Introduction to Palestine

Palestine throughout the history:

Palestine has a long and vast history. First documented in ancient Egyptian tablets as Peleset over
3000 years ago, the region between the Mediterranean and the river Jordan has come to mean
many different things to many different peoples.

Throughout the ages, Palestine has been home to dozens of cultures, kingdoms and empires.
From Assyrian and Nabataean, to Persian and Roman -and many more- each influencing as well
as being influenced by the rich cultural and civilizational mélange that defined the area. These
ancient influences can still be felt today in the idioms, vocabulary and toponymy used by its
native Palestinian population. Even Palestinian agricultural practices can be traced back to the
Natufians -one of the peoples credited with inventing agriculture- who called Palestine and the
fertile crescent their home, as far back as 9,000 BCE.

Before we continue, it is important to stress that when we talk about Palestine, we are not talking
about a Palestinian nation state. For the vast majority of history, the concept of a nation state did
not exist. Today the nation state is so ubiquitous that many have come to internalize it as natural.
This is not the case, and we should be especially wary of imposing our modern conceptions on a
context where they would be nonsensical. For example, the impulse to imagine our ancestors as
some closed-off, well-defined, unchanging homogeneous group having exclusive ownership over
a territory that somehow corresponds to modern day borders has no basis in history.
Unfortunately, this is the foundational myth of many reactionary ethno-nationalist ideologies.

As elsewhere, over the millennia kingdoms rose and fell, religions were founded, wars both holy
and unholy were waged, and peoples lived, mixed, moved and died out. In other words, history
happened.

This article does not aim to delve into the minutiae of this Palestinian history, indeed entire
books could be -and have been- written on the subject. Rather the goal of this introduction is to
describe the political context that led up to the modern Palestinian question.
Palestine Under The Ottoman Empire:

Following the decisive defeat of the Mamluks in the battle of Marj Dabiq (1516), the Levant laid
open for the conquering Ottoman armies. A few months later they would enter Jerusalem and
usher in one of the longest chapters of Palestinian history, lasting over 400 years.

Jerusalem held an important place in Ottoman eyes due to its religious and historic significance.
From the onset of their rule, sweeping and majestic construction projects were carried out which
would become staples of Jerusalemite architecture and topography, such as the striking walls of
Jerusalem erected by Suleiman the magnificent.

Over its history, the Ottomans divided Palestine into various political configurations and
divisions. The last of which came in 1887, where Palestine was divided into 3 districts (Sanjaks):
Jerusalem, Nablus and Acre. The Sanjak of Jerusalem was of such importance to the Ottomans
that it would be governed directly by Constantinople (Later Istanbul).

The population of these three at the time would amount to approximately 600,000, the vast
majority of which were Sunni Muslim. Palestinian Christians made up around 10 percent of the
population, while Jewish Palestinians numbered around 25,000, mainly situated in Jerusalem,
Hebron, Safad and Tiberius.

The Ottoman Millet system and its various manifestations provided a certain degree of autonomy
to minority religious and ethnic communities. While this system suffered from serious flaws, and
its breadth and tolerance waxed and waned with different governors and social and economic
circumstances, it was still superior to the outright persecution and pogroms which various
religious groups on the European continent had to endure.

Relations between the numerous religious groups in Palestine were generally stable and peaceful,
nurtured by more than a millennium of coexistence and shared adversity. For example, the
inscription on the Jaffa Gate of Jerusalem reads “There is no God but Allah, and Abraham is his
friend” in a nod to Christian and Jewish Ottomans, who like Muslims, are considered to be part
of an Abrahamic religious tradition. Palestinian Muslims, perhaps uniquely so, were also in the
habit of celebrating religious festivals in honor of the prophets and holy men of Judaism such as
Reuben, son of Jacob. This attitude was also extended towards Christian Palestinians, where the
keys of the Holy Sepulcher remain traditionally entrusted with a Muslim family to this day.

However, as with any empire, there were times of peace and prosperity, as well as times of
hardship and war. Towards the end of the life of the Ottoman empire, the latter was much more
common than the former. With the advent of European-style nationalism and the weakening of
the Ottoman state, the relations between the various ethnic groups and communities would fray.
There were rebellions against Ottoman rule, and Palestine even managed to win autonomy for a
good while under the leadership of Daher al-‘Umar, however, it would eventually be crushed by
Constantinople. These tensions would later be exacerbated by the Young Turk Revolution and
the increasing efforts to Turkify the various Ottoman provinces.

The empire would eventually collapse after its defeat in the first World War, and the various
peoples who made up its population -some of whom had sided with the Allies against the
Ottomans- looked towards independence and establishing their own nation states. This, of
course, would be thwarted, as the peoples fell from the domination of one empire to the
domination of many others.

It was during the final few decades of this dramatic collapse that a certain Austro-Hungarian
thinker, Theodor Herzl, was planting the seeds of a new political movement that would change
Palestinian history forever.

The Zionist movement:

Convened in the Swiss city of Basel in 1897, the first Zionist congress included over 200
delegates from all over Europe. The program of the congress called for establishing a Jewish
state in Palestine, and to begin coordinating the settlement of Zionists there. This, according to
Herzl, the founder of political Zionism and president of the Zionist congress, would constitute a
“solution for the Jewish question” and emancipate the Jewish people from persecution.
While there were other Zionist and proto-Zionist movements preceding this which had settled in
Palestine, such as Hibbat Zion, the Zionist congress was the first to organize and marshal the
colonization efforts in a centralized and effective way.

Zionism, then, is a settler-colonial [1] political movement that calls for establishing a Jewish
nation-state in Palestine with a Jewish majority. The issue here, of course, is that Palestine was
already inhabited. The question of what to do with the native Palestinian Arabs animated much
of the early discussions of the Zionist movement, though the consensus was that they needed to
be removed somehow, either by agreement or by force. Indeed, there was no way to establish a
Jewish majority state in Palestine without seriously displacing most of the native population.

When we call Zionism settler-colonialism, we refer to a very specific phenomenon. [2] Settler
colonialism differs from classic colonialism, in that settler colonialism only initially and
temporarily relies on an empire for their existence. In many situations, the colonists aren’t even
from the empire supporting them, and end up fighting the very sponsor that ensured their
survival in the first place. Another difference is that settlers are not merely interested in the
resources of these new lands, but also in the lands themselves, and to carve out a new homeland
for themselves in the area.

Modern day Zionists might recoil at Zionism being called a colonial ideology, yet in the early
days, the Zionist movement was astonishingly honest about its existence as a form of
colonialism. For example, Herzl wrote [3] in 1902 to infamous colonizer Cecil Rhodes, arguing
that Britain recognized the importance of “colonial expansion”:

“You are being invited to help make history,” he wrote, “It doesn’t involve Africa, but a piece of
Asia Minor ; not Englishmen, but Jews . How, then, do I happen to turn to you since this is an
out-of-the-way matter for you? How indeed? Because it is something colonial.”

Vladimir Jabotinsky, in his infamous Iron Wall (1923) stated that[4]:

“A voluntary reconciliation with the Arabs is out of the question either now or in the future. If
you wish to colonize a land in which people are already living, you must provide a garrison for
the land, or find some rich man or benefactor who will provide a garrison on your behalf. Or
else-or else, give up your colonization, for without an armed force which will render physically
impossible any attempt to destroy or prevent this colonization, colonization is impossible, not
difficult, not dangerous, but IMPOSSIBLE!… Zionism is a colonization adventure and therefore
it stands or falls by the question of armed force. It is important… to speak Hebrew, but,
unfortunately, it is even more important to be able to shoot – or else I am through with playing at
colonizing.”

These quotations are merely the tip of the iceberg, but lest you think we are cherry-picking and
choosing out of context passages, we invite you to read their original writings. There are only so
many mental gymnastics you can perform to try and find a different meaning to “Zionism is a
colonization adventure.”

To drive this point even further [5]

[6](https://israeled.org/jewish-colonial-trust/) It would only be a matter of time before the Zionist

movement began sending settlers to Palestine and forming a foothold with the goal of taking
over the entirety of Palestine. The Ottoman defeat in WW1 and Palestine becoming a British
mandate was the golden opportunity that would allow them to fulfill these aims.
[1](http://www.ism-italia.org/wp-content/uploads/12.zionist.colonialism.palestine.1965-1-compl
eto.pdf) [2](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14623520601056240)
[3](https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/30707675.pdf)
[4](https://bookscouter.com/book/9781566561310-original-sins-reflections-on-the-history-of-zio
nism-and-isra?type=buy)
[5](https://oldwebsite.palestine-studies.org/sites/default/files/jps-articles/Zionism%20and%20Im
perialism-%20The%20Historical%20Origins.pdf) , the first Zionist bank established was named
the ‘Jewish Colonial Trust’ and the whole endeavor was supported by the ‘Palestine Jewish
Colonization Association’ and the ‘Jewish Agency Colonization Department’.

The Mandate Years And The Nakba - Part 1:

As we have learned so far, the fall of the Ottoman empire, the birth of the Zionist movement, and
the declaration of Palestine as a British mandate, all contributed to birthing the Palestinian
question. Even before Palestine was officially declared a mandate in 1922, British policies and
preferential treatment of the Zionist colonists helped create a volatile political climate.

While Zionist settlement in Palestine predates the mandate years, the newly found British
sponsorship, whether tacit or explicit, provided the perfect cover for the Zionist movement to
ramp up its colonization efforts. For all intents and purposes the Jewish Yishuv became a
proto-state within an existing nation. Aiming to establish an exclusive Jewish ethnocracy, the
Yishuv had to contend with the fact that the entirety of the land was inhabited by the native
population. This is where the settler “logic of elimination” came into play. Coined by scholar
Patrick Wolfe, this means that the settlers needed to develop not only moral justifications for the
removal of the natives, but also the practical means to ensure its success. This could take the
form of ethnic cleansing, genocide or other gruesome tools of ethnocide.

