“I’m looking at two-state and one-state,” pronounced President Trump at a press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on February 15th. “I like the one that both parties like. I’m very happy with the one that both parties like. I can live with either one.” With that barely coherent thought, Trump outlined the path forward for Israel’s colonization of Palestine and the Trump regimes unequivocal support for Israel’s desires against those of Palestine.
For 60 years already, since 1947, endless negotiations, treaties, peace deals and more have been debated and signed by the leaders and ‘experts’ of the conflict. But after so much time has passed with no progress it would appear that perhaps the art of the deal is more important than the deal itself.
Road to Peace or Dead End?
Since the signing of the Oslo Accords in 1993 by the Israeli PM at the time Yitzhak Rabin and PLO leader Yassir Arafat, little has changed the course of Israeli development and further occupation in the illegally occupied territories of the West Bank. The Accords which were meant to usher in a Palestinian State alongside Israel, halt Israeli expansion into the West Bank and withdraw Israeli military from Palestinian territory among many other items in the agreement, have all been a failure. Israel has not only continued in action to reject all aspects of the Accord they have hastened the process of colonization of the territories meant to become a Palestinian State.
Today the Palestinian West Bank is divided by the 8 meter tall apartheid wall which when complete will snake through the Palestinian territory with a length of 650 kilometres. The wall divides Palestinians from each other and makes travelling to school or work nearly impossible with long line-ups to pass through the Israeli checkpoints dispersed across the wall.
Today despite the Oslo Accords and over a dozen UN resolutions condemning Israeli settlements in the West Bank more than 600,000 Israeli settlers live in the Palestinian territory and since President Trump has come to power the Israeli government has approved another 4,000 settlements to be built there.
The Palestinian Gaza Strip is subjected to bi-annual bombing campaigns which level entire areas leaving Palestinians in a constant state of either being bombed or rebuilding what they lost.
In the 24 years since the Road Map to Peace or Oslo Accords were signed the situation has not improved yet quite to the contrary has become much worse for Palestinians.
“I like the one that both parties like”
The main problem with Trump’s statement, besides the fact that it appears as a joke is: of which parties is he speaking? We know the Israeli regime is one but the other is not so clear. Israel refuses to negotiate with the Palestinians they do not want to negotiate with.
Israel will only negotiate with the Palestinian Authority (PA) which they themselves with US help established in order to be the friendlier party to Israeli interests at the expense of Palestinians. Furthermore Palestinians have nothing to negotiate with. Their land has been stolen by Israel, they have no army, they have no resources. So on what grounds could negotiations be settled? Aren’t negotiations about finding a compromise between two parties? But Palestinians have nothing left to compromise. During these decades of endless negotiations, Israel has continued stealing all Palestinian bargaining chips, their land.
So what is the Goal?
A couple of possibilities arise when analyzing the manoeuvrings of Israel and their political/financial backers in the US. One: that Israel plans to use their new great ally in the US government to completely colonize and ethnically cleanse Palestinians from their land, create an apartheid system in Israel where Palestinians live as second or even third class citizens or Two: that Israel and the US are quite pleased with continuing the illusion of negotiations at the expense of the Palestinian people. And after all, it has been a successful strategy of all former Israeli and US regimes for well over 25 years.
Do Jews and Palestinian Inherently Hate Each Other?
Jews and Palestinian, have much greater things in common than they do against each other. In fact, acts of hate against each of the peoples have brought them closer today then ever. It is in this light that the State of Israel must be seen: As an organized act of hate perpetrated against both Jewish, Muslim and Palestinian people to keep them divided.
No other time in history has it been clearer that Jewish and Palestinian people can and must unite together to dismantle the Israeli State and live together in peace under a democratic and secular state of Palestine, the former and proper title of the land, which Israel illegally occupies.
Much like South Africa, each human being given the right to their vote and opinion on the organization of their future together. Let’s no longer leave it to the corrupt politicians like Trump and Netanyahu to plot our fait.
Follow Noah Fine on Twitter: @noahfine
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