How Should We Solve The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict?

1 state, 2 states, 3 states, 4?

One question that I’ve heard quite a lot since I started advocating for peace is what kind of solution do I advocate for the conflict? What does the end state look like?

It’s a really fair question, because people want to know what the destination is. But at the same time, it’s a question that has been asked incessantly without actually getting anywhere, which is why my answer to the question is that maybe it’s not the right question. What I’m really committed to is peace itself. We could impose the most well-designed 2-state solution or federation or 1-state solution, but if it collapses into chaos and another round of war, then it might as well be garbage.

So the most important characteristic of a solution is that it is agreeable. In other words, it needs to be a system that can be agreed upon by the human beings living in the Holy Land, preferably a majority of people as well as the governmental leadership on both sides.

The second characteristic which is very much related to the first characteristic is that it is tolerable and liveable, in other words that when it is imposed it doesn’t collapse due to anger, provocation, or killings. People need to be able to live a normal life, and have personal security for themselves and their families. If people’s families are dying or being physically attacked like in the Second Intifada, this stokes anger and radicalisation. Instead, the peace should be mutually beneficial. Nobody should feel like they’re being oppressed or subjugated. Instead, they should just be able to enjoy their life like anyone in Europe or America or any modernised country can do.

Beyond these criteria, I wouldn’t rule out anything. With this being said, I think that after all of the hatred and violence that we have seen over the preceding decades, a one-state solution of any kind is quite unlikely simply because of all of the bad blood that decades of strife has created. Furthermore a one-state solution would seem to snuff out either Zionism or Palestinian nationalism, and to be quite frank I don’t think either side wants to give up their national ideology nor merge them together. They are very distinct and they are quite opposed.

Secondly, any solution involving mass displacement also seems tremendously unlikely to be implementable because of the deep attachments to the land that both people feel. Now, of course individuals and their families on either side should be free to leave if they personally wish to, but after all of this time and struggle both sides have their heels deeply dug in.

Thirdly, any solution where one side has total dominance over the other is going to breed immense dissatisfaction and will ultimately prove unsustainable. Don’t confuse this with security. Both sides of course have a right to live securely and without being targeted by violence, but permanent military occupation or disenfranchisement is not sustainable because of the resentment that it breeds. Nobody wants to feel like they are being subjugated.

So what do I recommend to achieve this kind of solution? We have to talk to each other and try to build up a reconciliation where we try to understand each other and empathise with each other, and humanise one another. Neither side is going to disappear or give up their historical attachment to the land. The emotional sway is too deep, and the sunk costs are too great.

This process is going to take a long time. Right now we are in the middle of a war, and it seems like it will be a war that Israel will win and Hamas will lose. Hamas, I expect, will be dismantled entirely as an organisation, and I think that jihadism more broadly as an ideology will have to be marginalised entirely. That is the consequence of October 7th, and I don’t see any way that Hamas or their ideological fellow travellers can avoid this. Jihadism is a dead end. It is a recipe for self-destruction.

But beyond this? No, I don’t think the Trump plan will be implemented. Moving 2 million people against their will and in full view of the international media is not likely to happen, and if it did it would be an atrocity. If it were to be implemented, I doubt that those who are moved would give up on their Palestinian identity. They would instead commit to returning somehow, someway, and at some point. The conflict would continue until such point as there is some kind of reconciliation, whether that is decades or centuries into the future.

That is the hard work that we need to move towards. We need to talk to each other and listen to each other in an honest way. We need to move sooner or later towards peace negotiations between an Israeli government and a Palestinian government, while also including regional partners like Jordan, and Egypt who have previously had a governing role. Not to mention Saudi Arabia, and the UAE who have an economic interest in long-term peace with Israel.

It is for the adults in the room on both sides to try to do this work. It’s time to start talking.