If you’re at all familiar with Zionist talking points, you can see this logic of elimination in
motion. “A land without a people for a people without a land“, “there is no such thing as a
Palestinian “, “Israel made the desert bloom” and many other talking points illustrate this
perfectly. The settlers would never admit that the Palestinians constituted a people, but rather
viewed them as disconnected communities at best, and wandering rootless vagabonds at worst.
Such arguments would form the basis for legitimizing the dispossession of the natives. This is
hardly unique to Zionist settler-colonialism.

Historically, Palestine has always been a place of refuge for many populations fleeing war and
famine; it is home to Palestinians of diverse origins, such as Armenian, Bosnian and even Indian
Palestinians. They all came to Palestine for different reasons, and to this day form an integral
part of its society. The issue was never with the idea of Zionists moving to Palestine, but rather
that from the onset, the Zionist movement was not interested in coexistence. There is ample
evidence -recorded by the Zionist pioneers themselves- that the native Palestinian population was
welcoming of the first Zionist settlers. They worked side by side, and the Palestinians even
taught them how to work the land, despite Zionists seeing the Palestinians as inferior and
uncivilized. Only after it became clear that these settlers did not come to live in Palestine as
equals, but to become its landlords, as the Jewish National Fund Chairman Menachem Usishkin
said, did Zionism come to be perceived as a threat. For example, Zionist leadership went out of
its way to sanction settlers employing or working with Palestinians, calling Palestinian labor an
“illness” and forming a segregated trade union that banned non-Jewish members.
[1]
https://academic.oup.com/ahr/article-abstract/125/4/1570/5933494?redirectedFrom=PDF&casa_t
oken=lkh7C16QsJMAAAAA%3ATtg8rljnhMJCnt

The Mandate Years And The Nakba - Part 2:

Historically, Palestine has always been a place of refuge for many populations fleeing war and
famine; it is home to Palestinians of diverse origins, such as Armenian, Bosnian and even Indian
Palestinians. They all came to Palestine for different reasons, and to this day form an integral
part of its society. The issue was never with the idea of Zionists moving to Palestine, but rather
that from the onset, the Zionist movement was not interested in coexistence. There is ample
evidence -recorded by the Zionist pioneers themselves- that the native Palestinian population was
welcoming of the first Zionist settlers. They worked side by side, and the Palestinians even
taught them how to work the land, despite Zionists seeing the Palestinians as inferior and
uncivilized. Only after it became clear that these settlers did not come to live in Palestine as
equals, but to become its landlords, as the Jewish National Fund Chairman Menachem Usishkin
said, did Zionism come to be perceived as a threat. For example, Zionist leadership went out of
its way to sanction settlers employing or working with Palestinians, calling Palestinian labor an
“illness” and forming a segregated trade union that banned non-Jewish members.

Consequently, as with every colonial situation, there was resistance by the native population; in
this context, some of this resistance was aimed at the British and some at the Zionist settlers
themselves. A prominent example of this is the 1936 revolt. 1

As colonial overlords, the British were exceptional record-keepers.2 Backed by empirical data,
they compiled report after report in an attempt to monitor the tensions erupting all over Palestine.
These reports showed that the distrust between the Palestinian and Zionist populations intensified
after the British military administration of Palestine and the issuance of the Balfour declaration.
The Haycraft report,3 for example, concluded that despite Zionist accusations the actions of the
Palestinians were not at all motivated by antisemitism, but rather by the British military
administration favoring the Zionist settlers to the detriment of the Palestinians. The Shaw report
4 stated that there had been no such tension for nearly a century prior.

By the end of the mandate, in spite of the Zionist efforts to purchase as much land as possible
and maximize the number of European Zionist settlers, they barely controlled 5-6% of the land in
mandatory Palestine and constituted only a third of the population. This population had only just
arrived, and did not amount to a clear majority in any region of Palestine. This population
distribution would make establishing an exclusivist Zionist state in Palestine impossible.

It is under these circumstances that calls for partitioning Palestine into an Arab-Palestinian and
Zionist-Jewish states started to gain traction in some circles.
[1]
https://academic.oup.com/ahr/article-abstract/125/4/1570/5933494?redirectedFrom=PDF&casa_t
oken=lkh7C16QsJMAAAAA%3ATtg8rljnhMJCntEscMgLzK7jZlyvCTP_DluXfMfX24DbK71s
nGDI2OrrhNdbkudtDs3zL_z19x9_xQ [2]
https://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Books/Story831.html [3]
https://archive.org/details/palestinedisturb00grearich/page/n1/mode/2up?view=theater [4]
https://web.archive.org/web/20201112042111/https://buconflict.files.wordpr

Partition of Palestine - Part 1:

When partition is brought up it is not surprising that most tend to think of the 1947 United
Nations General Assembly resolution. This resolution recommended the partition of Palestine
into an Arab-Palestinian state and a Zionist-Jewish state at the end of the British mandate. This
was seen by some as a solution to the escalating tensions and violence during the mandate years.

However, this was not the first partition scheme to be presented. In 1919, for example, the World
Zionist Organization put forward a ‘partition’ plan, which included all the territory which would
become mandatory Palestine, as well as parts of Lebanon, Syria and Transjordan. At the time, the
Jewish population of this proposed state would not have even reached 2-3% of the total
population. Naturally, such a colonial proposal would be unjust regardless of the population
disparity, but it is an indication of the entitlement of the Zionist movement in wanting to
establish an ethnic state in an area they had no claim to, and where they were so utterly
outnumbered. [1]

The bulk of the Zionist population arrived in Palestine during the 4th [2] and 5th 3 Zionist
immigration waves -Aliyot- (Between 1924-1939). That means that the majority of those
demanding partition of the land had barely been living there for 20 years at the most. To make
matters worse, the UN partition plan allotted approximately 56% of the land 4 of mandatory
Palestine to the Zionist state, including most of the fertile coastal region.

The Palestinians, of course, rejected this. They were being asked to give away most of their land
to a minority of recently arrived settlers. The rejection of this ridiculous premise is still cited
today as the Palestinians being intransigent and refusing peace. This is often negatively
contrasted with the claim that the Yishuv agreed to the 1947 partition plan, which is portrayed as
a showing of good will and a readiness to coexist with their Palestinian neighbors. While this
may seem true on the surface, a cursory glance at internal Yishuv meetings paints an entirely
different picture.

The Palestinians, of course, rejected this. They were being asked to give away most of their land
to a minority of recently arrived settlers. The rejection of this ridiculous premise is still cited
today as the Palestinians being intransigent and refusing peace. This is often negatively
contrasted with the claim that the Yishuv agreed to the 1947 partition plan, which is portrayed as
a showing of good will and a readiness to coexist with their Palestinian neighbors. While this
may seem true on the surface, a cursory glance at internal Yishuv meetings paints an entirely
different picture. Partition as a concept was entirely rejected by the Yishuv, and any acceptance
in public was tactical in order for the newly created Jewish state to gather its strength before
expanding.

[1] https://journals.openedition.org/bcrfj/6405
[2] https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-fourth-aliyah-1924-1929 [3]
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-fifth-aliyah-1929-1939 [4]
http://passia.org/media/filer_public/17/35/1735106c-e496-45d1-9066-a573f98a02d5/pdfresizerc
om-pdf-crop_12-page-001.jpg

Partition of Palestine - Part 2:

While addressing the Zionist Executive, Ben Gurion, leader of the Yishuv and Israel’s first Prime
Minister, reemphasized that any acceptance of partition would be temporary:

“After the formation of a large army in the wake of the establishment of the state, we will abolish
partition and expand to the whole of Palestine.”

This was not a one-time occurrence, and neither was it only espoused by Ben Gurion. Internal
debates and letters illustrate this time and time again. Even in letters to his family, Ben Gurion
wrote that “A Jewish state is not the end but the beginning” detailing that settling the rest of
Palestine depended on creating an “elite army”. As a matter of fact, he was quite explicit:
“I don’t regard a state in part of Palestine as the final aim of Zionism, but as a means toward that
aim.”

Chaim Weizmann, prominent Zionist leader and first President of Israel, expected that “partition
might be only a temporary arrangement for the next twenty to twenty-five years”.

So even ignoring the moral question of requiring the natives to formally green-light their own
colonization, had the Palestinians agreed to partition, they most likely still would not have had an
independent state today. Despite what was announced in public, internal Zionist discussions
make it abundantly clear that this would have never been allowed.

Partition of Palestine - Part 3:

However, the problems with the United Nations partition plan go even deeper than this. To be
clear, the resolution did not partition Palestine. It was in fact a partition plan, which was to be
seen as a recommendation, and that the issue should be transferred to the Security Council. The
resolution does not obligate the people of Palestine to accept it, especially considering the
non-binding nature of UNGA resolutions.

For its part, the Security Council attempted 1 to find a resolution based on the UNGA
recommendation, but could not arrive at a consensus. Many concluded that the plan could not be
enforced. Israel was unilaterally declared a state by Zionist leadership while the Security Council
was still trying to arrive at a conclusion. The plan was never implemented.

However, there is an argument that although the plan never came to fruition, the UNGA
recommendation to partition Palestine to establish a Jewish state conferred the legal authority to
create such a state. As a matter of fact, this can be seen in the declaration of the establishment of
the state of Israel.
This argument falls flat on its face when we take into account that the United Nations, both its
General Assembly as well as its Security Council, do not have the jurisdiction to impose political
solutions, especially without the consent of those it affects. There is nothing in the UN charter
that confers such authority to the United Nations. Indeed, this was brought up during the
discussions on the matter. Furthermore, not only would this be outside the scope of the United
Nations’ power, it would as a matter of fact run counter to its mandate. This issue was raised by
the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine itself: ```“With regard to the principle of
self-determination, although international recognition was extended to this principle at the end of
the First World War and it was adhered to with regard to the other Arab territories, at the time of
the creation of the ‘A’ Mandates, it was not applied to Palestine, obviously because of the
intention to make possible the creation of the Jewish National Home there. Actually, it may well
be said that the Jewish National Home and the sui generis Mandate for Palestine run counter to
that principle.”``` This is a direct admission that the creation of a Zionist national home in
Palestine runs counter to the principle of self-determination for Palestinians already living there.
The United Nations needed to twist itself into a knot and make an exception to their own charter
to recommend the partition of Palestine. However, even if it had been within their power to do
so, and had it not ran counter to their charter, the UN still had no right to force the Palestinians to
tear their homeland in half. [1]
https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2010/10/26/the-myth-of-the-u-n-creation-of-israel/

The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine:

The demographic realities in Palestine had always troubled the Zionist movement. Despite their
consistent sloganeering of “A land without a people for a people without a land”, they were
acutely aware of the reality on the ground. Even from its earliest days, Zionist leaders spoke
about removing the native population to make room for the colonists who would utilize the land
in much more “civilized” and “advanced” ways. Towards the end of the mandate, it would
become clear that there would be no voluntary exodus of the native Palestinians.

