Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
After decades of failed negotiations, many argue that little that can be achieved in pursuing Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking right now. Yet parking the conflict or returning to the pre-Trump status quo ante could have serious implications not only for Israelis and Palestinians but also for the region and the United States. How can the U.S. administration do more by doing less and help reverse negative trends that are cementing occupation and inequality, while avoiding previous failed policies that have empowered anti-democratic forces in both Israel and Palestine?
A survey of experts on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the viability of the two-state solution.
No country can achieve sustainable political and economic development without ensuring legal equality for all.
Donald Trump was far less interested in a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — a struggle that has outlasted every postwar president — and far more in a 22-state outcome, normalizing Israel’s relations with the Arab world, especially Persian Gulf countries.
The Trump administration always made it fairly clear that it was far less interested in a two-state solution than in facilitating ties between Israel and the Arab states—a veritable 22-state solution.
Even by Middle Eastern standards the past month in the region has been head-spinning and volatile. Conflict between Israelis and Palestinian along three fronts — Jerusalem; Gaza and within Israel proper fractured an already tenuous status quo.
There is this cycle that we keep seeing over and over again. But really we also saw some developments inside of Israel with Palestinian citizens of Israel and mob attacks against by Israeli Jewish citizens and of course in the occupied territories
The new and oft-repeated formulation of “equal measures of security, freedom, opportunity, and dignity” for Israelis and Palestinians is meant to signal some change in policy, but not a great deal of change.
While there is a pressing need for immediate humanitarian relief and reconstruction support in Gaza following last month’s intense violence between Israel and Hamas, Palestinians in the Strip will need far more than that to achieve real long-term stability.
The most important word is “equal,” which is meant to signal to progressives within Democratic Party circles — and to Israel — that the administration is aware of and concerned about the glaring inequality that Palestinians experience under occupation.
The Israeli government has accomplished a great deal which is to dethrone Benjamin Netanyahu after a dozen years.