Introduction

If the goal is to have lasting peace in the Middle East, with as much economic success and freedom as possible for both Israelis and Palestinians, a one-state solution is likely to be the best way to achieve those goals.

That is the subject of today’s 10-minute blog/podcast.

Continuing

We live in a unique and exceptional country; part of the equally unique and exceptional role that we play here is to understand what is going on beyond our borders, and to hold our politicians accountable for doing the right things internationally as well as domestically. The Middle East has been in turmoil since the beginning of recorded history. Let’s take a look at what has been happening in recent decades.

Modern history in the Middle East began with the final collapse of the Ottoman Empire at the end of WWI. They had sided with the Kaiser, and the Ottomans suffered fatally when Germany lost. Post WWI, Jews began to immigrate, in small numbers, from various countries to Palestine, then a British Mandate country. After almost thirty years in control with some serious waffling about the right of Jews to immigrate to Palestine, the British Mandate in Palestine ended in 1948 with the UN partition which created the new state of Israel.

The many and powerful forces arrayed against Israel, with the relatively recent exception of Egypt, don’t want peace with their enemy, Israel. Their long held position has been to refuse to recognize Israel’s existence, and to repeatedly call for its extinction. Their commitment is to drive every Israeli, man, woman and child, into the Mediterranean. The problem, to Hamas, the recognized terror group that runs the Gaza strip, and the Palestine Liberation Organization, PLO, the should-be-recognized terror group in charge of the West Bank, is not that Israel is not cooperating with them in the way it should. To them, Hamas and the PLO, the problem is that Israel exists at all. The people who lead and are paid by these terrorist groups would have nothing to do if there was peace. They would lose their coveted place in the “resistance” and have to go get a job. Simple truth: Activists Don’t Want Peace. And that’s true in more places than the Middle East. Egypt, a far larger, more diverse and successful country than either the Gaza Strip or the West Bank, was not filled with terrorist leaders and high-ranking followers who needed to avoid peace at all costs to maintain their positions in their society. Egptian leaders knew the benefits of peace, and were confident enough in themselves to make it happen. They signed a separate peace deal with Israel in 1979. And have honored it.

Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East. And there are precious few democracies in Muslim countries around the world. Arabs in Israel have more freedoms and have far better standards of living than the average person living in either Arab countries or Iran (Iranians are Persians, not Arabs). What is the benefit of having a two-state solution where Israel would continue to be successful and free, and a combined Gaza and West Bank would be ruled by the terrorist coalition of Hamas and the PLO? While their citizens continued to live in poverty.  

The claim that the Israelis “made the desert bloom” has a solid foundation. With no oil, and having been attacked by multiple countries, with the announced intention of annihilating them in 1948, 1967 and again in 1973, Israel has literally made the desert bloom. Everything from massive desalination plants providing vitally needed water to the creation of a thriving tech industry, Israel has made its tiny part of the world bloom. All while needing to have the largest standing military per capita in the world. Remember, Israel, the defender, needs to win every war, every time, or be eliminated. As counterpoint, when Hamas took over the Gaza Strip after Israeli...