation towards Israel itself, boost efforts to reduce socioeconomic disparities, rally investments for equal opportunity in education and employment, strengthen the legal system, advance full civic equality, and promote progress toward numerous other life-affirming goals and objectives. For all those crucial goals and objectives that have been mired in the swamp of the Occupation, this was to be their hour.
A new spirit of optimism? Not exactly.
The scenario that now seems to be emerging turns out not to be one that will end the occupation of the Palestinians or revive Israeli democracy. On the contrary. In the territories – we can expect to see no end to occupation, but a pseudo-state under the further prolonged state of occupation. In Israel – it looks like there not to be a revival of democracy or improvements in civic equality, but further and even accelerated deterioration towards a pseudo-democracy. The result will be a pseudo-state there and a pseudo-democracy here.
In the territories, even if 150 or more nations vote in September at the UN for the declaration of a Palestinian State, this by itself will end neither the occupation nor the human rights violations to which the occupation, by its nature, necessarily gives rise. In fact, at least in the short run, such a step may intensify the violence and lead to even broader human rights violations than hitherto, including harsher limits on freedom of movement for Palestinians in their state under occupation, and further entrenchment of the separate and unequal legal and administrative systems to which Palestinians and Israeli citizens living in this new “state” will be subject. In the occupied Palestinian state, the new, internationally recognized sovereign will have pseudo-control, while the actual sovereign will continue its reign well into a fifth decade.
Inside Israel, the process that is already underway – whereby the rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel are being limited as if to levy an advance payment for the future Palestinian State – is liable to accelerate and intensify. The political logic subscribed to by a wide range of parties, from Kadima to Likud to Yisrael Beytenu and National Unity (Ichud Leumi), holds that as Israel is confronted by the “future Palestinian State,” it must move immediately to strengthen its “Jewish identity” – identity in a sense that is both demographic and anti-democratic. That means solidifying demography at the price of democracy.
Hence the government is considering bills such as “no loyalty, no citizenship” and legalizing communities’ rights to reject those found to be “unsuitable” (read: Arabs); hence expressions of Palestinian national identity within Israel must be silenced, extra rights for Jews must be legislated, and a drive to boost Jewish-nationalist education is being launched; hence the Bedouins should forget about justice for their villages, and hence the moves to ensure that those pests at the Supreme Court and in human rights organizations can’t be too much of a nuisance. In the Israel that the current policies are shaping, all that will remain of democratic governance will be a barely discernible shadow, as the experiment in creating a “democracy for the Jews” collapses from the weight of its own internal structural contradictions.
Here are the public opinion data: On the one hand, a huge majority of Israelis (80 percent, according to the Israel Democracy Index) prefers “democracy” to any other form of government. Democracy – but what kind of “democracy” do they mean? Without freedom of speech (50 percent believe that there is “too much” of it, according to a 2010 survey by Professor Daniel Bar Tal of Tel Aviv University); without freedom of action for human rights organizations (58 percent favor restricting organizations that “expose immoral acts by the State,” in Bar Tal’s survey); without equality for Arabs (46 percent of Jewish youth would deny Arabs the right to hold public office (in a 2010 survey by Maagar Mochot). Democracy? Pseudo-democracy.
* * *
Is there an alternative to this double-pseudo scenario? Israelis who desire a less hollow future must now stand up for two principles. First, internalize the fact that the world will not end the occupation for us: this is a struggle that must be led by Palestinians and Israelis, and this struggle will not end in September with the UN decision. Secondly, within Israel, standing up for the rights of Palestinian citizens is not a matter solely for the Supreme Court or for Palestinian citizens themselves. In Israel within the Green Line there has been and will be a large national minority, with individual rights and with collective rights. The protection of those rights must not be conditional on external negotiations over a future diplomatic solution. But alas – at present, even in the absence of negotiations, the rights of Israel’s Palestinian minority are already being eroded.
Today, only a minority of Israelis is prepared for the complex process required if we are to deal with the core issues of ending the occupation and delivering equality for the Palestinian minority in Israel. This creates a situation in which, step-by-step, our lives are being emptied of the accepted moral foundation for running democratic states, with the principle of equality the first to go.
