Gaza, Trump, and the Arab initiative

A peace initiative to solve the Arab-Israeli conflict, based on facts and not on myths, is needed. The 2-state solution is dead: It was killed by the Palestinians when they rejected President Bill Clinton’s proposal, in year 2000, for a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza (and a divided Jerusalem), in return for an end to the conflict. The Israelis accepted Clinton’s proposal.

All the “peace” initiatives of the Arab world – since year 2,002 till the present 23-point plan presented by the Arab League in reaction to President Trump’s proposal – are a repeat of the Palestinian rejectionism and irredentism. They constitute a 2-stage approach, with an ephemeral Palestinian State as a first stage, and the elimination of the State of Israel as a second stage, the latter through the implementation of the “right of return” of millions of Palestinians to Israel proper, within its pre-June 1967 borders.

All the Arab “peace” initiatives ignore that an effective population exchange took place: About 3,500,000 Jews living today in Israel are Jewish refugees from the Arab countries or descendants of these refugees.

As in all other large conflicts in the world since World War I – that resulted in exchange of populations and millions of refugees – claims of “right of return” and/or indemnization should be dismissed, and the focus should be in a humanitarian resettlement of these refugees and their descendants in their present countries of residence.

At its core, this is not a local conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, but a regional conflict between the Arabs and the Jews. I urge you, therefore, to support instead the resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict based on the 242 United Nations Security Council Resolution from November 1967. Essentially, the aim should be a demilitarized West Bank as part of Jordan, a demilitarized Gaza as part of Egypt (as they were before June 1967), and an official end to the conflict between the Arab world and the Jewish State.

For details see my book “The root of the Arab-Israeli conflict and the path to peace” (November 2024 edition). The book can be downloaded for free at:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/364057784_The_root_of_the_Arab-Israeli_conflict_and_the_path_to_peace