Skip to main content

Two into One

The Israelis may still be talking about a two-State solution, but the Palestinians may be having second thoughts about it, as the Toronto Star reports in a piece "Palestinians revive idea of one-state solution":

"Among Palestinians, the idea has long been out of fashion. But in recent weeks, the notion of a single bi-national state for Arabs and Jews has experienced something of a revival among Palestinians, most notably when Sari Nusseibeh, a respected intellectual and president of Al Quds University in East Jerusalem, spoke favourably about the concept in a lengthy interview with an Israeli newspaper.

"I think one should maybe begin, on the Palestinian side, to begin a debate, to re-engage in the idea of one state," Nusseibeh said, in remarks published last month by Haaretz.

The main point of Nusseibeh, 59, was that the search for a two-state solution – an independent Palestine dwelling alongside Israel – is now floundering so badly it may never recover.

After many years of failed negotiations, the two-state vision is still far from reality, and few expect current peace talks between Israel and Fatah – the more moderate Palestinian political faction – to change matters by much, if at all."

Meanwhile, coincidentally, Haaretz reports in "Olmert: There's no such thing as 'Greater Israel' anymore" that PM Olmert - with his last days in office looming has said that "Greater Israel is over. There is no such thing. Anyone who talks that way is deluding themselves."

Not only that:

"I thought that land from the Jordan River through to the sea was all ours, but ultimately, after a long and tortured process, I arrived at the conclusion that we must share with those we live with, if we don't want to be a bi-national state."

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Video: Israel demolishing a Bedouin village

From Mondoweiss - Israel's supposed "most moral army in the world", the IDF, engaged in immoral, and according to international law, illegal action.... "Israeli forces have demolished every home in the Bedouin village of Khirbet Taha in the northern West Bank district of Nablus during three separate demolitions since the start of the year. Unlike most Bedouin villages, the residents in Khirbet Taha own their own land. However that land falls in Area C, territory in the occupied West Bank under full Israeli control. The village’s only school was also destroyed, leaving children to study in a dilapidated 100-year-old mosque — the only structure left standing in the village. According the United Nations, Israel has demolished half as many Palestinian buildings in the first few months of 2016, as they had in all of 2015. In February alone, the UN found that more Palestinians homes were destroyed than any other month since 2009, when the organization began its docum...

Robert Fisk's predictions for the Middle East in 2013

There is no gain-saying that Robert Fisk, fiercely independent and feisty to boot, is the veteran journalist and author covering the Middle East. Who doesn't he know or hasn't he met over the years in reporting from Beirut - where he lives?  In his latest op-ed piece for The Independent he lays out his predictions for the Middle East for 2013. Read the piece in full, here - well worthwhile - but an extract... "Never make predictions in the Middle East. My crystal ball broke long ago. But predicting the region has an honourable pedigree. “An Arab movement, newly-risen, is looming in the distance,” a French traveller to the Gulf and Baghdad wrote in 1883, “and a race hitherto downtrodden will presently claim its due place in the destinies of Islam.” A year earlier, a British diplomat in Jeddah confided that “it is within my knowledge... that the idea of freedom does at present agitate some minds even in Mecca...” So let’s say this for 2013: the “Arab Awakening” (the t...

Palestinian children in irons. UK to investigate

Not for the first time does MPS wonder what sort of country it is when Israel so flagrently allows what can only be described as barbaric and inhuman behaviour to be undertaken by, amongst others, its IDF. No one has seemingly challenged Israel's actions. However, perhaps it's gone a bridge too far - as The Independent reports. The Foreign Office revealed last night that it would be challenging the Israelis over their treatment of Palestinian children after a report by a delegation of senior British lawyers revealed unconscionable practices, such as hooding and the use of leg irons. In the first investigation of its kind, a team of nine senior legal figures examined how Palestinians as young as 12 were treated when arrested. Their shocking report Children in Military Custody details claims that youngsters are dragged from their beds in the middle of the night, have their wrists bound behind their backs, and are blindfolded and made to kneel or lie face down in military vehi...