Time for Israel to Put Up or Shut Up

Re: One State Solution.

I cannot imagine a one-state solution ever happening in Israel. It would mean doom for the Jewish state.

Think about it. All their laws would have to be changed to give all Jews, Muslims and Christians (6-10% of Palestinian Arabs are Christians) equal rights. No more special treatment for Orthodox rabbis and haredim (who seem to already be losing their special status).

Politically it would be suicide. Even with the current boundaries with a two-state solution demographics indicate that Arab Israelis will outnumber non-Arab Israelis in a few decades. With a single state that happens the day the two countries are unified. Bibi Netanyahu would be bounced out of office within two weeks when all the Arab members of the Knesset call for a non-confidence vote.

But Israel has to do one or the other. The status quo of oppressing all Palestinians in the Occupied Territories because some small number of them are terrorists is indefensible. Israelis will counter with arguments that there is a great animosity against them by all Palestinians, but they cannot use that as an excuse because they cause that animosity by denying Palestinians basic human and economic rights, by sealing up the Palestinians in economically isolated ghettos. This invites comparisons to certain mid-20th century dictators, but it's considered bad form to name names.

The situation in Israel and Palestine is now analogous to South Africa and its homelands during apartheid. Like apartheid, this occupation cannot stand forever.

There is a third option, and that's the one I fear Israel will exercise: ethnic cleansing. They did it in 1940s, killing or driving hundreds of thousands of Palestinians into exile in a Palestinian diaspora. They have been slowly swallowing chunks of Palestine since 1967, building giant walls splitting up villages and stealing land from farmers, many of whom now live on the opposite side of an impenetrable barrier from their olive groves.

So the Palestinians should call Israel's bluff: either finalize a two-state solution, or absorb Palestine into a greater Israel and give all Muslims and Christians in Israel and the occupied territories the same rights that Israelis enjoy. That's the kind of religious pluralism that Americans have, despite Republicans blather.

Israel has to put up or shut up. Are they a real democracy, or a religious dictatorship who destroys anyone who won't bend a knee to their god?

The situation is that much more ironic because the Palestinians' plight so closely mirrors that of the Jews, both in the Biblical past and the 20th century.