Comment by YZF
2 years ago
Yes yes. I'm from Israel. I know that story.
Palestinians did not reject a one state solution. Most Israelis don't want that. I.e. annex the West Bank and Gaza and have a single country, let's call it "Israel-Palestine".
I think the Israeli Arabs are a model/proof that it can work. It might need a generation or two to get there.
If you want more radical ideas then if all Palestinian Arabs convert to Judaism we can also solve the problem pretty quickly...
I don't see how the minority of Israeli Arabs can so easily be used as proof. The Arab population of Israel is around 20% at 2 million. The population of the two Palestinian territories is at around 5 million Arabs and they have a strong Muslim majority. Israel's population is considered to be 3/4 Jewish. If Israel and the Palestinian territories were to become combined into a single state, it would no longer have a strong Jewish majority and would also cease to have its strong secular minority. It would cease to be Israel.
Even though the current Israeli government may be more conservative than the ones previous, I see few possibilities for a more socially liberal government if Israel were to combine with the more-conservative majority-Muslim Palestinian states, given that there is not a single majority Muslim country in the world that is close to as socially liberal as Israel is, even now. Especially given that Muslim majority countries have a tendency to start employing Sharia law, even in Malaysia, far separated from the Middle-Eastern Muslim world.
> If Israel and the Palestinian territories were to become combined into a single state, it would no longer have a strong Jewish majority and would also cease to have its strong secular minority. It would cease to be Israel.
> Even though the current Israeli government may be more conservative than the ones previous, I see few possibilities for a more socially liberal government if Israel were to combine with the more-conservative majority-Muslim Palestinian states
According to some forecasts, roughly 50% of all Israeli children born in 2065 will be Haredi. [0] If that's right, Israel could well end this century with a majority of the population being Haredi, and Haredi parties in control of the Knesset and Israeli government. I doubt a socially liberal Israeli government could be possible in that circumstance; whatever remains of the secular minority may not be "strong", it may be politically weakened, demoralised, and increasingly diminished by emigration and a low birth rate.
And all that's assuming there is no change to the relationship with the Palestinians. So maybe a change won't do as much as you think – it might just hasten the inevitable.
[0] https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/2023-05-22/ty-article-opinio...
> And all that's assuming there is no change to the relationship with the Palestinians. So maybe a change won't do as much as you think – it might just hasten the inevitable.
So destruction now or destruction some time after 2065? I know what I'd pick ...
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> Most Israelis don't want that
Because it would mean the end of a Jewish state. Combine Israel and Palestine and you get roughly 50% Jews, 50% Arabs. (5.3M Arabs in Palestine, 7.1M Jews in Israel and 2M Arabs in Israel).
> Combine Israel and Palestine and you get roughly 50% Jews, 50% Arabs
It it leads to a peaceful and stable state that would be a good thing.
Is there a need for a Jewish state? Lots of ethnic groups do not have their own state. Mine does not - a much smaller number of us, and we are disappearing through mixing.
Historically, wherever Islam is in majority or has political power, they have problems with non-muslims, unless the latter become muslims. In fact, Christians have had problems with Jews too. One core element of anti-semitism stems from Christianity as a religion: for more, read James Carroll's Constantine's Sword:The Church and the Jews, A History
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I don’t really know, but I guess the argument is that historically Jewish minorities have not really been free from oppression in any country at any time until the end of the Second World War.
So maybe there’s no strict need for a Jewish state, but I can see how going back to a collective of (often oppressed) minorities is not appealing.
I think it's workable with a constitution that guarantees rights for Jews such that the 50% Arabs can't change that and with a long slow process of building that single state (30 years? 50 years?). There might need to be other safeguards, Arabs today don't really serve in the IDF so maybe that would need to continue.
What else is the long term trajectory here? Israel can't keep occupying Palestinians indefinitely (and I'm using the term "occupy" in the Israeli meaning, not in the Palestinian meaning, fwiw). Two states as we've seen is not going to work. Anyways, I know this is a hard time to talk about this.
Adding a larger population that doesn't serve in the army isn't going to help IMO — the non-religious Jews are already very mad about the carveouts for Haredim not serving in the army. An "equal state" where a Jewish minority are forced into the military or else imprisoned, and the non-Jews aren't, is not going to go well.
Two states are much better than one in my opinion, and the PA-led pseudo-state is much better than Hamas-controlled Gaza. Israel and Palestine need a manageable divorce, not a forced and unhappy marriage.
Regardless, the PA does not advocate for one state, Hamas does not advocate for one state, and the vast majority of Israelis do not want one state, so I think this is kind of a moot point.
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I have the impression that Israel's government does want a one state solution, but only after expelling as many as possible of the Palestinians into neighbouring countries to join those already in exile; they certainly don't want to grant them Israeli citizenship.
Arabs rejected a two-state solution at the very inception of Israel. An Arab majority Israel-Palestine would drive out its Jews, just as every other Arab country has done.
Arabs rejected getting <50% of the land (and being evicted at gunpoint from the rest) when they were ~2/3rds of the population in 1948. 1948 was 75 years ago, things have changed since then.
