Proponents of the two-state solution have for years faced a grim outlook. Every new Jewish settlement that pops up on the lands slated for a Palestinian state has added to the despair and disillusionment with any peace process.

After 46 years of military occupation and colonial policies highlighted by an aggressive attempt to build exclusive Jewish settlements in Palestinian areas, it is no surprise that many are losing faith in a peace based on the two-state solution. The latest intellectual to join the ranks of the disenchanted is American political scientist Ian Steven Lustick.

In a powerful essay in the New York Times Sunday Magazine, Lustick, a University of Pennsylvania professor, lays out the problems that the continuation of defending and promoting the two-state solution has created. Using examples from Ireland, the Soviet Union and other places, Lustick simply argues that the two-state solution currently makes no sense and that clinging to it is an illusion. He criticizes the US diplomatic machinery, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Israel — as well as pundits, journalists and nongovernmental organizations — all of which have built careers on defending the indefensible.

Lustick asserts that the quicker all these parties stop talking about the two-state solution, the faster other options can develop. He gives Israeli Zionists a special warning, presenting examples of great empires and countries that have collapsed with little warning, citing the French in Algeria, the Soviet Union and Spain. Perhaps the most powerful and difficult possibility to fathom is the unexpected alliances that could come about if the area between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River were to become one democratic state: