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The 'One-State' Solution
by Steven E. Plaut
February 5th, 1997
There has long been confusion about the term "Two-State Solution for the Middle East Problem." If one goes back a ways, this was the "solution" adopted in 1922, where Transjordan became the Arab portion of Mandate Palestine with the rest reserved for the Jewish homeland. Then the 1947 November Partition Resolution in the UN adopted a "Two-State Solution", by proposing a re-partition of Western Palestine into two states, one Jewish and one Arab. Arab aggression and imperialism killed that one.
Under a "One-State Solution," Israel would cease to exist. It would be replaced by a Palestinian state in which the Jews would be almost half the population.
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Then in recent years, the Israeli Left adopted the fashionable fad that had been the favorite of the Left overseas and once again started talking about a "Two-State Solution," meaning Israel and Palestine (Jordan being the forgotten Third State), and this became the basis for the Oslo process, now also embraced by the Likud. Opponents to Oslo had always argued that when the Arabs talk about "Two States for Two Peoples," the two peoples they have in mind are the Palestinian people and the Jordanian people. Nevertheless the "Two-State Solution" for the Middle East has become as universally accepted as the only road to go as was disarmament after World War I, and just as well thought through.
Be that as it may, there is now a growing alternative school of thought springing up on the fringes of the Israeli Left. It is called the "One-State Solution." It is a rehash of the "binational state" proposals that were kicked about by the Utopianist Jewish Left before Israel became an independent state and was supported by people like Louis Brandeis and Martin Buber. Now, reports far-Leftist columnist Gideon Levy in Ha'aretz Feb 2, 1997, the "One-State Solution" is making a comeback in the Israeli Left, and he completely approves.
Under a "One-State Solution," Israel would cease to exist. It would be replaced by a Palestinian state in which the Jews would be almost half the population. The state would represent both the Jews and the Arabs, about as peacefully as multi-national Bosnia and Ulster and Lebanon.
Levy reports that a growing number of Israeli "intellectuals" of the Left are open to this solution. Some have been holding meetings with Arabs in East Jerusalem, where the main proponents on the Arab side are the leaders of Hamas. Levy claims Meretz ex-Chief Shulamit Aloni was asked about the idea on TV recently and pointedly did not rule it out.
Israeli Arabs, including Communist Party Knesset Members, also approve of the idea. Levy thinks this is the ultimate goal of Zionism, since the alternative is perpetual "conquest," which is Israeli leftist Newspeak for Jewish ruling over an Arab minority.
My guess is that Meretz would welcome the idea as a way for the Left and Palestinians to gang up on and suppress religious Jews. In any case, now you know the trend on the trendy Left. Don't say you were not warned.
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