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The Palestinians and annexation: support and trap

2020-06-18T18:17:54.730Z


Yossi BeilinOn the eve of the annexation decisions (if any, and if so - where?) The media also reaches the Palestinians, asking them what they would like to happen if it was their decision. And again, the surprise is that many of the respondents, instead of expressly opposing the annexation of parts of the West Bank, express a desire to become citizens of Israel. Stalls in Hebron market. Oslo agreement has ...


On the eve of the annexation decisions (if any, and if so - where?) The media also reaches the Palestinians, asking them what they would like to happen if it was their decision. And again, the surprise is that many of the respondents, instead of expressly opposing the annexation of parts of the West Bank, express a desire to become citizens of Israel.

Stalls in Hebron market. Oslo agreement has become a trap // Photo: IP

In an article on Channel 13, Zvi Yehezkeli presented his camera to his random interviewees (who were already able to pay a price, in the PA, because of their public disclosure) who said that annexation was the best thing that could happen to them and that they were very happy if Israel had them or granted them permanent residency .

But these positions should come as no surprise. They live in poverty, in a framework that does not give them even a small part of Israeli welfare services, spending much of their time in the crossings to work in Israel, study and be hospitalized when needed. The PA is ineffective, and it has corruption that makes it difficult to obtain the most basic services. Naturalization in modern and modern Israel is not a decree for them, but a carrot.

The Palestinians have historically opposed any partition of Western Israel between the Jews and themselves, because they found it difficult to understand why they were asked to share the land on which they lived with Jews who were no more than ten percent of them, and who pretended to speak for many others who had not yet walked on the land.

The PLO's agreement to adopt the two-state solution was born only in 1988, and was a compromise of the organization with reality. Traditionally, the Palestinian national movement held that all territory on both sides of the Jordan should be under Palestinian rule, and that only the Jews who arrived in the country before the Balfour Declaration could remain. The two-state solution, which many of us consider to be a Palestinian demand, is, in fact, the Zionist movement's demand, since it realized that it would have difficulty producing a Jewish majority west of Jordan in 1937 (the Phil Commission).

Many Palestinians' willingness to be part of Israel is nothing more than a return to the idea of ​​a single state, from reading the demographic map and understanding that if Israel wants to preserve its democratic character, they will not have to carry its flag for a long time and they will - through the Palestinian majority created - fulfill their sovereign dream west of Jordan.

But is it an Israeli interest? The answer is clear. The many voices on Palestinian street thanks to the annexation are not a recommendation for this reckless move but a warning light from it. These votes may be the basis for an informed Palestinian decision, as far as they are concerned, to officially declare that the PLO is withdrawing from the decisions it made in 1988 and, instead, is demanding one simple claim: one person, one vote.

A Palestinian demand for an Israeli-Palestinian sovereign state, whose citizens are all citizens of equal rights, is the most logical alternative, from the Palestinian angle, to the Oslo Accord that has become a trap for them, because the interim agreement has become a permanent agreement.

Israel will also find it very difficult to convince its friends around the world that the claim to one egalitarian state is also repugnant. It will enter a new campaign in the international arena. This time it will not be a campaign designed to explain our right to the land, not to prove that Zionism is not racism, not to convince that the West Bank is a disputed area and not an occupied territory, not that a Palestinian state will be the basis for terrorism. Israel will have to explain that the most basic principle of democracy - a voice for every person - does not hold in our case. It will be a hopeless fight. The annexation of large or small territories in the West Bank is a dangerous step towards our fall into this trap.

See more opinions by Yossi Beilin

Source: israelhayom

All news articles on 2020-06-18

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