It is within this context that Plan D 1 (Tochnit Dalet) was developed by the Haganah high
command. Although it was adopted in May 1948, the origins of this plan go back a few years
earlier. Yigael Yadin reportedly started working on it in 1944. This plan entailed the expansion of
the borders of the Zionist state, well beyond partition, and any Palestinian village within these
borders that resisted would be destroyed and have its inhabitants expelled. This included cities
that were supposed to be part of the Arab Palestinian state after partition, such as Nazareth, Acre
and Lydda.

Ben Zohar, the biographer of Ben Gurion wrote that: [2]

“In internal discussions, in instructions to his men, the Old Man [Ben-Gurion] demonstrated a
clear position: it would be better that as few a number as possible of Arabs would remain in the
territory of the [Jewish] state.”.

Although it could be argued that Plan D did not outline the exact villages and cities to be
ethnically cleansed in an explicit way, it was clear that the various Yishuv forces were operating
with its instructions in mind.
It is important to stress that the ethnic cleansing of Palestine began before the 1948 war, and
before even a single regular Arab soldier set foot in Palestine. This is important to understand
because many still erroneously argue that the Nakba -Arabic for catastrophe- was a byproduct of
the Arab war on the fledgling Israeli state. Approximately 300,000 Palestinians had been
expelled through ethnic cleansing campaigns before the onset of war or the end of the mandate.
These campaigns were accompanied by massacres and war crimes, even against villages that
were neutral and had non-aggression pacts with the Zionist Yishuv. The ethnic cleansing of the
village of Deir Yassin demonstrates this perfectly.

For many reasons, the Arab states, mainly Transjordan, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq, were not
interested in a war. However, after the monstrous ethnic cleansing campaigns against the
Palestinians, they finally reluctantly intervened. However, an aspect that is often ignored is the
inter-Arab rivalries and disunity that were among the chief causes for the intervention in 1948.
Barely coming out from under colonialism themselves, their actions during the war showed that
they never really joined the war with eliminationist intent, as the popular narrative goes. The
Jordanians were more interested in acquiring the West Bank as a stepping stone to their real
ambition, which was greater Syria. As a matter of fact, there is ample evidence 3 of collusion
between the Israelis and Jordanians during the 1948 war, with deals under the table pretty much
gifting parts of the West Bank to Transjordan in return for not interfering in other areas.
[1] https://imeu.org/article/plan-dalet [2] https://www.jstor.org/stable/20007686?seq=1 [3]
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4283369

The Egyptians joined in an attempt to counter the Hashemite power-play that could change the
balance of power in the region. For these reasons, the Arab armies generally intervened in the
territories of the mandate destined to be part of the Palestinian Arab state according to the 1947
partition plan, and with very few exceptions, stayed away from the area designated to be part of
the Zionist-Jewish state. Yes, support for Palestine and Palestinians played a large role in the
legitimization of such interventions, but they were never the real reason behind them. As per
usual when it comes to international relations, interests are always at the center of any maneuver
regardless of the espoused noble and altruistic motivations.

Despite their propaganda and rhetoric, the Arab states sought different secret opportunities to
avoid and end the war with Israel. Some offers went as far as to agree to absorb all Palestinian
refugees. These were all rejected by Israel with the goal of maximizing its land-grabs. For
example, when it became clear that Israel would ignore all negotiations regarding partition and
unilaterally declare its independence, there were enormous efforts behind the scenes aimed at
avoiding war, not to mention ending it early when it did eventually break out. These efforts were
heavily sponsored by the United States, who asked in March 1948 that all military activities be
ceased, and asked the Yishuv to postpone any declaration of statehood and to give time for
negotiations. Outside of Abdallah of Transjordan, the Arab states accepted this initiative by the
United States. However, it was rejected by Ben Gurion, who knew that any peaceful
implementation of the partition plan meant that the refugees he had expelled earlier would have a
chance to return, not to mention that war would offer him a chance to conquer the lands he
coveted outside the partition plan.

This followed a long series of Zionist rejection of overtures by the native Palestinians. In 1928,
for example, the Palestinian leadership voted to allow Zionist settlers equal representation in the
future bodies of the state, despite them being a minority who had barely just arrived. This was
faced with Zionist rejection. Even after this, in 1947 the Palestinians suggested the formation of
a unitary state for all those living between the river and the sea to replace the mandate to no
avail. There were many attempts at co-existence, but this simply would not have benefited the
Zionist leadership who never intended to come to Palestine to live as equals.

By the end of the war, 1 800,000 Palestinians would be ethnically cleansed from approximately
530 villages and communities. Israel would be established on the rubble of these villages, and
their settlers would come to call the emptied abodes that once housed Palestinian families home.
To this day, these 800,000 and their descendants are still scattered all over the world in refugee
camps, and Israel refuses their right to return home. The ethnic cleansing operations continued
well into the 1950s, years after the end of the war.

The post-war armistice line would come to be known as the green line, and it marked the de
facto borders of the Israeli state, though official borders have never been declared. The areas that
Israel did not conquer, i.e. the West Bank and the Gaza Strip would come to be ruled by Jordan
and Egypt respectively. It is estimated that around 80% of the Palestinian population within the
green line were expelled. The remaining 20% would live under martial law for decades to come,
and have their communities turned into segregated, heavily controlled enclaves surrounded by
barbed wire.

These early years would prove formative to the discriminatory regime of laws that govern Israel
to this very day.
[1] https://www.plands.org/en/maps-atlases/atlases/the-atlas-of-palestine/pdfs/atlas-part-1.pdf

Part 1 - From Nakba to Naksa:

In mid May 1948, the state of Israel was officially established on the ruins of Palestine. Having
ethnically cleansed approximately 80% of the Palestinians in its newly acquired territory, the
following years would consolidate Zionist control of the land and pave the way for
discriminatory ethnocratic laws and policies 1 that would institutionalize the theft of everything
Palestinian.
The ethnic cleansing of Palestine would not stop after the war; Palestinians in the Naqab, as well
as those close to the ceasefire lines, would continue to face mass expulsions into the 1950s. 2 In
the same period, Israel issued the infamous Absentee’s Property Law. 3
This law was instrumental in systematically seizing the property of all the refugees it had
created, including their homes, farms, land and even the contents of their bank accounts.
Through this law, the state took control of everything remaining behind when the refugees fled,
and if not “contested” or “claimed”, they would then become the property of the state, free to be
utilized in any way it saw fit. Given the fact that any refugee attempting to return was shot, you
can see how this law served merely as a fig leaf to legitimize what can only be described as
naked theft.

This in conjunction with the Land Acquisitions Law.4 allowed for the mass transfer of the entire
Palestinian economy to the Israeli state. Practically overnight, the state gained control of over
739,750 agricultural acres, the vast majority of which were of excellent quality as well as 73,000
houses, 7800 workshops and 6 million pounds. This dropped the cost of settling a Zionist family
in Palestine from 8000$ to 1500$, effectively subsidizing the creation of the Israeli state and
kickstarting its economy.

The following years, Israel would continue consolidating its control and preventing any refugees
from returning, and would skirmish with Jordanian and Egyptian troops along the ceasefire lines.
In 1956, Gamal Abdel Nasser, president of Egypt, would nationalize the Suez Canal5 in a move
that threatened the interests of many a colonial power. This would form the basis for a tripartite
attack on Egypt by France, Britain and Israel. The British were enraged at Nasser’s reclamation
of Egyptian strategic and economic assets as well as the threat this posed to their route to India,
while France wanted to defeat Nasser due to his support for the Algerian freedom fighters
resisting French colonial rule and genocide. As for Israel, this was a chance to defeat its biggest
threat in the region. On the eve of the Sinai campaign, Ben Gurion franklyadmitted that he:

“..always feared that a personality might arise such as arose among the Arab rulers in the seventh
century or like [Kemal Ataturk] who arose in Turkey after its defeat in the First World War. He
raised their spirits, changed their character, and turned them into a fighting nation. There was and
still is a danger that Nasser is this man.” This would also be a chance to acquire some of the
territories Israel did not conquer in 1948.

While this aggression would be a military success, it would ultimately become a political defeat,
as the three countries were pushed into withdrawing their forces after world outcry and threats
from the United States. This only strengthened Nasser’s position and cemented him as the most
popular leader across the Arab world.
[1] https://www.adalah.org/en/law/index [2]
https://www.plands.org/en/maps-atlases/atlases/the-atlas-of-palestine/pdfs/atlas-part-1.pdf [3]
https://www.adalah.org/en/law/view/538 [4] https://www.adalah.org/en/law/view/533 [5]
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2624270?casa_token=jVvgzSTeYxoAAAAA%3A0v2hv1PrjRcgraD
hmYvwUP111oRYGRG10LbmenIK1d6_VeHB1swggh04-VNF5DnNMaUGNJeLKW5hrSO9-O
jk4b3oz7DoPRjXsfSuc2WqsmulLucKviE_

The United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) was created in the aftermath of the 1956 war on
Egypt to secure peace, and patrol both sides of the border between Egypt and Israel. Despite
being the aggressor, Israel refused to cooperate with the UN force, and rejected the idea of any
peace-keeping force on their side of the border, while Egypt accepted the UN force and
cooperated with them. Not only did Israel refuse to cooperate with UNEF, but over its
decade-long existence Israeli troops “regularly patrolled alongside the line and now and again
created provocations by violating it“. This, however, was only the tip of the iceberg of Israeli
provocations towards its neighbors after 1956. These would lay down the groundwork for
Israel’s next war on its neighbors.

