For multiple decades, both the United Nations and the USA–Israel’s #1 ally and sugar daddy–have denounced Israel’s continuing policy of increasing Jewish settlements in the West Bank. Why? It is hoped that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be solved by creating a Palestinian state in the discontiguous Gaza Strip and West Bank, or portions thereof, with an approximately twenty-mile corridor joining the two land parcels. Why this land? That is where most Palestinians have lived and are still living.
I call this a Demographic Solution. But all the players–both Israel, Palestinians, the USA as the primary peace negotiator, and the UN–call it “the two-state solution.” Notice I’m saying “the,” as if there is no other. That’s because no other two-state solution as been put forth. But most Israelis and Palestinians now agree that “the” two-state solution is dead.
I wrote a book on this, entitled Palestine Is Coming: The Revival of Ancient Philistia, that was published in 1990. This book really consists of two parts–history of the conflict and a proposal of an alternative two-state solution based on historical precedent. That is, let Israel have all of the West Bank–the heartland of ancient Israel, called Judea and Samaria–in a land swap in which it forfeits the coastal plain to allow for a very expanded Gaza Strip resulting a Palestinian state being located in “the land of the Philistines.”
The ancient Philistines, from whom the modern Palestinians derive their name, were the arch-rival of the ancient Israelites. The Bible is full of stories about their interaction, including much war, between these two peoples. I maintain that the Hebrew writing prophets in the Bible indicate that ancient Philistia is going to be revived, and I surmise that it will be the resolution of the Israel-Palestinian conflict. These interpretations that I make about these biblical prophecies then become a proposal for solving this conflict.
Thus, I agree that the only way this conflict can be solved is for there to be two separate states; but I contend that the common two-state solution–a West Bank and Gaza entity–will not work. Thus, I doubt that it will ever happen. But if it does, I assert it will not succeed. For the prophets make it clear that at the end of days (end of this age), Israel will possess all of its heartland and the Palestinian state will exist in the coastal plain side-by-said the State of Israel.
Since my book was published 26 years ago, several historical events have occurred that make my proposal for solving this conflict much more plausible. Foremost is that the continuing settlement of Jews in the West Bank is rendering the common two-state solution impossible. So, I maintain that the players involved need to change their focus and think of an alternative two-state solution.
Why? The old one is dying more and more every day. There are now 150 Jewish settlements in the West Bank and 100 outposts. The total number of these Jewish settlers is over 400,000. And that does not include the many Jews who also live in the contested East Jerusalem.
Case in point: Amona. It is a small Jewish outpost in the West Bank that has existed since 1996. Unlike other Jewish settlements and outposts, it exists on land owned by Palestinians. So, the Israeli court has ruled that it is illegal and must be demolished. Prime Minister Netanyahu’s administration announced yesterday that Amona residents will be evacuated and settled a few miles north, still in the West Bank, at a new location where 300 homes will be built.
That is not what the U.S. wanted to hear. The U.S. State Department denounced this “significant new settlement” as being “far closer to Jordan than Israel,” that it would “effectively divide the West Bank and make the possibility of a viable Palestinian state more remote.”
For multiple decades, the U.S. has given Israel about $3 billion in annual aid. And for decades, all U.S. presidential administrations have opposed Israel increasing the number of Jewish settlements in the West Bank and the number of their residents. But no U.S. president ever applied political pressure to Israel in order to make it stop this activity with one exception. President Jimmy Carter threatened to do it, but President George H.W. Bush actually did. He withheld $400 million of aid from Israel for this reason for a short time. Many political pundits claim it contributed to his political defeat against Bill Clinton for the next presidential term. That’s along with Bush’s breaking his word not to raise taxes by saying, “read my lips; no new taxes,” and then he raised them.
Just about a week ago, the U.S. and Israel completed an agreement in which the U.S. will give Israel $38 billion in military aid for the next ten years. Thus, it appears that Israel delayed this announcement of the new Jewish settlement in the West Bank involving Amona residents so that this deal about U.S. aid was be finalized first. Tricky Israel! If the U.S. would have known that was going to happen days later, would it not have completed the $38 billion aid agreement?
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