On the day after May 15, 2011, the Knesset was addressed by the “leader of the opposition” (who did not even bother to show up to vote against the Acceptance to Communities Law or the Nakba Law or the “Transparency” Law or the Slavery Law or the Annulment of Citizenship Law): “These [Palestinian] children, who are wearing those keys around their necks, must understand that the door their key will unlock is no longer in the State of Israel.” Heartfelt imagery – but to what end? What of the keys we are missing? What is the key that will enable us to deal with the challenges that most of us are avoiding? What of the key around our own necks, the key within our hearts and embodied in our deeds, the key that will open the door to our future here?
Hagai El-Ad is the Executive Director of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel. This is the English version of a Hebrew op-ed originally published earlier in Israel on Haokets.
————————
+972 magazine needs your support. Check this post to see why, and how can you help to keep this project going
June 6, 2011
9:13 pm
Finally, one who is willing to question the viability and the possibility of the “two-state solution.”
June 6, 2011
11:08 pm
i do believe a palestinian state would never bring peace because the palestinians have never been taught or encouraged to seek normalized relations with israel.
every compromise israel has made it met with more demands and more violence. partial concessions should bring partial peace? no?
the facts are this: 40% of palestinians in the WB are citizens of jordan. since the only other country that controlled the west bank either than israel was jordan – it makes sense to hand off whatever land remains to jordan. the palestinians in jerusalem should become citizens naturally, and gaza – well, that will have to be dealt with eventually.
palestinians in lebanon and syria should be incorporated into those states as the jews of arab nations were incorporated into israel.
many solutions…israel isn’t going anywhere so enough of this “democracy” B.S. israel lives in a tough neighorhood and yet it is condemned day in and day out while its neighbors are praised for their “spring” which hasn’t brought anything at all.
June 7, 2011
2:36 am
Abban Aziz,
Barukh Ashem your racist-pro-settlers plan will not have the upper hand. And u should remember that if the Jews from the Arab States were relatively easily absorbed was just for 2 reasons: 1) They took the houses of the Palestinians that were expelled 2) Israel needed new Jews citizens in order to justify what was going on.
Palestine has the right to exist, not less than Israel.
June 7, 2011
10:28 am
The concept of a two state solution (‘two states for two peoples’) implies that there are two people incapable of living with another – a falsehood. In reality Zionism and Palestinian nationalism are incompatible; both nationalism seek exclusively ethnically pure (more or less) states and both are tainted in religious imagery. The two state solution model (like India & Pakistan) does not solve the problem it only exacerbates the inevitable clashes of nationalisms.
Israel must reconcile historical Jewish insecurity and the ethnic cleansing of 1948, it must establish a new narrative that recognizes the wrongs of 1948 with the traumas of the Holocaust, and the wars of traumas that followed. Palestinians, like Jews throughout previous centuries have been oppressed and subjugated to the point of exhaustion. We cannot and should not expect Palestinians to incorporate Israel and Jewish history into their narrative; Israel must do so first in order to enter into reconciliation, and a socio-economic partnership of mutuality.
Israelis need to look to the uncomfortable yet similar situation that forced Apartheid South Africa to yield power to all of its citizens. Israel/Palestine should be one country for all the people of Israel/Palestine.
June 7, 2011
11:14 am
@susy, I disagree with Abban Aziz’ view, but can’t detect there a hint of racism. Would you please show where you detect it?
.
@David Michael,
1. I’m afraid your idealistic view hasn’t yet been successfully tried out in this region: just go through the list of countries around Israel and check for yourself.
2. “Palestinians, like Jews throughout previous centuries have been oppressed and subjugated to the point of exhaustion”
That’s news to me. Care to provide some examples?
.
@Hagai, a 2-state for 2-nations solution is viable when it’s accepted by both sides, regardless of their “narratives”.
Your post doesn’t address a solution, but an attempt to enforce a one-sided action; this indeed will not result in a solution but rather bring extremism on both sides.
June 8, 2011
1:16 am
Max,
It is “racist-pro-settlers” because it implies that an entire people should be absorbed there, there and there…he doesn’t recognize them. In psicology they call this approach “solypsism”.
David Michael,
When one of the 2 sides is much more stronger than the other, how you could expect to built up a binational state? It will become just a “tool” in the hand of the stronger. IT will be a new version of the Ratosh-Canaanist extremist idea…of course not exactly the same, but we some points in common.
Brit Shalom failed in the 20s, whe there was still space for a viable “binational state”. How can u still think that this idea could be applied today?
For me it is really incredible that there are even some clever people that still continue to propose this flawed idea.
