The war in Gaza will end sooner or later. And then the talks will begin on the Palestinian issue and how to find a fair and sustainable solution, which will put an end to the perpetual Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We are trying to explore this solution and how it can be implemented. The administration of Joe Biden, from the beginning, had prioritized the negotiations for the final status between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA), although as it appeared, they did not there were many chances of success. They also believed, wrongly, that the conflict was being successfully "managed" by Israel. Today, however, and with the Gaza war in mind and how to achieve a sustainable peace, senior government officials, including the US president, are now reiterating the necessity of a two-state solution as the only way to ensure security for Israel. and freedom for the Palestinians.
USA. Change of Course in Palestinian.
So, according to his article War on the rocks (American strategy, defense and foreign affairs analysis and discussion website-platform), what the United States can and should do is “pursue a path forward that will politically empower the Palestinians and secure Israel's legitimate security interests». They will have to reject options that either return to the unsustainable pre-war status quo, or seek to bind the US to some dangerous anti-Palestinian agendas, cultivated by extremists in Israel. Instead, the US should aim to maximize the political legitimacy of the Palestinian Authority. This requires the Biden administration to go further than recognizing a Palestinian state. The looming, and for many certain, military defeat of Hamas should bring lasting benefits to both the Israeli and Palestinian people, only if it is replaced by a government with domestic credibility and high popularity among both peoples. This, in turn, requires a real political horizon for the Palestinians, free of extreme perceptions and ideologies, such as that of Hamas, with its extreme Islamist ideology of Jihad (holy war). And it is considered certain that in the future for the resolution of the Palestinian issue, there is no place for Hamas, since there probably will be no Hamas.
In formulating its plan for Gaza, the United States should decisively move away from conflict management and ultimately work toward a final and just conflict resolution. After nearly 20 years of failed policies, conditions in both the West Bank and Gaza have worsened, and Israel is finally no safer, as it was believed to be with the policies implemented so far by both Israel and the US. The decades-long delay in the eventual establishment of a Palestinian state has only strengthened violent actors and extreme Islamist radical organizations such as Hamas. Washington, if it truly wants to, can and should help break this perpetual cycle of bloodshed by strengthening the P.A. and recognizing a Palestinian state, with acceptable leadership, that will come from legitimate elections, since elections in Palestine have been held for 17 years. And the existing Palestinian leadership has lost, if not its legitimacy, at least its credibility and acceptance by the Palestinian people.
The Two State Solution.
The magazine Newsweek, in an article titled Exclusive: Biden's Plan for Gaza Wins Palestinian Backing, emphasizes that the P.A. accepts and is ready to regain full control of the Gaza Strip once the war between Israel and Hamas ends and is willing to hold the first national elections since 2006 as part of a broader long-term peace deal, a Palestinian official told the magazine. P.A. would accept the Biden administration's proposal to reunify Gaza and the West Bank under its control if the international community supports the full reconstruction of Gaza and pushes Israel to agree to a two-state solution, said Ahmad Majdalani, a senior of the PLO Executive Committee, in an interview at a government office in Ramallah in the West Bank. "We are ready for a political reform agenda with free, democratic general elections", he said. However, "the P.A. she will not come to the negotiating table if Israel does not let her decide the future of Gaza. We are not returning with an Israeli tank, but with a political solution». The comments represent the first substantive response by the PA leadership to the White House's vision for a new post-conflict Gaza, which US Vice President Kamala Harris detailed in a recent speech. But the position articulated by Majdalani also raises significant points of potential disagreement between the Palestinian Authority and Israel, an indication of obstacles to the United States' effort to begin forging a political solution to the conflict.
On the Israeli side, an Israeli official spoke on condition of anonymity to Newsweek magazine saying:We assume that there will still be hotbeds of terrorism in Gaza after the end of the current phase of the war, which will require a continued Israeli security presence on the ground. Israel should maintain some level of operational freedom in Gaza", the official said, adding that Israel is not interested in a reoccupation of the Gaza Strip. But P.A. has made it clear that it would be opposed to any such form of interim arrangement and that it is opposed to and will not support an international peacekeeping force after the war. "P.A. can handle security in Gaza if it receives logistical support from Egypt and JordanMajdalani said, without elaborating.
Estimates – Perspectives. The new leaders
As for the leaders from both peoples, we believe that the current Israeli and Palestinian leaderships will have no place in the peace talks and will be removed with the end of the war. Prime Minister Netanyahu will not be Prime Minister, since the Israeli opposition is ready to file a motion of impeachment against him, holding him responsible for the October 7 Hamas invasion (the Israeli 11/1973) and it is assumed that he will either be voted out, or will prefer the resignation. So it was in 1973, with Golda Meyer, who resigned immediately after the war, although she ultimately won, believing that she was responsible for the surprise that Israel suffered in the Yom Kippur War of 181. Who will be the new leader of Israel, it's still early days, but many names are already coming to the fore, such as opposition leader Ted Lapid and especially and perhaps the favorite (for me), former Chief of the General Staff and chairman of the Blue and White party, General Benny Ganz, a excellent leader and ethical politician. The same on the Palestinian side, where the old, "incompetent and corrupt PA president", Mahmoud Abbas, as many Palestinian leaders accuse him. He should hand over power to an interim government that will lead the Palestinians to honest and fair elections for the difficult talks with new leadership that will unite all the Palestinian people, in the West Bank and Gaza. Leaders such as Mohammed Dahlan, who lives in exile in the Emirates, will play a role in developments after the war. Another Palestinian leader and perhaps the favorite is the imprisoned in Israel for almost two decades, Marwan Barghouti, founder of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. We will talk about the Palestinian leadership later, in more detail. Thus we estimate that the new leaders from both sides, sensitive, democratic, conciliatory and with a vision for the future and the sincere relations of the two peoples, should lead this historic effort and achieve the terribly difficult, unimaginable for the more achievement of the acceptance of the two states, Israeli and Palestinian that will coexist peacefully side by side, in accordance with the 1947 decision of the UN, of XNUMX. Is it easy? Of course not. It is terribly difficult to achieve and implement, it must be done, otherwise the cycle of hatred, violence, blood will continue. Wishing that the war in Gaza will end as soon as possible and both sides will sit at the table for talks and resolve the longest issue and problem in the Middle East.
*Ioannis Ath. Baltzois is a lieutenant general. formerly AKAM Tel Aviv, with M.Sc. in Geopolitics from EKPA, president of ELISME
photo deeznutz1 / https://pixabay.com
