bitterlemons-international.org
Middle East Roundtable /
Edition 14
A Palestinian View:
Outside the box
by Ghassan Khatib
The illegal Israeli settlers and settlements in occupied
Palestinian territories have always been the most dangerous and explosive
aspect of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The settlement process creates
direct tensions and friction because it involves confiscation of Palestinian
land and the settlers themselves are among the most hostile to Palestinians.
In addition, the settlements and settlers' presence create a reality that is
prejudiced against the establishment of an independent and viable
Palestinian state.
There have been many different proposals for how to deal with this problem
in final status negotiations. These range between the complete removal of
settlements and keeping them in place. Keeping settlers and settlements in
turn is an idea that has been proposed in two ways. The first is that
settlements remain under Israeli sovereignty but are swapped with land from
the west of the 1967 borders, i.e. Israeli territory. The other is keeping
settlers as citizens of a future Palestinian state.
The first is not a new proposal and was entertained in the Camp David
negotiations, where Palestinians accepted the principle of a swap of
territories on an equal-in-quality-and-quantity basis. The other has never
been officially discussed, and is a little strange from a Palestinian
perspective because settlers are among the most hostile to Palestinians and
it's difficult to imagine them living at ease in an independent Palestinian
state.
Nevertheless, the possible Palestinian position on such an alternative is
going to be based on several conditions, most importantly that any settlers
that would stay would have to live under Palestinian jurisdiction and abide
by Palestinian laws. Second, any Israeli settlers staying in the Palestinian
state cannot expect to keep the land they are living on now. Most of this
land belongs to Palestinian individuals who are still alive and carry deeds
of ownership, and it's difficult to imagine a solution that does not involve
returning their land to them.
The third condition would be a limitation on numbers, because Palestine will
need the space and resources for returning refugees, and their needs must be
prioritized.
Despite the difficulty in envisaging such a solution, it is constructive to
try to get rid of the influence of the current hostile reality when trying
to imagine future solutions, simply because these solutions will occur in a
context of peace, rather than the current context of conflict and ongoing
violence. Accordingly, one should be able to imagine Israelis living in
Palestine and abiding by the jurisdiction of the Palestinian authority. In
fact, we have witnessed periods in our history when Palestinian Jews lived
normal and friendly lives among Palestinian Muslims and Christians in
historical Palestine. This was before the beginning of hostilities that
started and were aggravated with the massive immigration of European Jews
and their accompanying activities to take control of the country. This
ultimately led to the expelling of 800,000 Palestinians who became refugees,
and they and their descendants are today's refugee issue.
An issue such as what to do with individual settlers can be a minor one. It
can be treated with tolerance if the major issues of the conflict are dealt
with in a way that does not compromise legitimate Palestinian rights, at
least as guaranteed by international legality, in particular in the form of
UN Security Council resolutions. These, of course, include a complete end to
the occupation of 1967 and the establishment of an independent Palestinian
state, in addition to a solution to the refugee issue. In a context where
these international resolutions are met, the Palestinians might be able to
tolerate the idea of keeping a reasonable number of Israeli settlers,
especially since Israel will have to accept the return of a certain number
of Palestinian refugees within the context of a final status agreement.-
Published 18/4/2005 (c) bitterlemons.org
Ghassan Khatib is coeditor of the bitterlemons family of internet
publications. He is the Palestinian Authority minister of planning and has
been a political analyst and media contact for many years.
Bitterlemons-international.org is an internet
forum for an array of world perspectives on the Middle East and its
specific concerns. It aspires to engender greater understanding about
the Middle East region and open a new common space for world thinkers
and political leaders to present their viewpoints and initiatives on the
region. Editors Ghassan Khatib and Yossi Alpher can be reached at
ghassan@bitterlemons-international.org
and
yossi@bitterlemons-international.org, respectively.
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20-04-2005 |