[Marxism] The One-State Solution By MUAMMAR QADDAFI, January 22, 2009

[Bonnie Weinstein <giobon@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

The One-State Solution
By MUAMMAR QADDAFI
January 22, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/opinion/22qaddafi.html?hp

Tripoli, Libya

THE shocking level of the last wave of Israeli-Palestinian violence,  
which ended with this weekend’s cease-fire, reminds us why a final  
resolution to the so-called Middle East crisis is so important. It is  
vital not just to break this cycle of destruction and injustice, but  
also to deny the religious extremists in the region who feed on the  
conflict an excuse to advance their own causes.

But everywhere one looks, among the speeches and the desperate  
diplomacy, there is no real way forward. A just and lasting peace  
between Israel and the Palestinians is possible, but it lies in the  
history of the people of this conflicted land, and not in the tired  
rhetoric of partition and two-state solutions.

Although it’s hard to realize after the horrors we’ve just witnessed,  
the state of war between the Jews and Palestinians has not always  
existed. In fact, many of the divisions between Jews and Palestinians  
are recent ones. The very name “Palestine” was commonly used to  
describe the whole area, even by the Jews who lived there, until  
1948, when the name “Israel” came into use.

Jews and Muslims are cousins descended from Abraham. Throughout the  
centuries both faced cruel persecution and often found refuge with  
one another. Arabs sheltered Jews and protected them after  
maltreatment at the hands of the Romans and their expulsion from  
Spain in the Middle Ages.

The history of Israel/Palestine is not remarkable by regional  
standards — a country inhabited by different peoples, with rule  
passing among many tribes, nations and ethnic groups; a country that  
has withstood many wars and waves of peoples from all directions.  
This is why it gets so complicated when members of either party  
claims the right to assert that it is their land.

The basis for the modern State of Israel is the persecution of the  
Jewish people, which is undeniable. The Jews have been held captive,  
massacred, disadvantaged in every possible fashion by the Egyptians,  
the Romans, the English, the Russians, the Babylonians, the  
Canaanites and, most recently, the Germans under Hitler. The Jewish  
people want and deserve their homeland.

But the Palestinians too have a history of persecution, and they view  
the coastal towns of Haifa, Acre, Jaffa and others as the land of  
their forefathers, passed from generation to generation, until only a  
short time ago.

Thus the Palestinians believe that what is now called Israel forms  
part of their nation, even were they to secure the West Bank and  
Gaza. And the Jews believe that the West Bank is Samaria and Judea,  
part of their homeland, even if a Palestinian state were established  
there. Now, as Gaza still smolders, calls for a two-state solution or  
partition persist. But neither will work.

A two-state solution will create an unacceptable security threat to  
Israel. An armed Arab state, presumably in the West Bank, would give  
Israel less than 10 miles of strategic depth at its narrowest point.  
Further, a Palestinian state in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip  
would do little to resolve the problem of refugees. Any situation  
that keeps the majority of Palestinians in refugee camps and does not  
offer a solution within the historical borders of Israel/Palestine is  
not a solution at all.

For the same reasons, the older idea of partition of the West Bank  
into Jewish and Arab areas, with buffer zones between them, won’t  
work. The Palestinian-held areas could not accommodate all of the  
refugees, and buffer zones symbolize exclusion and breed tension.  
Israelis and Palestinians have also become increasingly intertwined,  
economically and politically.

In absolute terms, the two movements must remain in perpetual war or  
a compromise must be reached. The compromise is one state for all, an  
“Isratine” that would allow the people in each party to feel that  
they live in all of the disputed land and they are not deprived of  
any one part of it.

A key prerequisite for peace is the right of return for Palestinian  
refugees to the homes their families left behind in 1948. It is an  
injustice that Jews who were not originally inhabitants of Palestine,  
nor were their ancestors, can move in from abroad while Palestinians  
who were displaced only a relatively short time ago should not be so  
permitted.

It is a fact that Palestinians inhabited the land and owned farms and  
homes there until recently, fleeing in fear of violence at the hands  
of Jews after 1948 — violence that did not occur, but rumors of which  
led to a mass exodus. It is important to note that the Jews did not  
forcibly expel Palestinians. They were never “un-welcomed.” Yet only  
the full territories of Isratine can accommodate all the refugees and  
bring about the justice that is key to peace.

Assimilation is already a fact of life in Israel. There are more than  
one million Muslim Arabs in Israel; they possess Israeli nationality  
and take part in political life with the Jews, forming political  
parties. On the other side, there are Israeli settlements in the West  
Bank. Israeli factories depend on Palestinian labor, and goods and  
services are exchanged. This successful assimilation can be a model  
for Isratine.

If the present interdependence and the historical fact of Jewish- 
Palestinian coexistence guide their leaders, and if they can see  
beyond the horizon of the recent violence and thirst for revenge  
toward a long-term solution, then these two peoples will come to  
realize, I hope sooner rather than later, that living under one roof  
is the only option for a lasting peace.

Muammar Qaddafi is the leader of Libya.
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