During these years of rising tensions, the Palestinian refugees did not sit idly by awaiting a
savior. They started organizing themselves in their tent cities, and fought back with the goal of
returning home. In this context, Palestinian leadership would slip away from the traditional urban
and clan elites to those willing to pick up a rifle. It no longer mattered what your status was prior
to the forced exodus, what was of worth now was how you would struggle to reclaim your stolen
home.
A few years later in 1964, and with sponsorship from the Arab League, the Palestine Liberation
Organization (PLO) would emerge1 from this new refugee-led leadership. With the goals of
liberating Palestine and allowing the refugees to return home, the PLO would come to be the
official representative and voice for the entirety of the Palestinian people, both in Palestine and
in the diaspora. The creation of the PLO in 1964 is why many erroneously believe that
Palestinian identity was “invented” in the 1960s. Needless to say, as with all freedom movements
at the time, the PLO as well as all Palestinian resistance groups were designated as “terrorists”
by Israel and its imperialist allies. Meanwhile, the PLO would be embraced as an ally to
liberation movements across the global south.
[1]
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2535603?casa_token=3rMUyfCghN4AAAAA%3AZCla-jLup_l19ht
PfZwCwQKt0RUBwk2hwnKx2u8qUY01iJLjMlGHGh-nltqdxmq1PQBA2ERsu6Jcl8HNJUOya
jzbqQzy5u3EyYiD3YqC_VLeXYIVhRQH

The War of 1967:

On the morning of June the 5th 1967, Israel launched a sneak attack on Egypt decimating its air
force. Thus began the 1967 war, which would last less than a week and enable Israel to finally
conquer the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Egyptian Sinai desert and the Syrian Golan heights.
Israel claims to this day that these strikes were preemptive self-defense, citing a number of
concerns, such as Nasser’s forces in Sinai, the closing of the straits of Tiran and the situation in
the Syrian Golan heights. As per usual, these claims should not be taken at face value, as even
the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian villages which had signed non-aggression pacts with the
Yishuv was framed as self-defense.

The 1967 war did not materialize out of a vacuum, nor should it be understood as such. It
constituted a continuation of Israel’s wars against the region to achieve maximum territorial
expansion. Particularly, this war would finish what began in 1956. Following the political defeat
in the previous war, much of Israel’s military actions were designed to goad Nasser and other
Arab leaders into an attack, an example of this can be seen in the disproportionate Israeli assault
on Samu in 1966, or the frequent unprovoked bombings of Syrian border positions. This is
hardly our unique interpretation of events; at the time this was widely understood. For example
the British ambassador in Israel explained that this tactic aimed to spawn a “deliberately
contrived preventive war“.

There is ample evidence to show that Israel was intent on provoking a war. This war would
finally give them an opportunity to expand into territories not conquered in 1948, as Ben Gurion
lamented.1 This becomes exceedingly clear once we examine the diplomatic record, and the
numerous times Israel sabotaged any attempt at mediation or diplomacy to avert the outbreak of
war.
For example, throughout much of the crisis of 1967 Egypt expressed its willingness to resurrect
and expand the Egyptian-Israeli Mixed Armistice Commission (EIMAC), which was officially
rejected by Israel in May. In the same month, the UN secretary-General personally attempted to
avert an escalation by traveling to Cairo to mediate between the Egyptians and Israelis. Once
again, Egypt agreed to the proposal in an attempt to lower tensions. Israel rejected the proposal.
Brian Urquhart, who was a senior UN official at the time, wrote in his memoir that “Israel, no
doubt having decided on military action, turned down [UN General Secretary] U Thant’s ideas“.

There were many other attempts at averting an escalation, for instance, the United States also
tried its hand at mediation. High ranking American diplomats and politicians met with Nasser in
late May in a meeting that was deemed a “breakthrough in the crisis”. In this meeting Nasser
showed flexibility and a willingness to include the World Court to arbitrate in some of the issues.
However, what was most promising was that Nasser agreed to send his vice-president to
Washington within a week in an attempt to reach a diplomatic settlement for the crisis.

You may be wondering why you’ve never heard of such a meeting, or what its results were. That
is because two days before the meeting, Israel decided to launch its surprise attack, torpedoing
all efforts to reach a non-violent diplomatic solution to the crisis. 2

This shocked even the Americans, Dean Rusk, the Secretary of State at the time wrote that:

“They attacked on a Monday, knowing that on Wednesday the Egyptian vice-president would
arrive in Washington to talk about re-opening the Strait of Tiran. We might not have succeeded in
getting Egypt to reopen the strait, but it was a real possibility.”
[3]
[1]
https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/martinkramer/files/israels_situation_today_looks_much_ben_gur
ion_envisioned.pdf [2]
https://imemc.org/article/norman-finkelstein-six-day-war-50-year-occupation-what-really-happe
ned-in-june-1967/ [3]
https://books.google.ca/books?id=55NKCgAAQBAJ&pg=PT163&lpg=PT163&dq=They+attack
ed+on+a+Monday,+knowing+that+on+Wednesday+the+Egyptian+vice-president+would+arrive
+in+Washington+to+talk+about+re-opening+the+Strait+of+Tiran.+We+might+not+have+succee
ded+in+getting+Egypt+to+reopen+the+strait,+but+it+was+a+real+possibility&source=bl&ots=q
mFLWcCCQM&sig=ACfU3U0YXUh2K0kBLJfRU1W0Mnj6I9c0xA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ah
UKEwi4xaTTg5f5AhX-BTQIHesAA1cQ6AF6BAgCEAM#v=onepage&q=They%20attacked%
20on%20a%20Monday%2C%20knowing%20that%20on%20Wednesday%20the%20Egyptian%
20vice-president%20would%20arrive%20in%20Washington%20to%20talk%20about%20re-ope
ning%20the%20Strait%20of%20Tiran.%20We%20might%20not%20have%20succeed
Following the diplomatic chain of events at the time leaves no shadow of a doubt that Israel was
purposely seeking war. It rebuffed all attempts at mediation and even deceived and humiliated its
ally, the United States, by allowing it to continue with the charade of diplomacy when Israel
knew it was going to attack anyway. On the other hand, this shows Nasser to have been far more
flexible, and amenable to diplomatic solutions than many suggest. Yet until this day, Israel is
portrayed as being forced into a defensive war, while Nasser is portrayed as a warmonger.

In his memoir, U Thant, the UN Secretary General at the time wrote that “if only Israel had
agreed to permit UNEF to be stationed on its side of the border, even for a short duration, the
course of history could have been different. Diplomatic efforts to avert the pending catastrophe
might have prevailed; war might have been averted.” This was further confirmed by Odd Bull,
chief of staff of the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO) at the time, who
stated that:

“it is quite possible that the 1967 war could have been avoided’ had Israel acceded to the
Secretary-General’s request.“

The revisionism surrounding the 1967 war is one of Israel’s most significant propaganda
achievements. Suddenly, reality is flipped on its head, and the powerful aggressor becomes an
underdog fighting to stave off extermination, though no such threat really existed. Israeli
Minister Mordecai Bentov frankly admitted1 a few years after the war that:

“This entire story about the danger of extermination was invented and exaggerated after the fact
to justify the annexation of new Arab territories”.

Following this war, Israel would come to control the entirety of what was once mandatory
Palestine. The Jordanians and Egyptians were pushed out of the West Bank and Gaza Strip
respectively, and these areas were now subjected to Israeli military occupation. In addition to
this, the Syrian Golan Heights as well as the Sinai Peninsula were seized by Israel. Similar to the
1948 war, the 1967 war provided cover for more ethnic cleansing campaigns. By the end of the
war, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians would be ethnically cleansed from various areas of
the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Over 100,000 Syrians would also be ethnically cleansed from
the Golan Heights, and their villages and communities demolished and erased.
This defeat would come to be known as the Naksa, Arabic for setback. It would also crush the
spirits of the Palestinians and the wider Arab population in general.

[1]
https://www.lemonde.fr/archives/article/1972/06/03/israel-etait-il-reellement-menace-d-extermin
ation_2390625_1819218.html

The Allon Colonization plan:

After decades of perfecting colonial control mechanisms for Palestinians inside the green line,
Israel was more than equipped to impose an effective military governing system on the
Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In 1966, Israel would end its martial law
regulations for Palestinian villages inside the green line only to impose them once again in the
West Bank and Gaza Strip after its victory in 1967.

The military occupation of the West Bank -including East Jerusalem- and the Gaza Strip persist
to this day. This new status quo allowed Israel to pursue its goals of colonizing the rest of the
territory that made up mandatory Palestine. It is in this context that the Allon plan emerged.
Named after its creator, Yigal Allon, this plan would see Israel permanently seizing control of
vast territories of the West Bank through multiple methods, such as through military installations
as well as settlements. The large Palestinian population centers would then either be given some
form of nominal autonomy, or have their control transferred to the Jordanian monarchy.

It was according to this plan that the colonial settlement enterprise1 in the West Bank and Gaza
Strip was birthed. Settlements are colonies built on land under Israeli occupation outside the
green line, and are open only to Jewish Israelis. Initially, Israel constructed settlements in all the
territories it seized in the 1967 war, including the Sinai and Golan heights. For reasons which we
will discuss in the next articles , the settlements in the Gaza Strip and Sinai were dismantled over
time. However, in the West Bank and Golan heights, this has only worsened. There are over 200
settlements and outposts dotting the entirety of these areas. These settlements are home to over
600,000 settlers, living on stolen and occupied territory. According to international law, these
settlements are absolutely illegal, and their existence is a stark violation of the Geneva
conventions and other international norms.

