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It Is Morally Wrong to Support the "Two State Solution" for Israel/Palestine
Many people who, to their credit, want to support justice in Israel/Palestine and want to support human righrts for Palestinians and want to end the unjust oppression of Palestinians that is inflicted on them by Israel's Occupation of the West Bank, wrongly think that the way to do this is to support the "two state solution." This is a terrible mistake. Here's why.
The number one grievance of Palestinians is that the Israeli government has for many decades been carrying out violent ethnic cleansing to remove them from the 78% of Palestine that is now called Israel--just because they are not Jews. The number one demand of Palestinians--a totally righteous demand--is to end the ethnic cleansing by allowing the Palestinian refugees to exercise their Right of Return, to freely live anywhere in Palestine including the part called Israel where they once lived until they were violently driven out by Zionist leaders in 1947-8 and 1967 and driven out even today by unjust oppression such as the demolition of their homes.
The "two state solution," far from ending the terrible ethnic cleansing, makes it permanent!
The "two state solution" is, by definition, to "end the conflict" by having the Palestinians agree to forfeit--forever!--their Right of Return to the 78% of Palestine now called Israel, in exchange for having a tiny piece of Palestine (it would be even less than 22% because much of the West Bank, where there are lots of Jewish settlers living, will be added to, and become part of, what is now Israel in any actual settlement) be--nominally only!--a "Palestinian state." This "Palestinian state" would be no more independent of the Israeli government than is the nominally independent region of Gaza independent of the Israeli government. Gaza is a place which residents cannot even leave, and into which residents cannot import anything, without the permission of the Israeli government.
Because the "two state solution" is simply a way to make the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians permanent, all Israeli prime ministers have supported it in principle, and some, such as Ehud Olmert, have declared it to be esssential to the survival of Israel as a Jewish state (a.k.a. as a state based on the ethnic cleansing of non-Jews.)*
Not only is the ethnic cleansing of non-Jews from Palestine a terrible injustice to the Palestinians, it is ALSO part of an attack on the welfare of ordinary Jews living in Israel, as I discuss in some detail here.
The "two state solution" is only good for the billionaire upper class people who rule Israel and the United States. The existence of Israel as a "Jewish state" (it is actually no more a state for the benefit of ordinary Jews than the United States is a state for the benefit of ordinary Americans) is part of a ruling class strategy to control and dominate Americans as well as Jews living in Israel as discussed in this leaflet (pdf) I co-authored, and in my article here.
When a politician cites his/her support for the "two state solution" as a way of claiming to be for justice in Israel/Palestine, it is a lie. The "two state solution" is an oppressive and unjust attack on BOTH Palestinians and ordinary Jews living in Israel. Politicians know this. We should know it too.
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* Ehud Olmert, as reported in Ha'aretz November 29, 2007, said:
WASHINGTON - "If the day comes when the two-state solution collapses, and we face a South African-style struggle for equal voting rights (also for the Palestinians in the territories), then, as soon as that happens, the State of Israel is finished," Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Haaretz Wednesday, the day the Annapolis conference ended in an agreement to try to reach a Mideast peace settlement by the end of 2008.
"The Jewish organizations, which were our power base in America, will be the first to come out against us," Olmert said, "because they will say they cannot support a state that does not support democracy and equal voting rights for all its residents."
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