The one state/two state debate is irrelevant as Israel and the US consolidate Greater Israel | Noam Chomsky
The one state/two state debate is irrelevant as Israel and the US consolidate Greater Israel | Noam Chomsky
On July 13, former Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin issued a dire warning
to the government of Israel: either it will reach some kind of two-state
settlement or there will be a "shift to a nearly inevitable outcome of
the one remaining reality -- a state 'from the sea to the river'." The
near inevitable outcome, "one state for two nations," will pose "an
immediate existential threat of the erasure of the identity of Israel as
a Jewish and democratic state," soon with a Palestinian-Arab majority.
On similar grounds, in the latest issue of Britain's leading journal
of international affairs, two prominent Middle East specialists, Clive
Jones and Beverly Milton-Edwards, write that "if Israel wishes to be
both Jewish and democratic," it must embrace "the two-state solution."
It is easy to cite many other examples, but unnecessary, because it
is assumed almost universally that there are two options for cis-Jordan:
either two states -- Palestinian and Jewish-democratic -- or one state
"from the sea to the river." Israeli commentators express concern about
the "demographic problem": too many Palestinians in a Jewish state.
Many Palestinians and their advocates support the "one state solution,"
anticipating a civil rights, anti-Apartheid struggle that will lead to
secular democracy. Other analysts also consistently pose the options in
similar terms.
The analysis is almost universal, but crucially flawed. There is a
third option, namely, the option that Israel is pursuing with constant
US support. And this third option is the only realistic alternative to
the two-state settlement that is backed by an overwhelming international
consensus.
It makes sense, in my opinion, to contemplate a future binational
secular democracy in the former Palestine, from the sea to the river.
For what it's worth, that is what I have advocated for 70 years. But I
stress: advocated. Advocacy, as distinct from mere proposal, requires
sketching a path from here to there. The forms of true advocacy have
changed with shifting circumstances. Since the mid-1970s, when
Palestinian national rights became a salient issue, the only form of
advocacy has been in stages, the first being the two-state settlement.
No other path has been suggested that has even a remote chance of
success. Proposing a binational ("one state") settlement without moving
on to advocacy in effect provides support for the third option, the
realistic one.......................................................
