Reviving the Bi-National State?

In a conference last Friday, organized by Likud following Netanyahu's visit to Washington, Uri Elitzur, a leader in the early settlement movement and former chief of staff to the current prime minister, proposed a one state solution for Israel and the West Bank. As described by the Israeli blogger Daled Amos, he said that

. . . the best possible option was the annexation of the entire West Bank, despite the danger of Israel eventually becoming a bi-national state. He said that solution was preferable to withdrawing from Judea and Samaria or continuing the current situation.

"While everyone has been saying for years that annexation was the worst option, we have tried everything else, so I think annexation is actually the most right plan," Elitzur said. "I would give citizenship to every Palestinian. There is no difference between Palestinians in Jenin and Sakhnin."

It is of course incredibly ironic that such a proposal would come from a right wing Likudnik. As I noted earlier in the week, the ideal of a bi-national state was a foundation of that element of the Zionism of the mandate period that favored accomodation with their Arab neighbours.

Yet as Patrick Martin noted in today's Globe and Mail, a two state solution is becoming increasingly unlikely. I would go further and say that, given both the extent and rate of expansion of settlements and the political impossibility of halting this let alone reeling it in, a de facto one-state solution already exists, something the Martin article notes, with which former PLO advisor and Palestinian-Canadian lawyer Diana Buttu agrees.

Economically, it is hard to disagree with this approach. When Netanyahu was last prime minister, in the late 1990s, Palestinians were becoming increasingly integrated into the Israeli economy. There was a level of prosperity that, while far below that of Israel, was vastly better than what they have now. If granted citizenship in a greater Israel, they would of course not achieve instant equality, but would likely embark on a journey in that direction.

The only alternative at this point appears to be a polity modelled on apartheid South Africa, with a series of Palestinian bantustans, left to their own devices -- a people with few rights and no prospects. So perhaps Izzy Stone's assessment from forty years ago will prove to be correct: the only possible road to peace is a home for two peoples in a single land.