A number of senior American and European officials have recently issued numerous statements talking about a “final” settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict in general and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in particular through “coexistence between two states,” that is, an Arab-Palestinian state and a Jewish-Israeli state…
These statements bring back to the surface previous political and diplomatic projects, agreements, and international resolutions, including Resolution 181, which after World War II divided “historic Palestine” into two states, one of which is the Palestinian people and the second is Jewish, which includes the Jews of the region and receives Jews who wish to do so from the whole world, especially the Jews of Europe. Survivors of the Holocaust, in which several racist European Nazi and fascist governments were involved…
Talk also returned strongly about “coexistence between two states” after the Second Gulf War in 1991, when former US President George H.W. Bush preempted launching the war on Iraq by presenting an initiative to “change the international and regional systems” that includes “coexistence between two Palestinian-Israeli states” and concluding Israeli peace agreements. Palestinian, Israeli, Jordanian… in consecration of the rule of “land for peace”…
The American initiative was a response to the speeches of Saddam Hussein and Baghdad, which pledged to “liberate Palestine”… and launched “Al-Hussein” (Scud) missiles at Tel Aviv, occupied Jerusalem, and some Gulf countries that participated in the war…
Despite the difficulties, it was possible to take steps in this direction after the 1993 Arsolo Agreement and the agreements concluded after it with guarantees from the American administration during the era of Bill Clinton, the European Union, and Japan.. .
Practical steps have been taken in this direction, including the construction of a modern airport and port, and Palestinian economic, political, military, and scientific institutions in Gaza, the West Bank, and Arab Jerusalem…
But the situation deteriorated after the Israeli far right assassinated Yitzhak Rabin in November 1996, the removal of his political partner Shimon Peres, and the bringing of Benjamin Netanyahu and his extremist companions to power…
The situation worsened further after the Al-Aqsa Intifada (2000-2004), which led to the assassination of the Palestinian national leader Yasser Arafat and a large number of fighters from several Palestinian-Lebanese resistance movements, and the imprisonment of others, including the leader Marwan Barghouti…and then a large number of cadres of Hamas, Jihad, and the Lebanese resistance..
The situation also developed towards a comprehensive Israeli war against the national resistance in Lebanon led by Hezbollah in 2006… and towards the separation of the Palestinian Gaza Strip from the West Bank 17 years ago… while the illegal Israeli settlements expanded around occupied Jerusalem and throughout the West Bank… to nearly reach the number of its population of military and security personnel. And their 750,000 family members…
Meanwhile, Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza were subjected to no less than five devastating wars… repeatedly accompanied by very violent raids by air, land and sea…
The number of martyrs, wounded and prisoners on the Palestinian side during the past two decades was estimated at tens of thousands…
The result was the escalation of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the increase in Palestinian resistance movements in Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza…
The escalation reached its peak on October 7th, when the Palestinian resistance “Al-Aqsa Flood Movement” was bombed, then after launching an unprecedented war of annihilation by Israeli forces and NATO forces… the result of which has so far been the fall of tens of thousands of victims, including martyrs, wounded, and prisoners… in addition to the displacement of More than two million Palestinian citizens after the destruction of their homes, most of the hospitals, schools, administrations, and…
Meanwhile, the current war has consolidated the results of the past decade of “the weakness of the Palestinian National Authority” in Ramallah, and the decline in popularity of most of its leaders from influencing the Palestinian street, including the activists of the Fatah movement and the factions that still cling to the Palestine Liberation Organization…
At the same time, the new Israeli settlements and cities absorbed most of the Palestinian lands… and the crisis of confidence deepened between the peoples of the region and the leaders of Israel and its allies in Washington and the Atlantic and Arab capitals…
Is it possible to establish a Palestinian state on less than twenty percent of historic Palestine?
Is it possible to establish a Palestinian state for a people, more than half of whom are abroad… while the other half was divided between four areas: the West Bank, Gaza, Jerusalem, and the 1948 areas?
Will the extremist Zionist lobbies accept the deportation of about 750,000 settlers from the West Bank and Jerusalem?!!
Can the Palestinian people and the peoples of the region easily forget the extent of the destruction, mass killing, and current war of extermination in Gaza, the West Bank, and Jerusalem?!!
All indicators make talk of returning to “square one” unrealistic…