If you were to look at the distribution of these settlements all across the West Bank, you will
notice that there is a striking resemblance between their positions and the territory outlined in the
Allon plan to be permanently seized by Israel. This is by design, and Israeli policy since the 60s
has been to change the facts on the ground as much as possible so as to enable the theft of these
lands. This colonization drive persists to this very day through various annexations and land
confiscations, and did not even stop during times of peace negotiations. As a matter of fact, it
accelerated3 during times of negotiations because the Israelis knew that the Palestinians would
not want to jeopardize the negotiations they so desperately needed to establish a state. In addition
to the settlements, the West Bank is dissected by military firing ranges, nature reserves and many
other legalistic schemes to deny Palestinians access. This dissection is so severe, that the West
Bank has jokingly come to be known as the West Bank archipelago, where small pockets of
Palestinians are surrounded by Israeli controlled zones.

[1]
https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/Documents/Countries/PS/SG_Report_on_Israeli_A.71.3
55.pdf [2] https://www.everycrsreport.com/reports/R40092.html#fn118

The War of 1973 and Camp David:

Despite the death of Nasser, Egypt remained determined to take back the territories it lost in the
1967 war. With the help of Syria, who had also lost its Golan Heights, they put together a plan to
retake control of their occupied areas.1 This came in the form of the 1973 war, which was a
game changer in the region.

In the first hours of the war, Egypt under the leadership of Anwar Sadat, was able to cross the
Suez Canal and overwhelm the Bar Lev line, which was constructed by Israel to fend off any
Egyptian attack. On the northern front, the Syrians were able to advance well into the occupied
Golan heights. These early military victories were ultimately reversed as Israel strengthened its
position with the aid of the United States. While the Arab forces would be repulsed, the war
served as a warning sign to Israel that it cannot forever guarantee that it would always be a victor
in war.

This laid the groundwork for the 1978 Camp David accords2 with Egypt, where the Sinai would
be returned to Egypt (with certain stipulations), in exchange for peace, normalization and the
Egyptian recognition of Israel. Furthermore, the fledgling Israeli colonies in the Sinai would be
dismantled. Egypt would be the first Arab state to officially recognize Israel, and would begin to
reorient itself towards the United States and the West Bloc.

Among the various clauses and provisions of the Camp David accords was the condition that the
rights of the Palestinian people were to be recognized, and that some form of autonomy would be
granted to the Palestinians. While vague and noncommittal, this would eventually pave the way
for the secret negotiations between the PLO and Israel.

The Syrians, however, would not fare as well. The Syrian Golan heights remain occupied to this
day, and the state of war between Syria and Israel has technically never ended. Israel has used
this as a pretext to illegally annex the Golan heights, and colonize it in a manner similar to the
West Bank and East Jerusalem.

This new status quo, and the perceived shift in the balance of power would ultimately culminate
in the Palestinian Intifada and the Oslo accords, which would for the first time allow the PLO
leadership to return to Palestine in an endeavor to establish a Palestinian state.
[1]
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2535924?casa_token=EJYdZpyipgEAAAAA%3AeVfWtjUf4rPMF
K2_YFCgJfM31_kpgOczVk7R_uW5AVQlHX2Hl6t6EzxD-6nACs7TQJvek2eozGAgX5xTpaXi
6rNTL98ROXPUQ7maAcfJgOlcAYX3keMa [2]
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2536577?casa_token=_GPsh4OTmB8AAAAA%3AMZiK0I-cvYcs
wFOuida7tDwlHOeM5-oqL4PI6gebKcDa9aYIdAl-yRnOPKwFs3sPdDtnHNwjUiiCE1Rz4Bobu
ZBVrL0FL7VvLKZhqUFQVI3ltjnIqpia
Part 1 - Two Intifadas and two states:
Twenty years after the extension of Israeli colonialism to the rest of Palestine, the people of the
West Bank and Gaza Strip came to live under unbearable repression, sustained through Israel’s
military and civil administration in these newly occupied areas. Civil and political freedoms were
non-existent, and Palestinians were faced with daily humiliation and violence. Things as simple
as dressing in the colors of the Palestinian flag were enough to net you savage beatings and jail
time. Land expropriation was rampant, as well as collective punishment and deliberate
de-development strategies designed to shrink the Palestinian economy with every year. For all
intents and purposes, their lives were run by a foreign military dictatorship that saw them as
inferior in every way.

Furthermore, Palestinians were reduced to cheap and exploited labor in Israel, where it is
estimated that around 35-40% of the entire Palestinian work force worked within the green line.
This concentrated repression and exploitation created a volatile climate which could explode
provided the right trigger. This trigger arrived on the 9th of December 1987, when an Israel
Defense Force (IDF) truck crashed into a Palestinian vehicle, killing 4 workers, 3 of which were
from the Jabalia refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, an event which Palestinians widely saw as
deliberate. Naturally, Israel denied all such accusations.

This would set off wide-scale protests, civil disobedience, boycotts and other forms of resistance
against Israel that would come to be known as the Intifada, which means to “shake off”.
Palestinians would burn Israeli products, refuse to pay taxes to the civil administration, and
organize themselves into popular committees to act as an alternative to the civil administration
and provide services and promote Palestinian self-reliance. These committees were popularly led
and decentralized in nature, which made them almost impossible to stamp out despite Israel’s
best efforts.

As is to be expected, Israel responded with extreme violence, deploying tens of thousands of

soldiers all over the West Bank and Gaza Strip. It utilized what came to be known as the “Iron
fist” policy, which instructed soldiers to break the arms and legs of protestors. However, as harsh
as its response was, it was also incoherent and panicked, and often contradictory. It brutally
repressed demonstrations and assassinated Intifada leaders, which backfired and brought more
Palestinians to the street. It destroyed local farms and businesses to force Palestinians to
purchase Israeli products, and closed down educational institutions which would only increase
youth mobilization in support of the Intifada. Moreover, these measures generated immense
sympathy and solidarity with the Palestinians, and seriously challenged the ‘progressive’ image
Israel always tried to project internationally.

The Intifada would have long-lasting effects on Palestinians, and is still fondly remembered to
this day. It would seriously challenge Israeli control over Palestine, and would reignite the fire
within Palestinians for resistance, which had been dampened by years of military defeat and the
normalization of Egypt. It would also prove that Palestinians could be the masters of their own
destiny, and could struggle for their liberation in a collective and self-organized matter without
support from abroad. It would also put to rest the fantasy that Jerusalem was a united city after
capturing its eastern part in the 1967 war, as Palestinians in East Jerusalem were among the
vanguard of the movement. In short, it was successful in making the Israeli occupation as taxing
as possible, in resources as well as in morale and international standing.
It is within this context that the PLO saw an opportunity to leverage this pressure. With
international support from the United States and the Soviet Union, this would culminate in the
Madrid Peace conference of 1991. This was an attempt to arrive at a negotiated settlement
between the Palestinians and the Israelis. Despite the PLO not officially being part of the
Palestinian delegation due to Israeli objections, they were coordinating closely with said
delegation. While the Madrid conference held symbolic importance to some, it had very little
tangible effect on the ground. It was the secret Oslo negotiations simultaneously going on behind
the scenes that would have a much more pronounced effect.

The Oslo accords - Part 1:

The Oslo accords [1] were a result of the secret negotiations between the PLO and Israel.
Negotiating directly, and sitting face to face for the first time, they agreed upon a declaration of
principles that would lead to creating the Palestinian Authority as an interim government that
would pave the way for a final settlement. Although these talks would kickstart what came to be
known as the “peace” process and the two-state solution, they were mostly a declaration of
principles which did not contain any concrete specificities for a resolution. As a matter of fact,
the word “state” with regards to Palestinians was never mentioned once.

It was two years later, in what is referred to as Oslo II, [2] taking place in the Egyptian city of
Taba, that negotiations earnestly began. In these negotiations more concrete parameters were
discussed, and the logistics as well as method for instating the Palestinian Authority on the
ground were determined. It is also worth mentioning that during this period, Jordan would go on
to sign the Wadi Araba peace treaty with Israel and officially normalize its ties, making it the
second Arab country after Egypt to do so.

Originally, the interim Oslo agreement and the Palestinian Authority were meant to be of a
transitional nature, only lasting five years leading up to the final settlement. Interestingly enough,
the form of this final settlement was never concretely defined as resulting in a state for
Palestinians. Oslo II resulted in dividing the West Bank into three areas, [3] labeled A, B and C.

Areas A: These areas were to be under complete civil and security Palestinian (Palestinian
Authority) control. This includes the major Palestinian cities and population centers. There
should have been no Israeli presence in this area. This area makes up approximately 18% of the
West Bank while containing 55% of the Palestinian population.

Areas B: These areas were to be under Palestinian civil control, but Israeli security control.
Many Palestinian villages and smaller population centers fall within this area. Areas B constitute
approximately 21% of the West Bank while containing 41% of the Palestinian population.

Areas C: These areas were to be gradually transferred to Palestinian jurisdiction in three phases,
each to take place after an interval of six months, to be completed 18 months after the
inauguration of the Council.. Areas C constitute the majority of the West Bank making up
approximately 61% of the land. It is in these areas where the majority of settlement activity takes
place, as they are abundant in land and resources while containing a relatively small portion of
the Palestinian population. Israel controls all of them fully until this very day.

[1] https://digitalcommons.wcl.american.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1390&context=auilr
[2]
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/interim-agreement-on-the-west-bank-and-the-gaza-strip-osl
o-ii [3]
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/interim-agreement-on-the-west-bank-and-the-gaza-strip-osl
o-ii

The Oslo accords Part 2:

The labeling and designation of these areas continues to be an issue of importance to this day, as
increasing numbers of Israeli officials call for the complete annexation of areas C to Israel. This
means that Israel makes life as difficult as possible 1 for Palestinians in areas C to encourage
their exodus. Other issues of importance such as the use of water resources 2 are heavily affected
by which area you live in. Naturally if you are an illegal Israeli settler, such distinctions do not
matter.

Today Israel barely distinguishes between these areas, as it is seen operating freely in Areas A, as
well as retroactively recognizing new settlement outposts in Areas B.

