Healing the divide

Is a two-state solution the most practical way of ending the current intolerable and endless Israel-Palestine cycle of violence? The question can only be answered successfully in the positive. Any attempt to absorb all citizens and land into the one state, Israel or Palestine, with equal political, religious and social rights, is not practical.

The Israelis, especially Zionist, having suffered centuries of persecution, and especially the horrors of the Holocaust, don’t want their dominant Jewish exclusivity threatened by non-Jewish people, and the Palestinians claim they can only live in a state where political, religious, and social equality applies to all its citizens. Such issues as the “right of return,” potential reparations for Palestinian refugees, dual citizenship and residential rights of all foreign Jewish people, would prove very difficult, if not impossible, issues to accommodate within a single state.

Both the Jewish and Palestinian people want a secure and prosperous future in their own homeland. However, it was not until the early 1990s, after some four decades of conflict and turmoil following Israel’s declaration of independence in 1948, that the leaders of both countries accepted that genuine hope for such a future lay down the two-state pathway. The Oslo Accord of 1993, signed jointly by Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestine negotiator (later president) Mahmoud Abbas, and underpinned by UNSC Resolution 242 of 1967, remain the blueprints of that mutual pathway.

Sadly, the Oslo Accord has never been implemented for various reasons. These include internal opposition to the Accord by political factions within both countries, disagreements over definitions of borders affecting Israeli troop withdrawals, the status of Jerusalem, the return of refugees, and outbreaks of Israeli-Palestine violence—including Hamas’s violent 7 October attack against Israel, and its consequences in Gaza and West Bank. The concurrent conflicts between Israel and especially Iran, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the Houthis in Yemen have seriously complicated any hope of early progress towards a two-state solution.

The speeches by President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the UN General Assembly (UNGA) on 26 and 27 September expose more insights into two-state prospects. Abbas’s major focus was on ending the war with Israel and establishing Palestine as a fully independent sovereign state protected by the UN. He condemned Israel’s war in Gaza as a war of genocide, sought a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire, the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Palestine, and a peace conference within a year to implement the two-state solution.

He did not explicitly accuse Israel of wanting a politically separate Gaza, but this was implicit in his reference to rejecting Israel’s intention to force the resettlement of the Gazans in Egypt and Jordan. He did not explicitly condemn Hamas for their 7 October killing of Israeli civilians, but reiterated his past condemnation of anyone responsible for killing civilians. He also demanded Palestine’s full UN membership, and strongly criticized the US for using its UNSC membership to block this.

Netanyahu described Israel’s mission as ruthlessly fighting enemies that sought their annihilation, while simultaneously seeking peace across the Middle East. His peace formula sought “reconciliation between Arab and Jew,” and working closely with “Arab partners,” especially Saudi Arabia.

He identified the principal enemy as Iran, though other enemies included Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis. He spoke only of resolving threats by force; any role for diplomacy was not mentioned.

On Hamas, he appealed for the release of Israeli hostages. The solution, if that didn’t happen and the war continued, was the total destruction of Hamas and replacement by a “demilitarised and de-radicalised Gaza.”

He affirmed Israel’s readiness “to work with regional and other partners to support a local civilian administration in Gaza, committed to peaceful coexistence.” He saw no role for Hamas in a post-war Gaza. His only reference to Palestine was attacks on Israel by Iran-backed “Palestinian terrorists in Judea and Samaria”—Palestine’s West Bank.

Netanyahu also bitterly attacked Abbas personally, partly because Abbas questioned in his UN speech Israel’s right to UN membership for failure to meet past UN obligations. Netanyahu also claimed Abbas was still engaged in funding “terrorists who murdered Israelis and Americans.”

He also bitterly attacked the UN as a “swamp of antisemitic bile” and accused the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) recent judgements on Israel as motivated by antisemitism. He strongly denied Israeli acts of genocide and restricting UN humanitarian aid to Gaza, and dismissed indiscriminate killing of civilians, claiming Israeli actions sought to minimise civilian casualties. He did not mention illegal settlements or a two-state solution.

My unavoidable conclusion from the above is that Abbas remains committed to a two-state solution, but Netanyahu is not.

Netanyahu has a reputation for having never supported a two-state outcome, believing rather in the eventual federation with or annexation of Palestine into a Greater Israel. His reference at the UN to a separately administered Gaza is consistent with this.

So too is an Israeli publication entitled Gaza 2035 issued by Netanyahu’s office in May, which identifies Gaza as a regional trade and technology hub, under some form of self-government. However, while the official status of the Gaza project is unclear, the intent is clear. Netanyahu’s reference to Judea and Samaria deliberately refers to the biblical land of Israel, also claimed as part of Greater Israel.

Other evidence of his support for Greater Israel is the rate at which he has allowed illegal Israeli settlements to expand throughout the West Bank and Jerusalem. The Israeli numbers now exceed 500,000 in the West Bank, and 250,000 in Jerusalem. The complications these pose for reaching any two-state settlement are formidable. Given all these factors, any move down the mutual solution pathway is unlikely without a change to imaginative and constructive leadership in both countries.

All this has implications for Australian policy, and national unity. Successive Australian governments, including Foreign Minister Penny Wong in her speech to the UNGA on 28 September, have identified our commitment to domestic and international peace, humanitarianism, justice, the rules of law, and opposition to extremism and violence in a multicultural environment. Importantly, all Australian citizens have the right to express different views within these policy parameters, but not if those actions incite violence.

Domestically, emotions, prejudice, and misinformation about the Middle East have been rampant, and it’s clear some writers and protestors are unsure what they are writing or protesting about. Opposing Israeli or Palestinian government policies or actions does not automatically mean supporting antisemitism or islamophobia. Being pro-Palestine does not mean being pro-Hamas, and similarly, Australia’s support to recognise Palestine’s full membership to the UN does not mean rewarding Hamas.

The Middle East is not going to settle down anytime soon. Nor, as Wong said, will Australia be a central player in that settlement. Yet it’s important that, despite domestic and international differences, we are informed players and can contribute constructively, and minimize the dangers of disunity.

This article was published by the Australian Institute for International Affairs.