US Secretary of State Antony Blinken departed for Israel on Monday in what many expect to be an effort to exploit the recent flare up in Israeli-Palestinian violence to restart talks towards partitioning the country into two separate states.
Blinken is expected to meet with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu (Likud), Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi (Blue & White), Israel’s Ambassador to the United States Gilad Erdan and President Reuven Rivlin before traveling to Ramallah for meetings with leaders of the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority.
Speaking to ABC on Sunday, Blinken reaffirmed Washington’s commitment to a “two-state solution” and argued that Washington’s longtime objective for the country is the only way to provide a better future for Israelis and Palestinians.
Following the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas that went into effect last Thursday after 11 days of fighting, Blinken’s behavior indicates that Washington is planning an aggressive renewed push for partition.
But while Washington is trying to use this current round of violence to jumpstart another process aimed at dividing the land into separate states, Israelis and Palestinians need to definitively reject the two-state paradigm.
It was actually this US-imposed paradigm that’s largely responsible for politicizing land ownership and property disputes like the one in Sheikh Jarraḥ that contributed to the recent upsurge of violence.
When Israelis experience pressure to partition the country and are made to believe that Palestinians seek political sovereignty over Jerusalem, many become convinced that the only way to resist Jerusalem’s division is to increase the Jewish presence in the parts of the city perceived to be in danger. This in turn leads to politicized property disputes that further fan the flames of conflict between the country’s two major populations.
The United States isn’t interested in resolving our conflict. In fact, low grade conflict generally serves Washington’s interests in the region, both in terms of geopolitical dominance and American weapons sales to several regional actors.
Israel needs to boldly reject the Western two-state paradigm and replace it with a one-state paradigm from the river to the sea.
Rather than gamble our future on US interests in the Semitic region, Israel needs to make clear that this land cannot be divided and work towards formulating a way for Palestinians to live here with us as genuine partners in a single state.
