Recent announcements by government such as France, UK, Canada and Australia that they will recognise Palestinian statehood as a step towards peace between Israel and its Arab neighbours certainly reflect growing global disgust with the Israeli government's genocidal behaviour towards Palestinians in Gaza and the Occupied West Bank territories.  However, they may achieve little in practical terms and, from a left/progressive political perspective are or should be open to criticism.  

In pressing for this latest step towards achieving what has been a bi-partisan position for a two-state solution Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong suggested that it was needed now before the processes of war, displacement of Palestinians, and Israeli settlements reached a point where there was no Palestine left to recognise.  The on-ground reality is that we may have already passed that point.  We need an end now to the murder of Palestinians in Gaza - let's not whitewash this crime by calling it 'war' - tens of thousands of children cannot be called 'combatants'.  We also need an end to military occupation with all its inhumane, some blatantly criminal, activity that will leave most of the two million population displaced from their homes and with their land in total desolation. Destroyed are most of the housing and almost all civilian infrastructure: hospitals, schools, universities, water, power, sewerage, roads, land for growing food. and more.    Rebuilding will take decades and cost billions. Healing the trauma will likely take much longer.

While this has been going on the Israeli government has given the green light to the expansion of internationally illegal settlements. It has resulted in increased control and harassment, including un-prosecuted murders of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.   The intention is clear.  The goal is to displace or permanently subjugate the non-Jewish population across what many inside and outside the government are calling the traditional lands of Greater Israel, encompassing not just the West Bank but parts of Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.   This Zionist-ideology-inspired terrorism is akin to, indeed an almost uninterrupted extension of the forced displacement from their homeland that began with three quarters of a million Palestinian refugees fleeing their homes in 1948.  This terrorism made possible the colonisation of Palestine by mainly European Ashkenazi Jews that laid the foundation for the state of Israel as a 'Jewish homeland'. 

Beyond this inter-cultural terrorism, we can trace a pattern of official Israeli behaviour that has frustrated every step that showed promise for peace and movement towards a two-state solution since the hopes for this were raised with the Oslo accords in 1993.  Looking deeper, we can see major structural impediments in the path towards a Palestinian state.  The Oslo accords envisioned borders based on outcomes of the 1967 war.  Negotiations between the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority for a Palestinian state were expected to start from the de jure position that Israel was illegally occupying the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. Negotiations for setting formal Palestinian state boundaries might have needed territorial concessions by both sides - Palestinians conceding territory occupied by some pre-existing Israeli settlements with viable Israeli land in exchange to accommodate returning Palestinian refugees and establish connections between separated Palestinian territory.   However, following Oslo, the occupied west bank was divided into three zones. Zone A, mainly the larger West Bank cities, notionally at least under Palestinian Authority control.  Zone B 'shared' control - though effectively dominated by Israeli forces. Zone C, by far the largest, under exclusive Israeli Control.     At the time of Oslo, settlement building was paused. Since then, it has been continuous and recently expanded.   This  has not only displaced Palestinians from their land.  Settlers backed by the government and military have prevented local Palestinian farmers and herders from use of their land. They have installed checkpoints restricting access to roads for travel, established ethnically separate services for health and access to utilities.  What it left for Palestinians is little better and, in some ways, worse than the supposedly 'independent' Black-African managed Bantustans promoted by apartheid South Africa before this globally condemned regime was dismantled in 1994.

Previously[1] I have argued that the path to peace 'From River to Sea' is a choice - largely one for Israel - between a two-state solution or a single apartheid state that would eventually result in the end of the state of Israel as a predominantly Jewish 'homeland'.   Today I would argue that events on the ground, declared policies of the Israeli government and the apparent degree of support for these within Israel Jewish community and many in the Jewish diaspora in other countries suggest the choice has been made.  There is little prospect for a viable, two state solution - unless it is the generous intention that Israeli-built settlements are merely being temporarily occupied by Israeli settlers pending their being handed over as homes for returning Palestinian refugees.   Or, equally unlikely, that Israeli Jewish settlers will willingly become citizens or at least legal residents of the Palestinian state, subject to its laws and customs.

There is another alternative - equally challenging to contemplate - but one that accords with what are broadly recognised as civilised internationally agreed democratic human rights principles.  Little short of 'regime change' this would involve creation of a unified, secular, truly democratic state - call it Palestine, Israel or Palestine-Israel or whatever.  One where all citizens and legal residents have equal rights, are bound by the rule of common laws, treated with dignity and respect regardless of their cultural origin, where there is a commitment to equality of opportunity and an economy aiming for inclusive wellbeing for all.  A dream?   Perhaps but I'm old enough to remember the dreams of Jewish and other young friends who went to Israel in the early years after its foundation, committed to making elements of this dream a reality while living and working in the emerging kibbutzim communities.   Time for a return to the principles, hopes and dreams many of us had for Israel then and some still hold for it now.  

Tony Webb

August 2025

[1] Previous articles include: Peace from River to Sea: a choice of two paths, Australian Fabians 2024 https://www.fabians.org.au/peace_from_river_to_sea ; and Which Side Are You On? New Community Vol 24 (2) Issue 90 2025.   Also in Search Foundation, Members Discussion Bulletin 2025 pp 14-22