JimLes
Well-Known Member
And in order not to be completely one-sided, let's touch more briefly on a similar issue on the other side. A viable Palestinian state cannot have 20 different piecemeal territories in the West Bank. It would have to be contiguous and the issue of settlers would have to be resolved. This is not nearly the insurmountable obstacle that it's made out to be. Yes, there are 500 thousand settlers in the West Bank, but more than half of that number is in 4 larger cities located immediately outside of Jerusalem. When you add some of the smaller settlements that are also next to the 1967 armistice line, not even 100 thousand live in various dispersed settlements all over the West Bank and it's these settlements that have been most detrimental to Palestinians and that have caused the PA to have authority over areas that aren't connected.
Land swap has been discussed and accepted in theory every since actual direct negotiations between Israel and Palestinians started 30 years ago. At Camp David in 2000, Arafat agreed that Israel would keep some settlements along the border and Palestine would receive a similar amount of land and perhaps even people in return. There are clusters of Muslim Arab villages in Israel that are right on the 1967 line, both south and north of Tulkarm that could be exchanged for the settlements around Jerusalem. Israel would also have no problem absorbing 100 thousand people who would have to move from West Bank. This whole process could actually be agreed upon fairly easily.
The problem is that no Israeli politician could survive this, politically but probably also literally. Rabin was assassinated by ultra-nationalists for much smaller concessions. We are talking about optics again. When Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, they demolished settlements and the army removed the unwilling settlers by force. This was 2005, though, and the situation was different. There were only about 8 thousand settlers in Gaza, the electorate was generally more moderate, and there was broad consensus in Israel that this should be done. In 2024, and especially after Oct 7th, the sight of soldiers removing Jews from their homes will not go over well with the public. Not just the more hardline segment, but with any segment of Israeli society.
And again, this should be done and probably needs to be done in order to have a lasting settlement, but who's going to do it? Unlike the Palestinians, Israel cannot be compelled by force to do anything, so that's basically it.
Land swap has been discussed and accepted in theory every since actual direct negotiations between Israel and Palestinians started 30 years ago. At Camp David in 2000, Arafat agreed that Israel would keep some settlements along the border and Palestine would receive a similar amount of land and perhaps even people in return. There are clusters of Muslim Arab villages in Israel that are right on the 1967 line, both south and north of Tulkarm that could be exchanged for the settlements around Jerusalem. Israel would also have no problem absorbing 100 thousand people who would have to move from West Bank. This whole process could actually be agreed upon fairly easily.
The problem is that no Israeli politician could survive this, politically but probably also literally. Rabin was assassinated by ultra-nationalists for much smaller concessions. We are talking about optics again. When Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, they demolished settlements and the army removed the unwilling settlers by force. This was 2005, though, and the situation was different. There were only about 8 thousand settlers in Gaza, the electorate was generally more moderate, and there was broad consensus in Israel that this should be done. In 2024, and especially after Oct 7th, the sight of soldiers removing Jews from their homes will not go over well with the public. Not just the more hardline segment, but with any segment of Israeli society.
And again, this should be done and probably needs to be done in order to have a lasting settlement, but who's going to do it? Unlike the Palestinians, Israel cannot be compelled by force to do anything, so that's basically it.
