Moving away from partition: the federal road to peace

Abstract

In 1991 Daniel J. Elazar published the book Two Peoples… One Land, calling for a federal solution to the Israeli‒Palestinian conflict. The idea seems to have been discredited by the Oslo process, which raised hopes that the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea would finally be divided between two independent nation states. With these hopes largely dashed, this article seeks to re-examine Elazar’s federal idea: the establishment of a single political entity divided into two provinces or states to incorporate both Jewish and Palestinian nations. While the federal solution could potentially face many obstacles, it would enable Israelis and Palestinians to place less emphasis on the drawing of borders and would avoid the traumatic and potentially violent ordeal of evicting entire populations from their homes. Moreover, federal solutions would allow both peoples to conduct their social, religious and cultural life autonomously while sharing political power at the federal level. Most importantly, working towards a federal solution would require both peoples to abandon ideas of separation and recognize our shared fate – living together in a single geographic unit.