Daily Alert Archives

Even the Most Moderate Palestinian Won't Accept a Jewish State

(Commentary) Jonathan S. Tobin - Anyone looking for reasons to despair about the prospects of peace in the Middle East need only pay attention to what Palestinian moderates like Sari Nusseibeh are saying against the idea of a Jewish state. His essay last week on the Al Jazeera website not only disparages Jewish rights to share the land but also Jewish history. Palestinians tend to forget the 1947 partition resolution explicitly demanded the creation of a Jewish state alongside an Arab one. Unless and until the Palestinians specifically accept that the part of the country they do not control is forever Jewish, the conflict will not be over. Nusseibeh knows very well that accepting Israel as a Jewish state does not mean it is a theocracy. Nor will it invalidate the citizenship of the country's Arab minority. The idea that recognizing a Jewish state would mean, as he claims, Palestinians will be legitimizing their own destruction is simply an absurdity that has no place in a reasonable discussion. Why then is it so hard for even a member of that small majority of Palestinians who actually believe in living in peace with the Jews to say the phrase "Jewish state?" Perhaps because to do so invokes finality to the conflict that gives even moderates like Nusseibeh pause. If even someone like him is moved to this level of invective by those words, then it is hard to imagine when the rest of Palestinian society will accept them and the permanence of their Jewish neighbors' hold on even part of the land.
2011-10-05 00:00:00
Full Article