A Modest Proposal Regarding the West Bank Settlements
The recent pressure that the Obama administration is placing on the Israeli PM Netanyahu to freeze settlement construction and Netanyahu’s reaction of “what the hell do they want from me” has made me wonder what the end game will look like for the region, given the continued pursuit of the two-state solution. As the settlements are currently the main point of contention in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, some satisfactory resolution must be reached regarding them, but a few problems arise. The Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in 2005 constituted a withdrawal of roughly 8,000 settlers, and even this was associated with popular unrest and general chaos, including protests of 75,000 and 150,000 in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, respectively. Given this, the idea of an organized withdrawal of almost 300,000 settlers from the West Bank is laughable, and would be inevitably violent. That being said, the present expansion of settlements should be frozen by the Israeli government as a signal of good faith in negotiations, but to seek the complete dismantling of the settlements is at best a quixotic exercise.
Ostensibly, the dismantling of the settlements is necessary for a peace plan to go to its conclusion (i.e. the creation of a Palestinian state), but the withdrawal of the settlers is politically and materially infeasible. This demonstrates the assumption that the settlements are inherently destructive to the future Palestinian state, and this is an assumption that is demonstrably false. The settlements are capable of acting as a much needed economic engine in the new Palestinian state, dampening the shocks that often accompany such radical changes in the political situation. Thus, what comes out of this is a fairly simple proposal: transfer sovereignty without dismantling the settlements. This would be part of the creation of a common labor market between Israel and the new Palestinian state wherein citizens of one state would be free to work in and to live in certain zones of the other. These zones would be designed for mutual economic development and would enhance the interdependence of Israel and Palestine. Thus, the settlers would remain Israeli citizens, but would pay taxes to the Palestinian government. Such an arrangement would do much to repair the economic damage that has been done in the occupation of the West Bank, and would do much to lower rampant unemployment in the Palestinian territories. The present unemployment rate in the Palestinian territories is 24%, slightly greater than that of South Africa and almost four times that of Israel. To destroy the settlements would be to destroy a source of economic activity and of potential revenue for the new Palestinian government. More importantly, the rampant unemployment is a factor in the radicalization of the Palestinian populace, and is therefore itself a large roadblock in the peace process. The presence of stable industry within the Palestinian state, along with the fall of the barrier wall and the ability of Palestinians to work in Israel, would do much to promote further stability of the peace plan.
Obviously, this plan would have to account for the potential for gaming the system by both sides and for other factors. The plan would have to assert that the property rights of the settlers cannot be interfered with for fifty or a hundred years, similarly to the British transfer of sovereignty of Hong Kong to China. However, control over issuance of building permits would also be transferred to the Palestinian government, meaning that the expansion rate of the settlements would be determined by and would serve the interests of the Palestinian state. The security barrier would have to be removed, or at least realigned with the Green Line, in order to facilitate movement of labor and resources. Case in point, the Palestinian border city of Qalqilyah is currently fully encircled by the wall, which has led to high unemployment in the city and a radicalization of politics in the area. Thus the city has become an electoral stronghold for Hamas. Many other factors would have to be taken into account based on this proposal, obviously far too many to be exhaustively covered in this context.
this problem in general is a very widespread one in the middle east. it runs straight back to the ending of WWI and subsequent dismantling of the ottoman empire. the simple in indisputable fact is that the political boundaries drawn by the western powers at the end of the war completely overlooked ethnic and cultural boundaries long since established by the native people, and the formation of Israel following WWII was simply a repeat of the same misguided mapmaking. the fact is that if we were to simply redraw boundaries and create new states throughout the middle east in accordance with the reality of what groups live where, the middle east would be entirely unrecognizable. Iraq would not exist. Kurdistan would be one of the largest nations in the area (rather than being nonexistent as it is now), Iran would be much smaller, Syria and Jordan would be unrecognizable, and Israel would consist of probably 3 or 4 separate states. Saudi Arabia would likely be the only country largely unaltered by this approach. Frankly, if the world would like to see lasting and functional peace in the middle east, it would likely take an effort much like the one i just described. besides, even if it didnt work, they couldn’t be much worse off than they are already.
Part of the current stalemate in the region has to do with recurrently playing the “blame game”, and trying to undo what is done. A more realistic solution would be to stop trying to make one side ot the other the “fall guy,” and instead work with what is. The idea of keeping the settlements and the settlers within the territory of a new palestinian state is entirely workable and plausible, given goodwill and a positive attitude (a highly questionable given.) The exact workings (Palestinian citizens, Israeli citizens, taxes, work permits, all to be worked out.) The bottom line has to be a politically and militarily secure, independent Jewish state ( not threatened with military or demographic destruction,) and the freedom of the Palestinians to determine their own fate (again, without threatening the Jewish state.) That goal is entirely achieveable, and does not require the 1967 armistice lines as borders; does not require east Jerusalem under Arab sovereignty, etc.