Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, August 2009, pages 26, 36

Special Report

Netanyahu Kills the Two-State Solution; Can Obama Rescue It?

By Esam Al-Amin

ON JUNE 14, Israel’s Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu laid out his vision for “peace” with the Palestinians. Since his election and the formation of the most hard-line government in Israel’s history, he has been under immense pressure from the U.S. administration to commit to a meaningful peace process with the Palestinians. Ever since President Barack Obama’s June 4 Cairo address, people in the Middle East have been wondering whether the U.S. leader meant what he said about the two-state solution to the perpetual Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

	Ghosheh family children stand amid the rubble of their East Jerusalem home, which the Israeli municipality ordered destroyed for being built without a permit, June 17, 2009. Their mother said she was forced to choose between destroying her home or paying the municipality 18,250 euros to do the job. According to the U.N., 1,500 homes in Arab East Jerusalem were ordered demolished for being built without permits (AFP photo/Ahmad Gharabli).

In his address, Obama declared: “The only resolution is for the aspirations of both sides to be met through two states.” The terms agreed to by the parties under the “road map” must be fulfilled, Obama added, sending a clear message to the Israelis regarding the establishment of a Palestinian state. But the closest Netanyahu came to uttering the word “road” in “road map” was when he said that there was a “broad” consensus in Israel regarding the conditions for negotiations.

In his speech, Netanyahu used all the old and tired arguments to justify Zionist claims to the entire land by invoking religious figures, citing Theodor Herzl, and referring to Jewish suffering during the Holocaust. He referred to the West Bank as Judea and Samaria, calling it “the land of our forefathers,” essentially laying religious claims to the region. Although Netanyahu started his speech by demanding to begin peace talks at once and “without prior conditions,” he immediately proceeded to establish his conditions. 

Despite his talk of peace, Netanyahu has consistently opposed any Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. He voted against Oslo I in 1993 and Oslo II two years later. In 2005, he voted against the Israeli government’s policy to withdraw from Gaza, and resigned from the government in protest.

Under the Oslo accords, the thorniest final status issues were supposed to have been resolved by May 1999, culminating in the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. But after almost a decade of Israeli delay tactics, the 22-member Arab League proposed the Arab Peace Initiative in 2002. It was based on U.N. Resolutions 242 and 338, advocating land for peace, and offering Israel complete recognition and normalization. The proposal was swiftly rejected by Israel, and ignored by the George W. Bush administration. 

The final status issues consisted of seven major areas: the borders of the Palestinian state (and by implication the border of Israel); the nature of this state and its sovereignty; the fate of Israeli settlements in the West Bank; the status of Jerusalem; water; the Palestinian refugees’ right of return; and finally, a regional agreement that required Arab and Muslim recognition of and normalization with Israel in exchange for full withdrawal from all occupied Arab territories. 

So how did Netanyahu address final status issues in his speech? 

Despite calling for negotiations without preconditions, the Israeli leader did just that by setting conditions on every major issue—effectively pre-empting any negotiations—and even imposing two other conditions that were not included in any previous agreements. 

First, Netanyahu set an absurd condition that was not even on the agenda, requiring the Palestinian side to formally recognize Israel as a “Jewish state.” This is clearly a diversionary tactic. Since every state typically defines its character in its constitution, Israel is no exception. If it wants to declare itself as Jewish, secular, democratic, or a dictatorship, that’s its business. It ought to be an internal matter between the state and its citizens. What business do Palestinians have in identifying the character of Israel? There are at least 1.2 million non-Jews living in Israel, comprising 20 percent of the population. Why should the Palestinian negotiators take sides against the citizens of another state and declare them as second-class citizens or worse? 

On the issue of statehood and the nature of the Palestinian state, Netanyahu never once called for a Palestinian state as defined by international law. In the speech, he used the word “state” 16 times when referring either to the “state of Israel” or “the Jewish state.” But when it came to Palestine he first referred to it as “the territory under Palestinian control.” When he finally used the phrase “Palestinian state,” it was in the context of it becoming a “terrorist” state, or that it should not maintain any real sovereignty. He insisted that if the Palestinians refuse to accept “such conditions” in advance, negotiations would be meaningless.

In Netanyahu’s twisted logic, the Palestinians must give their concessions prior to any negotiations. He then defined the nature of their state as his pre-condition, declaring: “the Palestinian area must be demilitarized, no army, no control of air space,” nor could it “make treaties with [other] countries,” but that Israel must control the borders of this mini-state “with solid security measures.” 

