This week several important developments took place in Israel and the West Bank, with the crutches holding up the limping peace process falling from the hands of the two people supposedly leaning on them. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas lost control of their management of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Netanyahu and his government spokespeople could no longer recycle the claim that the obstacle to peace is Abbas’ refusal to recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people. On the other hand, at the beginning of the 25th year of the Oslo Accord, Abbas can no longer claim to the Palestinian public that his investment in the diplomatic option is yielding dividends. An Israeli source who requested anonymity told Al-Monitor this week that if the right-wing government remains in power, Abbas will very soon ask the United Nations to recognize Palestine as a state under foreign occupation.

On Dec. 31, the Likud Central Committee, the most powerful body of the ruling party, passed unanimously a resolution urging the faction’s leaders to annex parts of the West Bank. By adopting such a resolution, the committee actually demanded to erase the dozens of UN resolutions against the occupation, to rip apart former US President George W. Bush's “road map for Middle East peace" and to tuck away Netanyahu’s 2009 Bar-Ilan speech that recognized the two-state solution. A large majority of Likud ministers and members of the Knesset raised their hands to support the decision that commits elected representatives of the party to work to apply Israeli law in the West Bank and freely allow construction in the “liberated centers of settlement in Judea and Samaria.” Thus, they ripped off the masks from the faces of Netanyahu and Abbas. 

The decision of the Likud Central Committee plays into the hands of the Palestinian refusal camp regarding the lack of hope in the diplomatic option. The speeches of the Likud ministers at the gathering, like the declaration of Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan that “the Likud will apply sovereignty to Judea and Samaria,” strengthen the argument that Netanyahu’s and Abbas’ words about the two-state solution are nonsense. How should the Palestinians understand the declaration of Minister of Tourism Yariv Levin that “all of the Land of Israel is ours and we will apply our sovereignty over all parts of the land”? What would have happened in an opposite case, if the Palestinian science minister were to announce publicly that the two-state option is dead, and that this land belongs to the Palestinians always and forever? How many TV interviews would Science Minister Ofir Akunis offer in order to attack the Palestinian Authority (PA) over such a statement?

The Foreign Ministry’s signature on the death certificate of the two-state solution was penned by Deputy Minister Tzipi Hotovely. “After years of struggle against the division of the land and the idea of the state of Palestine,” said Netanyahu’s deputy, “the time has come to say positively that Judea and Samaria are an indivisible part of Israeli sovereignty.” The prime minister preferred to be absent from the center’s meeting, but his deafening silence at the words of his ministers and deputy pierced the walls of the Muqata, the Palestinian headquarters in Ramallah. His tacit agreement let out the remaining air from the wheels of the diplomatic process, following US President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israeli's capital. The dying “two-state solution” officially and publicly turned into a shriveled fig leaf. It can no longer hide the settlement enterprise flourishing under the outdated slogan.