In theory, then, the two-state solution calls for establishing two states, as the name implies. The
Palestinian state would be erected in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as its
capital. On the question of refugees, this topic was always postponed for future negotiations. The
Palestinian Authority insists that there will be a “just solution” to the refugee question, but
internal documents 3 reveal that they have basically given up on the matter. Not even a token
amount 4 of refugees would be permitted to return to their homes. Another issue is borders,
where Israel has attempted to keep control of its illegal settlement blocs in the West Bank.5

The Oslo accords came bundled with the Paris protocol, which dictated the economic policies the
Palestinians were allowed to make, and directly tied the Palestinian economy to the Israeli one.
In essence, what the Paris protocol achieved was a structured subordination of the Palestinian
economy to the Israeli one, giving the Israeli market immense control and power over it. As a
matter of fact, many aspects of the Oslo accord were just a reformulation of occupation policies
with a civil face; domination and exploitation were simply rebranded as cooperation.

Setting aside the practical issues and stalemates in the negotiation, the two-state solution has
many conceptual problems that make it unfitting as a mechanism through which a resolution can
be found. To put it bluntly, Israel is not a normal state. It is a settler colony. We are not talking
about two naturally occurring populations which have a land dispute. Israelis are descended from
settlers that arrived from abroad with the goal of erecting an ethnocratic settler state in an area
that was already home to the Palestinians.
[1]
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02665433.2018.1543611?casa_token=Wsl5xEnW
cDoAAAAA%3AZh_OSodjyL1C91EMAUraGCgNEjeeMdVmPALR7-ZNflDsr-f2kEBq5ZrFM
CN_sW3OIzDx0OIJpijjFX3e&journalCode=rppe20 [2]
https://library.fes.de/libalt/journals/swetsfulltext/15245437.pdf [3]
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2011/1/24/pa-relinquished-right-of-return [4]
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-palestinians-israel-refugees-idUSLE15373320080814 [5]
https://www.un.org/unispal/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/OCHAFACTSHEET-211217.pdf

The Oslo Accords - Part 3:

Additionally, this approach is inadequate to right historical wrongs, as it focuses on the pre-1967
borders as a starting point, which are in themselves a product of this colonization, and not the
root cause of it. It is thus preoccupied with finding solutions to symptoms, rather than dare
address the root cause, which is Zionist settler colonialism and the ethnic cleansing of
Palestinians.

This automatically means that Palestinians must relinquish any rights or hopes for their millions
of refugees, and it also means that Palestinians must relinquish their rights to live in over 80% of
the land they were ethnically cleansed from. Naturally, this promises that resource distribution,
from water to fertile land, will be heavily stacked in Israel’s favor.

All of these shortcomings are often countered with the assertion that Palestinians must
compromise to reach peace. Israeli control is treated as a fait accompli and that Palestinians must
deal with it, rather than demand justice. This is the whole premise of the two-state solution, that
Palestinians must compromise on their rights to be granted a small, powerless sham of a state in
part of their homeland. Israel, of course, was not asked to compromise on anything substantial.
The only “compromise” asked of Israelis is to stop its illegal occupation of foreign lands, as well
as stop its illegal settlement enterprise, which it should cease regardless of any negotiation with
the Palestinians. This attitude basically boils down to “What’s mine is mine, and what’s yours is
negotiable.”.

Yet despite all of this, Palestinians were willing to agree to these terms. The PLO was willing to
give up on the Palestinian people’s historical rights in order to find peace and have a state. But
none of this was sufficient for Israel. Even Rabin, the Israeli Prime Minister who signed the Oslo
accords, who is considered a holy martyr for peace among the Israeli peace camp, was not
prepared to give the Palestinians real estate. He spoke of a sham “state-minus” 1 with no
sovereignty, and the offers did not get better than that throughout the history of negotiations.

So even when Palestinians accepted the 1967 borders, an incredibly limited return of refugees,
and other compromises, this was still not good enough for Israel that sought to shrink the
Palestinian Bantustan even further. These arrangements seek to formalize the status quo with
cosmetic changes. Netanyahu, the Israeli Prime Minister, promised 2 that no sovereign
Palestinian state will emerge, and in the case of any limited self-rule arrangement for the
Palestinians, there will be a permanent IDF presence3 in the West Bank, as well as Israeli control
of the borders and airspace. As it stands, Palestinian aspirations cannot exceed the ceiling of
Israeli table scraps, and any rejection of this ridiculous premise is framed as irrational
intransigence.

Needless to say, the Palestinian Authority, which was supposed to last only 5 years still exists to
this day. No Palestinian state has materialized, and the Israeli matrix of control is more
far-reaching than ever. Israeli intransigence and the stalemate in negotiations following the failed
Camp David negotiations would erupt a second Intifada. This time, however, it would differ in
character and organization from the first, and would become much more militarized over its
course.
[1] https://www.972mag.com/yitzhak-rabin-oslo-accords-aoc/ [2]
https://www.timesofisrael.com/netanyahu-no-palestinian-state-under-my-watch/ [3]
https://www.haaretz.com/2014-12-07/ty-article/netanyahu-peace-requires-idf-in-west-bank/0000
017f-dbf0-df9c-a17f-fff8bbe80000

The Second Intifada - Part 1:

The stalemate in the negotiations, and the escalating settlement activities in the West Bank and
Gaza Strip combined together to create a climate of heightened tension. This tension would erupt
into a conflagration at the end of September 2000. Triggered by the visit of Ariel Sharon to the
Aqsa mosque and the Noble Sanctuary, the second Intifada, also known as the Aqsa Intifada,
would demolish much of what the Palestinian Authority had built over the last few years.

Ariel Sharon, known as the butcher of Sabra and Shatilla 1 to Palestinians, visited al-Aqsa
mosque 2 escorted by hundreds of armed troops to make a statement that no matter what
agreement would emerge, the Noble Sanctuary would forever remain under Israeli sovereignty
and control. Being the third holiest site in Islam, and holding a very special importance for all
Palestinians, this visit was deliberately designed to provoke a response from the Palestinians. It
was thought that decisively crushing this response would give the Israelis a better position in the
negotiations, and lower the political demands of the Palestinian Authority.

Similar to the first Intifada, Palestinians mobilized massive protests, civil disobedience actions,
boycotts and other forms of resistance. However, unlike the first Intifada which took Israel by
surprise, the repression was much more harsh and violent. Israel ruthlessly shot to kill, using live
ammunition and savagely cracked down on Palestinians. What had initially erupted as a popular,
mostly peaceful movement, was soon pushed by the harsh response to gradually become
militarized. While popular resistance would continue, this time it would be accompanied by
guerilla warfare, suicide bombings and other tactics.

Soon the same Ariel Sharon who provoked the Intifada would become Prime Minister, and with
his extensive history of repressing Palestinians, he greatly escalated the violence. He would
invade and reoccupy all Palestinian areas that were under the control of the Palestinian
Authority, including the large population centers such as Nablus and Ramallah. This was also
used as a pretext to begin constructing Israel’s infamous segregation wall, which has been widely
condemned as illegal.

This would shake up the status quo considerably; the West Bank and Gaza Strip would be
completely cut off from each other and the rest of Palestine. Much of the Palestinian Authority’s
security forces were decimated, and Israel retrenched its position to have a tighter grip on the
occupied areas. Naturally, during this period there were many attempts at resuscitating the peace
process or shifting the status quo, but they all ended in failure.

[1]
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1525/jps.2002.32.1.36?casa_token=pnycdxCyGesAAA
AA%3Agh0YOIH7_jStsBkMtgaP0wzqUlNc0RdBtLiuVOvEChn4OaAfTwX347fc7Q8wTedg2z
ZgkvGtUz2FavVr&journalCode=rpal20 [2]
https://yplus.ps/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Baroud-Ramzy-The-Second-P
The Second Intifada - Part 2:
One of the major events that took place during the second Intifada was the Israeli withdrawal
from the Gaza Strip. While it is true that Israeli forces and settlers withdrew from within Gaza in
2005 due to heavy Palestinian resistance, this does not mean that the occupation was ended, as it
continued to exert effective control over Gaza. This is confirmed by the United Nations, 1
Amnesty International, 2 the International Red Cross 3 and countless other international
organizations specialized in human rights and international humanitarian law.

But this claim that Gaza is unoccupied has been very useful for Israel, as it plays into the
propaganda that Israel has sacrificed immensely for peace, a talking point unsubstantiated by
actual history. As noble as Israelis make it sound, there were less altruistic intentions behind the
withdrawal from Gaza, articulated by Dov Weisglas, top aide to Ariel Sharon who was Prime
Minister at the time: 4

“The significance of the disengagement plan is the freezing of the peace process, and when you
freeze that process, you prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, and you prevent a
discussion on the refugees, the borders and Jerusalem. Effectively, this whole package called the
Palestinian state, with all that it entails, has been removed indefinitely from our agenda. And all
this with authority and permission. All with a presidential blessing and the ratification of both
houses of Congress.”

He continued:

“The disengagement is actually formaldehyde, It supplies the amount of formaldehyde that is

necessary so there will not be a political process with the Palestinians.”

And he was right. For example, whenever the Palestinian Authority criticized Israel for its
intransigence or its new settlement and colonization projects in the West bank, Israel would retort
that they gave up Gaza and sacrificed immensely for peace. This was an effective way for Israel
to circumvent criticism of its violations of international law and shift the onus of compromise
onto Palestinians. In this context, “compromise” came to mean acquiescence to the brazen
colonization of the vast majority of the West Bank. Weisglas bragged that: 5
“That is exactly what happened, you know, the term `peace process’ is a bundle of concepts and
commitments. The peace process is the establishment of a Palestinian state with all the security
risks that entails. The peace process is the evacuation of settlements, it’s the return of refugees,
it’s the partition of Jerusalem. And all that has now been frozen…. What I effectively agreed to
with the Americans was that part of the settlements would not be dealt with at all, and the rest
will not be dealt with until the Palestinians turn into Finns. That is the significance of what we
did.”

