While we are awaiting the outcome of the Israel-Iran conflict — at a minimum Israel should demand that the regime renounce its longstanding objective of annihilating the Jewish state — let’s not forget about the Palestinian problem.
As an international-relations scholar who has written almost a dozen books on the subject, I am often asked by friends and associates what I think about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. My standard response is that, as intractable as the conflict seems, I have seen stranger things in my lifetime than a resolution of that problem.
What I particularly have in mind is the end of the Cold War in 1989 without a shot being fired. No less astute an observer of foreign affairs than Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser, said in 1986 that “the American-Soviet conflict is not some temporary aberration but an historical rivalry that will long endure.”
This prediction was widely shared by almost everyone at a time when President Ronald Reagan was continuing to call the Soviet Union “the evil empire” and when his own secretary of defense was quoted as saying tensions were such that “we are no longer in the postwar era but the prewar era.”
Yet within five years, not only had the Berlin Wall collapsed but the Soviet Union itself had self-destructed.
Granted, we are witnessing today a revival of the Russian-American rivalry under Vladimir Putin’s leadership, but it hardly dominates U.S. and world affairs as the Cold War did. Is it conceivable we might see a similar winding down of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
There have been moments during the seven-decade conflict when peace seemed to be at hand, most notably when Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) chief Yasser Arafat shook hands with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin during the famous White House Rose Garden ceremony in 1993. Under the Oslo Accords, the two sides signed “Letters of Mutual Recognition,” with the PLO renouncing terrorism and recognizing Israel’s right to exist and Israel recognizing the PLO as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, along with the understanding that Palestinian self-government would be established over the West Bank and Gaza Strip within five years.
Of course, between Arafat’s second thoughts and Rabin’s assassination, the Oslo Accords never produced peace.
What has changed to make peace any more likely today? If anything, things arguably look far less propitious. A terrorist group, Hamas, controls Gaza, while a weak, corrupt PLO authority under Mahmoud Abbas runs the West Bank Meanwhile, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu along with a majority of Israelis oppose the creation of a Palestinian state after the atrocities committed by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, that resulted in about 2,000 Israelis killed and more than 200 hostages taken. Israel Defense Forces retaliation has reduced Gaza to rubble and killed more than 50,000 Palestinians.
The two sides remain at a standstill despite efforts by the United States and other actors to promote a long-term ceasefire.
The battle lines have hardened since Oct. 7. Netanyahu continues to reject a two-state solution. His opposition might soften if the Palestinians were to more clearly condemn and reject Hamas, but the failure of Israel to contemplate Palestinian statehood, along with the total devastation suffered by the Gaza population, has allowed Hamas to survive despite the IDF’s efforts to eradicate the group.
Despite such challenges, I remain semi-optimistic that a bargain can be struck that will end the conflict. Put simply, it is in the interests of both sides to negotiate a peace agreement. Clearly, the Palestinians have a stake in rebuilding their territory and producing more livable conditions, while it is hard to envision Israel obtaining any long-term peace and security without giving the Palestinians their own state.
Israel cannot exist as a stable, prosperous, secure democracy — and certainly not a “Jewish state” — if it houses a majority Palestinian population that would probably be its demographic destiny.
A possible solution, admittedly easier said than done, is the creation of an interim, international, pan-Arab governance regime led by Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf states that would rule over Gaza and the West Bank, with a charge to rebuild the territory and eventually bring that area to self-government.
The Palestinians would be incentivized to have rich, Muslim, Arab states agreeing to pay for the economic development and modernization of Gaza. The Arab states would benefit from increased stability in the region. And the Israelis would potentially benefit from a reduction in terrorist threats as Hamas would no longer be a governing entity. The United States would be a partner in any such agreement, expected to look out for Israeli interests.
The “interim” nature of the arrangement would presumably require at least a five- to-10-year period to develop a viable Palestinian state, but at least there would be a clear endgame to the conflict that eventuates in a Palestinian home of their own.
Let me be clear that I am very pro-Israel in defending Israel’s right to exist and be free of violent attacks on its people. Israel’s suspicion and animosity toward the Palestinians is totally understandable in the wake of Oct. 7. However, the main criticism of Israel’s current policy is the absence of any endgame that gives reason to believe a security community will eventuate from its actions. Even under a best-case scenario — the eradication of Hamas, if that is possible — Palestinian grievances in the absence of a Palestinian homeland will persist and forever foster terrorist activities against the Jewish state.
I can still vividly recall sitting in a paneled room at the International Studies Association annual meeting in Washington, D.C., in April 1986, attending a session featuring two American diplomats engaging two Soviet diplomats in a discussion about “The Future of U.S.-Soviet Relations.” One of the Russian diplomats started his comments by uttering what he said was an old Romanian proverb, that it is always hard to predict anything, especially the future.
It is as hard today as it was then. But we can still be hopeful history might repeat itself.