Arabs got the vast majority of the land, which became Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_Revolt.
The reason Arabs supported the British against the Ottomans was because they wanted to create a unified Arab nation: https://awayfromthewesternfront.org/campaigns/egypt-palestin.... And Arabs got the overwhelming majority of the territory they wanted (notwithstanding the many minority groups they had conquered in the Levant), with the exception of what became Israel. Put differently, you could say that Arabs got 0% of Israel, and that’s technically true. But it’s not an accurate description of what they got in comparison to what they actually wanted.
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They might have to change what the UNRWA schools in Palestine (among others) are teaching to get people on board with that first:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/unrwa-continues-to-teac...
That report is based on policing the likes and shares in social media accounts of teachers, not on what they taught the children or what they themselves did or wrote.
Imagine that was done here (in the US), those teachers might get a talking to, but nobody would buy that they're teaching hate unless students or observers say something.
If someone were to scrub your social media accounts, would they find 0 likes or shares of 'hateful content'? Depending on who you follow, that could be anything from sharing videos of the IDF's attacks, Hamas' attacks, Likud's charter, or even some dude that edited their viral post to inject something positive about Mein Kampf
No, there were actual textbooks used in classes too.
> Palestinians did not reject a one state solution. Most Israelis don't want that. I.e. annex the West Bank and Gaza and have a single country, let's call it "Israel-Palestine".
Hardliners in the current Israeli government (e.g Itamar Ben-Gvir, Bezalel Smotrich, Amichai Eliyahu) want to "annex Judaea and Samaria". There seems to be a bit of ambiguity about whether they mean only Area C, or the whole of the West Bank (or even annex Area C now as a precursor to annexing A and B later.)
If they did that, what would happen to the Palestinians living in those areas – would they become Israeli Arabs? Would they first have to request Israeli citizenship? Would they be entitled to it, or would it be up to the Israeli government to decide whether to extend it to them?
"One state solution" is an idea primarily associated with Israel's peacenik far left, but maybe the best way to achieve it might (paradoxically) be to let the Israeli far right get a big chunk of what it wants?
> If you want more radical ideas then if all Palestinian Arabs convert to Judaism we can also solve the problem pretty quickly...
Speaking of radical ideas, I find the "cantonization" proposals [0] for the future of Israel rather fascinating. Basically convert it into a federation of different "cantons" representing the different sectors of Israeli society (secular, religious, Haredi, Arab). These cantons might be partially geographical and partially personal – i.e. every citizen belongs to a canton personally, the canton also controls the territory where its members are a majority, but has to protect the rights of minorities from other cantons in its territory; individuals will receive some government services from the canton of residence (e.g. public utilities), others might be provided by their personal canton (e.g. education, family law)
[0] https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-05-05/ty-article-ma...
The hardliners real plan is to Annex Judea and Samaria, make the Palestinians second-class citizens and convince them to immigrate.
Sort of apartheid.
It's more wishful thinking than a plan.
Possible outcome: they win the argument on annexing Judaea and Samaria, which is the first step of their plan, but then they fail to achieve the subsequent steps (denying Palestinians citizenship, mass deportation of Palestinians, etc) – which could produce an end result which is a long way from what they actually want – e.g. Israeli annexation could make all West Bank Palestinians eligible for Israeli citizenship, and then what if large numbers of them decide they want it, and end up getting it? Suddenly the "binational one-state solution" seems a lot closer to reality, as Arabs become an increasing percentage of Israeli citizens – even though what the hardliners actually wanted to achieve by annexation was the "mononational one-state solution" (Israel gets all the land while the Palestinians all leave and give up their Palestinian identity)
I don't know what the fix is but that's impossible. Israel has to stay a relatively united nation with a powerful military and nuclear power status or the Arab nations will immediately bulldoze it.
> I don't know what the fix is but that's impossible. Israel has to stay a relatively united nation with a powerful military and nuclear power status or the Arab nations will immediately bulldoze it.
Under the "canton" proposal, there would still be a national government in charge of the military, intelligence agencies, diplomacy, foreign trade, the currency, the banking system, etc. The "cantons" would primarily control local matters, schools, housing, family law, religious affairs, etc. So I don't think it would make much difference to military.
It would basically be transforming Israel from a unitary state (like New Zealand) to a federal state (like the US, Canada, Australia, Germany, Switzerland) - however, with the added factor that the top-level national subdivisions would be based on cultural factors rather than purely geographical ones – which would be a system more like that of Belgium.
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Chomsky called it. Then again he stated that none of it is hidden. Those ideas were floated in the open, but not covered in US at all.
> I think the Israeli Arabs are a model/proof that it can work
Because they’re a minority. Look at what happens when Jews are a minority in a Muslim-majority country.
Even if Palestinian Arabs could get okay with Jews it would be a powder keg long term. Because the whole Muslim world hates the idea of Jews in the holy land, and uses Palestinians as a proxy against Jews. I’m from a “moderate” Muslim country. Out of thousands of Jews that used to live in the country, only a few families are left (openly). It’s really as bad as people think.