June 8, 2011
2:25 am
Susy, “solipsism” has little to do with what you describe, it’s a philosophical (not psychological) term used to describe the idea that only my mind is sure to exist.
.
Absorbing people there and there and there is a political position that says that not every group of people is entitled to their own country; this is the norm in the world.
I don’t agree with this position in this specific case, but there’s no racism in it.
.
We do seem to agree on the futility of the single-state idea.
June 8, 2011
2:42 am
Solipsism is a concept used is philosophy as well in psycology. In fact, developmental psychologists usually believe that infants are solipsist.
.
To me, to consider my own people has the only one (among the two) who is entitled to exist as a people is an ill-concealed form of racism.
.
The “border” is very thin. If you consider the price that the Palestinians have already paid is morally reprehensible to apply your alleged “norm of the world”.
.
It is always noteworthy to remember that the Palestinians were obliged to accept the Western concept of “nationalism”.
.
At least we agree on something.
June 8, 2011
4:14 am
“It is always noteworthy to remember that the Palestinians were obliged to accept the Western concept of “nationalism”.”
What would be “their” concept? How were they “obliged”?
.
“Solipsism is a concept used is philosophy as well in psycology”
Solipsism is a philosophical term used in psychology, like multiplication is a mathematical term used in economics.
It’s good to argue about inconsequential things
June 8, 2011
4:29 am
Bilad-al-Sham would be their “concept”. How? Through the impositions of maps, for example. I.e. through “the way in which the colonial state imagined its dominion”.
.
So what I wrote was correct: Solipsism is used also in psycology.
June 8, 2011
4:52 am
Bilad-al-Sham denotes greater Syria, which indeed was the only political reference to the Arab people in what’s today Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Palestine. This started changing in the 1920’s (first references to Palestinians as people distinct from others not only because they happen to have a home somewhere) and became “mainstream” in the 1960’s, though the Syrian government hasn’t accepted it yet…
So it’s exactly the opposite of what you claim.
June 8, 2011
4:54 am
maps have been used by Arabs a long time ago and not all Arabs were Bedouins
June 8, 2011
5:34 am
yes, you’re right: the philosophical concept of Solipsism is used also in psychology
June 8, 2011
5:55 am
I know that in your western-centric way of perceiving the reality it seems that Bilad al-Sham would be “the opposite of what I claim”. But to be part of Bilad al-Sham with the peculiarities that each of these peoples had doesn’t mean to say that they were just a monolithic body. It just means that borders/capitals/states/flags/anthems are all concepts that had a value in the western cultures, and no one for the indigenous people. A Palestinian who moved to south lebanon or a lebanese who moved to palestine is surely not a foreigner because he was part of the culture of the society of bilad-al-sham, where there were no borders between countries. But that doens’t mean that they didn’t have any difference one with the other.
.
You just want to impose your national ideological perspective on people that didn’t give any value to it.
.
I don’t know what is funny about it and I don’t have time to lose. Go to study the maps that were created by the British and give a look to the way in which the reality was “standardized”. Of course from your perspective this is something acceptable.
.
I am so glad that you feel relieved by your brilliant clarification.
June 8, 2011
6:32 am
Susy,
Your claims are that the people of Palestine had a common identity at those times; that Abban’s view is racist; and that borders are a new, “Western” concept in the region. There’s nothing in what you wrote so far that proves that. You’ve also not provided a non-Western parallel to statehood, beyond the Islamic Empire. Pretending that borders, countries and people being citizens of countries is a Western concept is not based on history.
In fact, you strongly argue that Palestinians are part of the larger Arab group comprising of today’s Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Israel/Palestine, as defined by the Ottoman administration.
I’m sorry, but I couldn’t relate the fact that people could move freely within Bilad al-Sham, part of the Ottoman Empire for 400 years and part of other empires for 1,500 years earlier, to our discussion.
Unless, of course, you side with Abban’s view that they should continue and move freely within those countries.
June 9, 2011
10:31 pm
Susy-
You are right. That is why I can’t understand why the oil-rich Gulf States didn’t take in the Palestinian refugees and make them full citizens. Today, they have millions of primarily Asian foreign workers there, many of whom would be considered idol-worshipers in Islam or, at best, dhimmis. If they brought in their brother Palestinians, they would have people who belong to the same umma, have the same religion and language and culture. Since they are always telling us that all Arabs are brothers and all Muslims love one another, I have never understand why they didn’t welcome the Palestinians with open arms.