Netanyahu was evasive on the issue of halting settlement construction and expansion, Israel’s main obligation under the Quartet’s road map, as well as the requirement spelled out by Obama in Cairo. He declared: “There is a need to have people [in the settlements] live normal lives and let mothers and fathers raise their children like everyone in the world.” In other words, he advocated the continuation of settlement activity under the guise of “natural growth.” Incidentally, this argument has been the same one advanced by Israel since the road map was announced in 2003. Such growth has been 4-5 percent annually, outpacing the 1.2 percent annual growth in other parts of the country. In effect, Netanyahu’s position was a total rebuff of the American president. 

Further, Netanyahu announced that Jerusalem would “remain the united capital of Israel,” in total violation of international law, and without any recognition of Muslim and Christian rights in the city or the 270,000 Palestinians living in East Jerusalem. Additionally, using security as a pretext for further land annexation, he declared that “Israel needs defensible borders,” a very elastic concept. Other issues regarding West Bank land and water, he said, would be subject to negotiations, rather than ultimate withdrawal. He then affirmed the right of Jewish people to settle in the land of their forefathers, referring to the West Bank, and describing settlers as “Zionist pioneers.”

Netanyahu was also dismissive of the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homeland, which is enshrined in international law and U.N. resolutions since 1948. He did not even acknowledge any Israeli culpability for their ordeals, or offer any small concessions such as reuniting families or financial compensation. Rather, he declared that he would only engage in negotiations that would “solve the Palestinian refugee problem outside of the borders of the State of Israel.” He side-stepped the fact that the “tiny state” of Israel, as he described it, had recently absorbed a million former Soviet citizens, though the Jewish heritage of many was suspect. On the other hand, he argued that the land was not large enough to absorb Palestinian refugees or any of their ancestors, who were forcibly expelled from their homes by Zionist paramilitaries, militias and gangs.

As for Arab and Muslim recognition and normalization, Netanyahu called for immediate action, citing the benefits to Arabs, especially the Gulf states, of tourism and economic investments in Israel with its advanced technology, but without offering them anything in return.

Yet Another Precondition

As if setting these preconditions were not enough to create huge obstacles for negotiations, he then imposed yet another stipulation on his Palestinian partners. By demanding that the PA must first “overcome Hamas” in Gaza, the Israeli leader was effectively advocating Palestinian civil war. He declared that his country would not sit at the negotiating table with “terrorists.” In other words, Israel would not negotiate with a Palestinian national unity government that accepts a two-state solution, if it includes Hamas. The prime minister of Israel had the audacity to dictate which Palestinians are acceptable to negotiate with after appointing to his cabinet a known racist foreign minister, who not only wants to transfer the Palestinian population in the West Bank to neighboring states, but would also like to expel one fifth of his adopted country’s own non-Jewish citizens. 

It is clear that Netanyahu’s conditions to resume the “peace process” would return it to the pre-Oslo era. However, this response from the most right-wing government in the history of Israel to Obama’s Cairo address was not unexpected. The real question now is: How will President Obama respond to these challenges? His credibility before the world, and particularly the Muslim world which he is trying to engage, is at stake. The U.S. has much leverage over Israel because of annual U.S. foreign subsidies that exceed $3 billion in direct aid to Israel, including its most advanced weapons systems. Additionally, the U.S. provides political and diplomatic support to Israel internationally and consistently shields it from criticism. So it will be very difficult for peoples around the world to comprehend why the U.S. doesn’t or can’t play a more active and decisive role in resolving this conflict. 

President Obama declared before the world that: “The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop.” He then added: “Israel must also live up to its obligation to ensure that Palestinians can live and work and develop their society,” calling for relief to the siege of Gaza and its “continuing humanitarian crisis,” and “the continuing lack of opportunity in the West Bank.” He concluded: “America will align its policies with those who pursue peace, and we will say in public what we say in private to Israelis and Palestinians and Arabs.” 

Two heads of state, two speeches, at two public universities, but with two opposing visions. 

If history is our guide, the Israeli prime minister will prevail over the American president. On the other hand, if Obama prevails, he will be a step closer to fulfilling his Cairo promise that, “America will not turn its back on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own.”

Esam Al-Amin is a free-lance writer who can be reached at < This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it >.

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