One State

Shimon Peres put down some thoughts today in the Washington Post about the importance of a two-state solution for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. His piece is in response to an increasing number of articles and commentary pointing out that the two-state solution is rapidly becoming obsolete. In this particular piece, Peres doesn't provide much argument; he basically just asserts the importance of a two-state solution:

Having personally witnessed the remarkable progress we have made with the Palestinian Authority in recent years, I believe that a two-state solution is not only the best resolution to this age-old conflict but one within our reach.

But is it really within reach? Like the many other pundits and writers, who hope, cajole or plead for some sort of resumption of peace negotiations aimed at creating a Palestinian state, he fails to actually address the question of whether it is really possible anymore.

There was an excellent story on 60 minutes a couple of weeks ago by Bob Simon (part 1 and part 2). As covered in depth in the story, it appears as though a tipping point may have been reached. There are now simply too many settlements and outposts and too many Jewish settlers resolutely determined to stay. When interviewed about it later, Bob Simon stated that in his view, history had simply passed the two-state solution by.

The graph below neatly and simply summarizes the situation by showing the number of West Bank settlers, increasing over time. This graph comes from the Peace Now website, which is worth checking out for the factual information that is otherwise hard to locate.



Importantly, at no point has the number of settlers decreased or even held stable. Under Labor and Likud governments, during peace negotiations and conflict, the number of settlements and settlers has steadily increased. It simply strikes me as surreal that Peres, who knows all about this, decides not to address it at all.

Nor does the evacuation of the Gaza settlements provide any real comfort. From my reading, I think there was a general recognition in the settler movement that Gaza was simply untenable, but the West Bank, Samaria, is another story entirely. I would not be at all surprised if there weren't some settlers that would be prepared to die rather than surrender the West Bank. After all, some of these folks, and obviously there are a minority, are prepared to live very roughly, in hostile territory, with their often young families. It takes deep faith, courage and determination to do this in the first place and I am very skeptical that they would simply uproot their lives if some politician in Tel Aviv told them to do so.

One of the reasons that I particularly like the 60 minutes interview is that it shows very clearly what happened when Olmert tried to evacuate just one tiny settlement outpost. The violence that was sparked was traumatic - and Olmert simply didn't try to remove any more.

It is also important to point out that the settler demographics are just one reason why the two-state solution is looking obsolete. The Israeli political structure itself, with the deal making power often being wielded by the far right groups, in itself could also preclude a two-state solution. This situation looks likely to reoccur after yesterdays election. Access to water, and especially the Jordan River, is another extremely complex issue that is fundamentally hard to solve. And critically, with every passing year the conflict becomes systemically harder and harder to solve.

So, increasingly I think that if writers or commentators are going to talk about a two-state solution, the onus ought to be on explaining why exactly they think it is feasible in a very concrete, practical way. I would very interested in hearing about how the settlers are going to be removed, and when for example. But then again, maybe these are questions that Peres would rather not think about.