Israel Matzav

The issue shifts to 1948

In Tuesday's New York Times, Hussein Agha and Robert Malley - former State Department Arabists in the Clinton administration - argue that a 'two-state solution' between Israel and the 'Palestinians' doesn't resolve anything.

Over the past two decades, the origins of the conflict were swept under the carpet, gradually repressed as the struggle assumed the narrower shape of the post-1967 territorial tug-of-war over the West Bank and Gaza. The two protagonists, each for its own reason, along with the international community, implicitly agreed to deal with the battle’s latest, most palpable expression. Palestinians saw an opportunity to finally exercise authority over a part of their patrimony; Israelis wanted to free themselves from the burdens of occupation; and foreign parties found that it was the easier, tidier thing to do. The hope was that, somehow, addressing the status of the West Bank and Gaza would dispense with the need to address the issues that predated the occupation and could outlast it.

That so many attempts to resolve the conflict have failed is reason to be wary. It is almost as if the parties, whenever they inch toward an artful compromise over the realities of the present, are inexorably drawn back to the ghosts of the past. It is hard today to imagine a resolution that does not entail two states. But two states may not be a true resolution if the roots of this clash are ignored. The ultimate territorial outcome almost certainly will be found within the borders of 1967. To be sustainable, it will need to grapple with matters left over since 1948. The first step will be to recognize that in the hearts and minds of Israelis and Palestinians, the fundamental question is not about the details of an apparently practical solution. It is an existential struggle between two worldviews.

For years, virtually all attention has been focused on the question of a future Palestinian state, its borders and powers. As Israelis make plain by talking about the imperative of a Jewish state, and as Palestinians highlight when they evoke the refugees’ rights, the heart of the matter is not necessarily how to define a state of Palestine. It is, as in a sense it always has been, how to define the state of Israel.

In other words, the real conflict isn't about borders but about 'refugees.' It's not about where the Jewish state will end and the 'Palestinian state' will begin but about whether there will be a Jewish state or a 'Palestinian' state. It's not about the results of the 1967 war, which resulted in what much of the world calls an 'occupation,' but about the results of the 1948 war, which resulted in the existence of the State of Israel.

Well, at least we're finally being honest. The conflict is existential after all.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:48 PM