The One-State Solution: A Breakthrough for Peace in the Israeli-Palestinian Deadlock

By Virginia Tilley, The University of Michigan Press, 2005, 276 pp. List: $27.95; AET: $20.

Reviewed by Sara Powell

FOLLOWING on Mazin Qumsiyeh’s Sharing the Land of Canaan comes another persuasive book regarding the need to abandon the horrific Palestinian and Israeli status quo: Virginia Tilley’s The One-State Solution. The idea of two separate nation states, Israel and Palestine, is no longer a possibility, Tilley explains, because of the vast expansion of Israeli settlements since the Oslo accords.

Focusing on the West Bank, Tilley details the immovability of the settlement blocs, their permanence, their placement, their (Israeli) government funding and their infamous June 2004 acceptance by U.S. President George Bush to demonstrate that the settlements will not be dismantled. Nor, based on the same reasoning, will they be turned over to a nascent Palestinian government. Moreover, Tilley argues (as have many others), a Palestinian state comprising non-contiguous Bantustans is not a viable option, as it would not—could not—satisfy the national aspirations of the Palestinian people.

Beyond the physical considerations, Tilley cites the economic interdependence of the Palestinians and Israelis, as well as the political impossibility of ceding “Judea” and “Samaria”—integral parts of what Zionists consider Erez Israel—to a future Palestinian state. Further, she elucidates the improbability of outside political forces, particularly the U.S., intervening to force the kind of difficult decisions any Israeli government would have to undertake to allow for a two-state solution.

Tilley focuses her arguments on the considerations Israel must face in order to end the decades of bloodshed. She deliberately eschews the role of Palestinian politics based on the premise that, like the African National Congress in South Africa before it, the Palestinian Authority is so distorted by the fact of occupation there can be no knowing what course it would take should that circumstance change.

In The One-State Solution, bare facts form the skeleton of a single territorial body and concrete proposals suggest how a shared state might be fleshed out to accommodate both Palestinians and Israelis. Such detailed creative thought is a necessary and welcome addition to the debate in which so many lives are at stake.

SIDEBAR

An Open Letter to Amb. Dennis Ross, Author of The Missing Peace

Dec. 12, 2005

Dear Mr. Ross,

While staying at the Cosmos Club in Washington, DC, I had the opportunity of glancing through your book, The Missing Peace. Having heard you at a meeting at The Aspen Institute in DC some weeks ago, I cannot help but find your approach totally biased. That you should fail as a negotiator on an assignment the importance of which cannot be overstated comes as no surprise.

Your belief in U.S. engagement in peacemaking is obvious. The U.S. has long fostered the delusion that we are “an honest broker,” but your over-riding concern for the security of Israel—no need to rebuild the harbor, airport or rail-link from Gaza, repeated several times during the Aspen meeting—reveals your true concern. That Israel should continue to exist does not justify the eradication of the Arab population in situ. I wish you luck in your attempt to convince yourself that you have an open mind. As a negotiator you have done nothing but create further misunderstanding and delay the outcome while pushing yourself forward. You can posture a bit longer, but few will trust you.

Sincerely,

John Goelet
Meru, France