A political cartoon depicting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sums up how peace talks have gone in the past.

Dave Granlund/PoliticalCartoons.com

Is Middle East Peace Possible?

November 20, 2017

Jim McMahon

The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, which began in the aftermath of Israel’s founding in 1948, has now lasted for nearly seven decades. Most people agree that the two sides need to find a way to peacefully coexist as neighbors, but their leaders remain far apart on many issues, including security for Israel, the borders of an eventual Palestinian state, and the status of Jerusalem, which both Israelis and Palestinians claim as their capital (see map).

For decades, the U.S. has tried unsuccessfully to help forge a lasting peace deal. In September, President Trump said that the time is right for
a final agreement.

Two Middle East experts face off about whether peace is achievable.

As President Bill Clinton’s chief negotiator for Arab-lsraeli peace from 1993 to 2001, I spent literally thousands of hours

negotiating with the Israelis and the Palestinians. The conflict between them cannot be resolved until they find a way to divide up the land they both claim into two nation-states: Israel and Palestine.

In 1993, Israelis and Palestinians formally recognized each other’s existence for the first time as part of the Oslo peace accords. In the following years, I helped negotiate several interim agreements between the Israelis and Palestinians. While none of these agreements succeeded in producing an independent Palestine or settling the conflict, they did produce tangible results that many would have considered unachievable even a few years earlier.

Because it’s been almost 25 years since the beginning of the peace process and there’s still no peace, many believe peace can’t be achieved. But I ask two simple questions: Are Israelis going anyplace? Are Palestinians going anyplace? The answer is no. So long as these two distinct national peoples live next to each other, they will have to find a way to peacefully coexist.

Restoring a sense of belief is essential for peacemaking—and it can be done.

There are solutions for where to draw the border, how to ensure Israeli security, and how to reconcile both sides’ needs on the issues of refugees and control of Jerusalem. I know this is true from long talks with both sides. The biggest obstacle is that both sides have lost faith in each other. Palestinians are convinced Israelis will never accept an independent Palestinian state. Israelis believe Palestinians will never accept Israel as a Jewish state.

Restoring a sense of belief is essential for peacemaking—and it can be done. If Israelis would substantially limit their construction of housing for Jewish settlers on land the Palestinians see as part of their eventual state—and say they were doing so because they support two states for two peoples—it would make a difference to Palestinians. If Palestinians acknowledged that the Jewish people also have a right to their own state, the Israeli public would see the Palestinians in a new light. And these shifts would make peace achievable.

—DENNIS ROSS

Washington Institute for Near East Policy

In the Middle East, peace negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians have dragged on for decades. But actual peace has remained elusive, and the prospects for any kind of meaningful deal at this time look pretty bleak.

The Trump administration has made a final peace treaty between Israel and the Palestinians a high priority. President Trump has placed his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who is one of his closest advisers, in charge of pursuing a peace deal—a choice that reflects the importance he seems to attach to the issue. And it may be possible to relaunch talks with the help of some key Arab countries. But as a former State Department Middle East peace negotiator, I know that the challenges lie not in Washington but with the Israelis and Palestinians and in the region at large.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presides over a very tough-minded government that’s not inclined to compromise with Palestinians. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is unpopular and he doesn’t even control all Palestinian territory: Abbas’s party governs the West Bank, but Hamas, which the U.S. and Israel consider a terrorist group, is the dominant force in Gaza. And Abbas and Netanyahu remain far apart in their positions on key issues. A skillful mediator might bridge gaps, but not when they’re as wide as the Grand Canyon.

The prospects for any kind of meaningful deal at this time look pretty bleak.

Meanwhile, ongoing violence, terror, and the fundamental fact that both Jews and Muslims claim the same holy spaces continue to complicate the environment for negotiations.

The bottom line is painfully clear. No one in Washington, no matter how skilled a negotiator, can provide the necessary urgency and courage to hammer out a lasting peace deal. Only the Israelis and Palestinians themselves can do that. Tackling the conflict’s big issues—setting the borders of a Palestinian state and figuring out how to handle refugees, security, and control of Jerusalem—requires visionary leaders who are willing to take great risks. And that sort of leadership is sorely lacking on both sides at the moment.

—AARON DAVID MILLER