Kurtz II: Israel’s One and a Half State Solution

Donn M. Kurtz II, Foreign Policy Journal, Aug 6, 2010

Jeremy Hammond, editor of this journal recently argued that the two state solution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is dead. I contend that it was never alive. No Israeli government –regardless of the party or Prime Minister in power — has ever made a serious commitment to the essential reality of a Palestinian state. At best Israel’s idea of a two state solution would lead to one and a half state outcome.

The conventional understanding of statehood involves four components. A state is an entity consisting of a recognized population and territory with a government exercising sovereignty over those people and that territory. In a variety of ways Israeli policy has always contradicted the substance of all four attributes of statehood.

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