Furthermore, Israel knew it was not really relinquishing control of the Gaza strip, but rather
reconfiguring how the occupation looked and functioned. They knew that the occupation, despite
being in a new form, would still elicit resistance from those inside the strip. Israel could then use
this resistance as proof that “relinquishing” land in return for peace with the Palestinians was an
impossible task, because Palestinians would continue to attack it no matter what. This has served
as a major argument for why Israel should not withdraw from any inch of the West Bank to this
very day.
By the end of the second Intifada and due to its militarized nature, nearly 5000 Palestinians and
1000 Israelis would be killed. It shifted the status quo in Palestine, and undid much of the work
accomplished by the Palestinian Authority in the years prior. This along with the death of
Palestinian Authority and PLO leader Yasser Arafat would trigger changes in the Palestinian
Authority and Palestinian leadership in general. The Palestinian Authority would be restructured
into an even more docile and obedient entity, Israeli colonization efforts would accelerate, and a
new phase in the Palestinian question would begin. [1]
https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/03/israels-55-year-occupation-palestinian-territory
-apartheid-un-human-rights [2]
https://www.amnesty.org/en/location/middle-east-and-north-africa/israel-and-occupied-palestinia
n-territories/report-israel-and-occupied-palestinian-territories/ [3]
https://www.icrc.org/en/document/fifty-years-occupation-where-do-we-go-here [4]
https://www.haaretz.com/2004-10-06/ty-article/top-pm-aide-gaza-plan-aims-to-freeze-the-peace-
process/0000017f-e56c-dea7-adff-f5ff1fc40000 [5]
https://www.haaretz.com/2004-10-06/ty-article/top-pm-aide-gaza-plan-aims-to-freeze-the-peace-
process/0000017f-e56c-dea7-adff-f5ff1fc40000

Part 1 - Palestine and Palestinians today:

By the end of the second Intifada, a general atmosphere of disillusion 1 and powerlessness came
to dominate Palestinian society. The Intifada had failed to procure the hoped-for gains, and the
Israeli control of increasing areas of Palestine had only tightened. Much of what the Palestinian
Authority had built lay in ruins, and with it, general support for the Oslo accords and the
two-state solution dwindled.
Parliamentary elections took place in 2006, resulting in a Hamas majority, beating Fateh, its rival
and traditional leader of the PLO and Palestinian Authority. In the wake of this victory,
Palestinians were subjected to enormous amounts of pressure from the international community
as well as Israel, as many claimed that Hamas was a “terrorist organization”. In an effort to
counter these pressures, Fateh and Hamas formed a unity government. Unfortunately, this
government would eventually crumble from external pressure, as well as internal struggles over
tactics, vision and ideology. This would culminate in Hamas taking military action in the Gaza
Strip, and seizing control of it from the Fateh-dominated government agencies and security
forces.
[1] https://www.pcpsr.org/sites/default/files/p13epdf.pdf

Part 2 - The Gaza Strip Today:

Even before the second Intifada, Israel had worked hard to cut off 1 the Gaza Strip from the rest
of Palestine. Travel between the West Bank and Gaza since the 1990s was always difficult, today
it is virtually impossible for the general public. This was further exacerbated by the military
siege 2 enacted by Israel following the Hamas take-over of the Strip in 2007. For the first time
since the establishment of the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank and Gaza Strip would now be
politically separated once again.

For all intents and purposes, the Gaza Strip has been turned into a ghetto, with Israel besieging it
from most sides. Egypt helps maintain this siege from its side. Gaza has undergone some brutal
assaults and wars on its population due to various Israeli pretexts, such as the 2008 3 and 20144
wars which killed thousands of Palestinians, including hundreds of children. This has made Gaza
a convenient testing ground for Israeli arms manufacturers, who tout their equipment as “battle
tested”. 5

The Gaza Strip is a small coastal enclave composed mostly of refugees ethnically cleansed from
their villages by Israel during the Nakba. As such, it does not have the capacity to support such a
large population, and according to multiple reports, including a United Nations one, it is teetering
towards being unlivable. 6 The water aquifers are gradually becoming poisoned, and its civilian
infrastructure is frequently destroyed by Israeli shelling and bombing.

Recently, the refugees of Gaza organized themselves into the Great March of Return7, which
saw tens of thousands peacefully protesting at the edges of the besieged strip with the goal of
ending the siege and for their right to return to their homes. This march was heavily demonized,
with Israeli claiming they were “riots” manufactured by Hamas, and its participants were
branded “terrorists” and mercilessly shot by Israeli snipers, despite them posing no threat to
them. A prominent example of this was the murder of the Palestinian medic, Razan Al-Najjar 8,
who was sniped while providing aid to the protestors. Israel even released doctored footage 9 in
an attempt to paint her as a threat, but it instantly backfired since it was apparent that it was
tampered with. Almost 200 Palestinians lost their lives, and thousands were wounded and
maimed for life.

The situation in the Gaza Strip continues to deteriorate, poverty, Covid-19 and other
circumstances have pushed it to the edge of implosion with no end in sight.
[1]
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2536651?casa_token=fsQoFTUQe70AAAAA%3AV30P8dc5IKg7x
KMFueq1lzedAp2hiedcieNZeHnxuqDcgwrpJ_2U6UFBouoZZ9Lf5UIzjI7OPB7N84L0mwoyET
i8BFtVl8qJOpjiKNDcGUbDRx2L2oCb [2]
http://arabpsynet.com/Archives/OP/OpJ20Thabet&AbuTawahina&ElSarraj&Panos.pdf [3]
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1525/jps.2009.38.4.91?casa_token=3woJcwzA6GMAA
AAA%3AY0ZEXgntExftPzW00Y4HqRl-RSmuxdB3jDeDZ58qLjzok0PpkbWXWuHusINhnZ5
mp24SAUAoAn62Svo_&journalCode=rpal20 [4]
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/282445774_The_2014_War_on_Gaza_Engineering_tra
uma_and_mass_torture_to_break_Palestinian_resilience [5]
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17547075.2018.1430992?casa_token=ar9NiZrfrR
YAAAAA%3ATKzH7xXrdoBRSuflArVtmW_oY4Hxhz9zVJIBTAO_4TeYNUZ-e7L-LREbNu
92XVj_OnDvKlGIkoKbEd-k&journalCode=rfdc20 [6]
https://www.unrwa.org/newsroom/press-releases/gaza-2020-liveable-place [7]
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7348434/ [8]
https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(18)31361-8.pdf [9]
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/gaza-protests-lat

The West Bank today:

Following the destruction of much of its assets, and the Hamas take-over of the Gaza Strip, the
Palestinian Authority found itself in the midst of a serious legitimacy crisis. Oslo lay in ruins,
and any attempt to resuscitate the process would remain unsuccessful. Meanwhile, the people
grew restless and skeptical of the Palestinian leadership and their role in society. So the
Palestinian Authority did what any other Arab regime would do in its place; crackdown on
dissent, and restructure and strengthen its security forces.

To this end, it would receive ample support, especially from the United States. US. General
Keith Dayton would oversee what was officially dubbed “the security sector reform”. 1 This
basically entailed training a new generation of Palestinian security and intelligence officers
fiercely loyal to the Authority’s leadership. This “reform” saw the ballooning of the security
sector and its budget. This would be accompanied by an unraveling of Yasser Arafat’s old
patronage networks, and establishing new ones with allegiance to the post-Arafat leadership.
The new tactic of the Palestinian Authority shifted towards state-building,2 in the hope that if
they could prove capable of building effective institutions, the world would deem them “worthy”
of a state. Slowly, but surely, things such as resistance and the right of return would be phased
out of the Palestinian leadership’s language, and the Palestinian revolution turned from a
liberation movement to a quest for autonomy. Not only that, but the security sector “reforms”
included a security coordination 3 program with Israel, meaning that the Palestinian Authority
would basically become a subcontractor to the occupation.
[1]
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/64699/1/The%20evolution%20and%20reform%20of%20Palestinian.pdf
[2]
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1525/jps.2011.XL.2.6?casa_token=9atgAMK0dUAAA
AAA%3A5vFo0ai3jq9UWVik9xPTxQz4NUBBAad6BnDQuY1itT8kqMeADEqmwm6k0yZcgo
Rq_y2RYgDAXwcBfifH&journalCode=rpal20 [3]
https://www.hrw.org/report/2012/02/05/forget-about-him-hes-not-here/israels-control-palestinian
-residency-west-bank-and

Despite all of this, the Palestinian Authority never had any real “authority” to begin with, and
this was by design. It is a purely administrative entity created to manage the “dirty work” of
education, health and other burdens the occupying power is usually responsible for, while having
absolutely no sovereignty or decision over any political aspect. This, of course, remains in the
hands of Israel. For example, the Palestinian Authority can’t even determine who a Palestinian
citizen is. The citizen registry for Palestinians is under the control of Israel.1 Meaning that if a
Palestinian marries a non-Palestinian, their spouse will never be able to gain Palestinian
citizenship as Israel’s demographic obsession would not allow for any preventable increase in the
Palestinian population. Even Abbas needs to coordinate with the Israeli military to be able to
visit other Palestinian cities, cities of a “country” he is supposedly president of.

The world, especially through its foreign aid, has effectively subsidized the Palestinian
occupation and relieved Israel of many of its responsibilities, while maintaining all of the
benefits.

Even though these changes to the Palestinian Authority have received praise from the IMF, and
other international organizations, many of which deemed them ready for statehood, this did not
sway Israel who was never truly interested in a real Palestinian state. This prompted the
Palestinian Authority to make symbolic gestures, such as stamping “State of Palestine” on its
paperwork instead of the traditional “Palestinian Authority '' insignia. This gesture, of course, fell
flat on its face when Israel threatened to not recognize these documents, which forced them to
backtrack from stamping any papers that needed Israeli approval. A symbolic move which was
supposed to signal independence ended up proving the exact opposite.
Meanwhile, not only would the occupation and colonization of the West Bank go on, but it
would become even more entrenched. Although both militarily occupied, the form of the
occupation in the West Bank differs3 to that in the Gaza Strip. Whereas the occupation in the
Gaza Strip is maintained at long range through siege as well as aerial and artillery bombardment,
in the West Bank this occupation experience revolves around the daily presence of an occupying
military and policing force. As a result, there are context specific effects to the occupation in one
region which are not as prominent in the other; for example, arrest of Palestinians is much more
common in the West Bank than in the Gaza Strip, but the destruction of homes due to war and
bombing is much more prevalent in the Gaza Strip. This is not to say that there are no deaths or
demolitions in the West Bank, but the contrast between the regions is significant.

