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Is There a Basis for an Israeli-Palestinian Peace Deal?

(Australian Jewish News) Joshua Levi - Australia's former ambassador to Israel Dave Sharma told the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies on Tuesday that there may be no solution in the current climate to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. "There is a degree of stability in the status quo," said Sharma, who lived in Israel for four years. "The relationship between the Israeli and the Palestinian people might be as good as it can be for now, until broad political change in the region takes place and the Arab world strengthens." He said that he still supports a two-state solution but that may not be possible until a new generation of Palestinians come forward who are willing to accept Israel as a sovereign nation. "I don't think there is an overlap these days between what the Palestinians see as a two-state solution and what the Israelis see as a two-state solution, and if there is no overlap, then there is no basis for a deal." He said the Israeli-Arab conflict is not the defining fault line of the region. "The big story about what is happening in the Middle East right now is the crumbling of the creation of the nation-state system." People in the nation-states have been failed by their political leadership and Israel is not the principal cause or a relevant factor to those states' failures. Sharma said he was struck by the amount of people who happily profess utter ignorance on a number of issues, but somehow feel empowered to possess an unimpeachable moral clarity on the Israeli-Palestinian issue. "I've always found that puzzling," he said.
2017-08-17 00:00:00
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