Before the results of the latest Israeli Knesset elections were announced, pundits were projecting an ascendant right, and with it the death of the two-state solution. These assessments have since been altered after Israel’s right-wing bloc did not win the anticipated seats, with new proclamations that the election results instead spelled an unexpected victory for “centrists.” Both assessments are fundamentally wrong, not least because any reasonable prospect of a two-state solution has long since vanished, and further the difference between the so-called “right” and “left” wings of Israeli politics have produced negligible differences as far as the Palestinian issue is concerned.
If we were to start at the 1949 armistice line (the notorious “’67 borders”), then it would be safe to say that for the past four decades, not one Israeli government has acknowledged its role as an occupying force reigning over the now 4 million Palestinians residing in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. These successive governments have also not differed in any meaningful way when it comes to defining their responsibility under international law as an occupier. This is most evident when it comes to Israel’s settlement policy. These cookie-cutter planned communities — which resemble suburban Los Angeles or southern Florida more than any place in the Middle East — have continued to pop up like mushrooms on West Bank hilltops under the watchful eye of Likud- and Labor-led governments alike.
