Death of the Two-State Solution

At the (rejuvenated) New Republic, Ben Birnbaum has a comprehensive and comprehensively-depressing survey of the last-gasp prospects for a two-state solution to the Middle East ‘peace process’. If the two-state solution (TSS) is not yet on life-support it is hardly a picture of health. The prognosis is not good and time is running out.

According to Birnbaum, Mahmoud Abbas and Bibi Netanyahu are, in their different ways, the last remaining men who could make it work. Yet neither man, as he also demonstrates, has much room for manoeuver. The sketched outlines of a deal remain in place (a divided Jerusalem, land-swaps, a symbolic ‘right of return’ for a few thousand Palestinians etc etc) but neither side is in a position to make the leap of faith required to actually make that notional deal a reality. Moreover, the ‘facts on the ground’ increasingly make a grand bargain most improbable.

Israeli settlements in and around East Jerusalem are, effectively, making it harder and harder for East Jerusalem to function as any kind of viable Palestinian capital.