All aspects of life in the West Bank today are run by Israel, either directly or indirectly through
the Palestinian Authority. This control extends from your basic rights, down to the most
mundane of things, such as your phone coverage. Settlements continue to expand, now holding
over 600,000 settlers with no indication of stopping. Increased areas are being annexed, and
support for annexing area C is gaining more and more traction inside Israel. The annexation of
the Jordan Valley, for example, has recently featured prominently4 in Israeli election campaigns.
[1]
https://www.hrw.org/report/2012/02/05/forget-about-him-hes-not-here/israels-control-palestinian
-residency-west-bank-and [2]
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-imf-westbankgaza-idUSN2540829720080425 [3]
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01436597.2020.1788932?journalCode=ctwq20 [4]
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/elections/2020-01-21/ty-article/.premium/gantz-calls-for-jo
rdan-valley-annexation-hopes-trump-releases-peace-plan-soon/0000017f-db46-df62-a9ff-dfd790
1e0000

Jerusalem today:
Although the Eastern part of Jerusalem is technically part of the West Bank, Israel has never
treated it as such since its capture in the 1967 war. Claiming that the “eternal capital” has finally
been reunited with its western counterpart, which Israel occupied in 1948. East Jerusalem was
officially annexed1 in 1980. This annexation, of course, was illegal and not recognized by the
world community barring a few exceptions, such as the United States2 under Donald Trump.

Although Israel claims that Jerusalem has been reunited, this is mostly in the realm of rhetoric
and propaganda. East Jerusalem is subject to a slew of measures, laws and procedures that
specifically target its majority Palestinian population. Palestinians are granted a special
“residence” permit that is often revoked with the flimsiest pretexts.3 For example, if you were to
study abroad or decide to move outside of Jerusalem, this could very easily get your residence
revoked, forcing you to live in the West Bank instead.
As with every other area of Palestine, East Jerusalem has been undergoing serious colonization
efforts, with the building of colonies and the transfer of settlers into it with the declared plan4 to
have Jerusalem with a 74% Jewish population. Towards this end, discriminatory lawfare5 is
waged against Palestinians to find justifications for their removal. Thousands of Palestinian
families have lost their right to live in Jerusalem over the decades, in what can only be described
as protracted and silent ethnic cleansing of the city. Accompanying this is the erasure of
traditional Palestinian names and toponomy, and replacing them with Israeli and Jewish names.

Massive discrimination in services, resource allocation and funding are the norm. Palestinian
neighborhoods are underserviced, poorer and dirtier. You can read about this in detail here
“Discrimination against Palestinian Citizens in the Budget of Jerusalem Municipality and
Government Planning: Objectives, Forms, Consequences.6

Jews living in Jerusalem , naturally, do not need to worry about any of this or the risk of losing
their homes.
[1] https://digitalcommons.wcl.american.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1280&context=auilr
[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/06/world/middleeast/trump-jerusalem-israel-capital.html
[3]
https://oldwebsite.palestine-studies.org/sites/default/files/jq-articles/50_The_Center_of_Life_1.p
df [4] https://unispal.un.org/pdfs/UNHAB_RTTODEV.pdf [5]
https://academic.oup.com/ijrl/article-abstract/24/2/202/1538062?login=false [6]
https://mas.ps/files/server/20201806143340-1.pdf

Palestinians inside the green line:

A cornerstone of Israeli propaganda efforts is the claim that all Israeli citizens are equal, this
claim aims to obfuscate the fact that Israel distinguishes between citizenship and nationality.

What does this mean?

You can be a citizen of Israel but be a Druze national, or a Jewish national. Your nationality is
determined by your ethnicity and it cannot be changed or challenged. Many of the rights you are
accorded in Israel stem from your nationality not your citizenship. Meaning an “Arab” Israeli
citizen and a Jewish Israeli citizen, while both citizens, enjoy different rights and privileges
determined by their “nationality”. Seeing how Israel is an ethnocracy, it is not a mystery who this
system privileges and who it discriminates against.

This is not merely discrimination in practice, but discrimination by law. Adalah have composed a
database 1 of discriminatory laws in Israel that disfavor non-Jewish Israelis. For example, the
Law of Return and Absentees’ Property Law are but two examples of flagrant racism and
discrimination in the Israeli legal system.
This is not some old, odd oversight, but a very deliberate part of the design of Israeli society.
This is periodically reinforced whenever some Israelis petition the Supreme Court to recognize
an Israeli nationality that does not discriminate based on ethnicity. A recent example of these
petitions was in 2013, where the Supreme Court rejected such an idea on the grounds that it
would “undermine Israel’s Jewishness“.2

It says quite a lot about Israel that a unifying egalitarian identity not based around ethnicity
would “pose a danger to Israel’s founding principle: to be a Jewish state for the Jewish people”
as the court ruled. The fact that such discrimination is seen as a cornerstone of Israeli society
only reinforces its colonial ethnocratic nature, and undermines any claims to equality among
citizens.

But this kind of discrimination is only the tip of the iceberg, as it only covers some aspects of de
jure inequality among Israelis. Inspecting the de facto discrimination against non-Jewish Israelis
shines an even brighter light on Israel’s ethnocratic hierarchy.

Almost half of all Palestinian citizens of Israel live under the poverty line, with a considerable
percentage close to the poverty line. They also have a considerably lower life expectancy, a
higher infant mortality rate, less access to education and resources as well as less municipality
and government funding. Should you be interested in delving into some of the more detailed
aspects of this discrimination, you can read Adalah’s The Inequality Report.3 It is an excellent
overview of many issues.

Furthermore, most land inside the green line is off limits to Palestinian citizens of Israel. A large
percentage of land in Israel is under the control of the Jewish National Fund (JNF), which has:

“..a specific mandate to develop land for and lease land only to Jews. Thus the 13 percent of land
in Israel owned by the JNF is by definition off-limits to Palestinian Arab citizens, and when the
ILA tenders leases for land owned by the JNF, it does so only to Jews—either Israeli citizens or
Jews from the Diaspora. This arrangement makes the state directly complicit in overt
discrimination against Arab citizens in land allocation and use..”.
The JNF is not the only entity blocking Palestinian citizens of Israel from purchasing, leasing or
renting land and property, but also the so-called regional and local councils, which account for
the vast majority of land. These councils have the authority to block anyone from settling in
these areas that do not seem like a “good fit”, for example a religious community would not want
to allow secular residents from moving in on the grounds that it would be against the spirit of
their communities. In practice, this has translated into a virtual ban on non-Jewish Israelis
moving into Jewish areas. In a Statement submitted by Habitat International Coalition and
Adalah to the United Nations, it was estimated that almost 80% of the entire country is off limits
to lease for Palestinian citizens of Israel. You can click
here[5](https://www.adalah.org/uploads/oldfiles/eng/intl06/un-i6-jnf.pdf) to read their full
statement. No matter how you look at it, Israeli society is a heavily segregated and hierarchical
one. Whether through the legal system or just the attitudes of average Jewish Israelis, the
ethnocratic nature of Israel and its obsession with ethnic gerrymandering always rises to the
surface. Some would deny it, citing standards of living or some random “Arab” judge as a
refutation of this point, but as discussed in [This] article, none of these challenge the extreme
inequality -by design- of Israeli society. This denial is not unique to Israelis, we saw similar
sentiments among white Americans who denied the existence of white supremacy, even though
they reaped its benefits either directly or indirectly. [1] https://www.adalah.org/en/law/index [2]
https://www.timesofisrael.com/supreme-court-rejects-israeli-nationality-status/ [3]
https://www.adalah.org/uploads/oldfiles/upfiles/2011/Adalah_The_Inequality_Report_March_20
11.pdf [4] https://www.hrw.org/reports/2008/iopt0308/4.htm#_Toc193705071 [5]
https://www.adalah.org/uploads/oldfiles/eng/intl06/un-i6-jnf.pdf

Palestinians in the diaspora:

Today, the Palestinians expelled during the Nakba and the Naksa and their descendants form the
majority of the Palestinian people worldwide. Situated mostly in refugee camps in Jordan,
Lebanon, Syria and Palestine, they continue to be denied the right of return despite many still
holding the original deeds and keys to their houses, now expropriated by the Israeli state. They
live under harsh conditions and yearn for the day they are able to return.

Not only does Israel deny their right to return, but it has also been waging a war on the very
concept of the Palestinian refugee, arguing for the redefinition of the term to exclude
descendants. This would run counter to every refugee population in the world, which has its
descendants recognized as refugees in the cases of protracted conflicts, such as in the occupied
Western Sahara.

Are Palestinian refugees unique?

The return of Palestinian refugees is the core of the Palestinian question, and their expulsion
formed the basis for the establishment of Israel. Therefore, any proposed solution that neglects
this, as the Oslo framework did, is doomed to failure. These approaches are preoccupied with
finding solutions to symptoms, rather than dare address the root cause, which is Zionist settler
colonialism and the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. This can be clearly seen when taking the
1967 borders as their starting point, although today not even that is good enough for Israel,
which seeks to annex increasing territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Palestinians are
then pressured to relinquish any rights or hopes for their millions of refugees, or their rights to
live in over 80% of the land they were ethnically cleansed from.

The democratic, progressive Israel we hear so much about in the mainstream media has never
once existed. From its inception, it functioned as an ethnocracy with the intent of taking over as
much land as possible with as few Palestinians as possible. Although a new tactic of Zionists is
to try and claim that Zionism was a liberation movement with the aim of decolonization, this is
belied by the actions, and the very detailed writings left behind by movement founders.