‘Two-State Solution Killed by Likud Party’: American Prof.
“The two state solution is dead, quite purposely killed off by the Likud party and its allies,” Glenn E. Robinson told IQNA in an interview about the recent developments and tensions in the occupied territories.
Glenn E. Robinson is Professor of Defense Analysis at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey, California, and is also affiliated with the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at the University of California at Berkeley.
He retired from NPS after 30 years in December 2021. He has authored or co-authored four books on Middle East politics as well as over 150 journal articles, book chapters, government reports and conference papers. His most recent book, Global Jihad: A Brief History, was named by both Foreign Affairs and Foreign Policy as a "Best Book of 2021." He has won awards for his teaching at both Berkeley and NPS.
Here is the full text of the interview:
IQNA: There have been again a rise of tensions between the Palestinians and Israel. What do you think is the main source of the tensions?
Robinson: Outbreaks of increased tension and violence between Palestinians and Israel have various "sparks" but the underlying problem is clear: the continued Occupation, now in its sixth decade, leaves 5 million Palestinians stateless and without rights.
Citizenship, as Hannah Arendt noted, is the right to have rights. Palestinians are stateless under Israel's occupation, so have no right to have rights. Palestinians are thus subject to Israeli predation; confiscating land, imprisoned without charge, various forms of collective punishment, etc. Injustice breeds responses.
IQNA: The continued blockade of Gaza has been mentioned as one of the reasons for the tension between Israel and the Palestinians. What effects do you think this will have on the Palestinian issue?
Robinson: The blockade of Gaza is a continuing problem, but a complicated one. Neither Israel, nor the US, nor even the Palestinian Authority want to put much effort into changing the situation as long as Hamas is in power in Gaza. The current situation is not really tenable for the long term and will continue to produce violence.
IQNA: How will the recent developments and internal protests in Israel affect the tension between Palestine and Israel?
Robinson: The judicial coup in Israel is overwhelmingly an internal Jewish-Israeli matter. You'll notice Arab citizens of Israel are hardly participating on one side or the other, and those Israeli protesters against Netanyahu rarely make any kind of universalistic justice claims that are inclusive of the other citizens of Israel.
The treatment of non-citizen Palestinians by the Israeli justice system has been a non-issue during these protests. So I do not think this issue will have much of an impact on Israeli-Palestinian tensions, at least not in the short term. Over the longer term, depending on how the judicial issue is resolved, there may be some impacts.
IQNA: Some experts believe that the lack of change at the head of power in the Palestinian government and the failure to hold national elections have made the Palestinian Authority unable to do much to secure the rights of Palestinians. What is your take on this?
Robinson: Correct, the PA is moribund. Abbas' term in the presidency expired over a decade ago and he rules by fiat. The PA has ended any meaningful democratic governance.
The leadership is out of touch with the Palestinian population and has lost much of its political legitimacy. Local government (municipalities) still work okay, but the national Palestinian leadership is a non-entity now. Free and fair national elections are imperative to generate a new and responsive national leadership -- but that is unlikely to happen soon.
IQNA: How do you predict the future of the Palestinian issue based on the events of the last few years and is there any international perspective for solving the Palestinian issue?
Robinson: I wrote a chapter in an edited book a few years ago that described my own path from a strong advocate of a two state solution since I first visited Israel, the West Bank and Gaza in 1980 to now believing that that solution is no longer possible.
The two state solution is dead, quite purposely killed off by the Likud party and its allies. I now subscribe to the notion that currently and for years to come there is and will be a one-state reality that is essentially an apartheid state now.
How that one-state reality evolves in the future will be determinative of the life that Israelis and Palestinians can lead. Belfast during "the troubles" may be a good analogy, but these troubles and their violence will go on much longer and be much deeper than Northern Ireland ever saw.
Interview by Mohammad Hassan Goodarzi
The views and opinions expressed in this interview are solely those of the interviewee and do not necessarily reflect the view of International Quran News Agency.
