For your perusal, my latest INTO THE FRAY column:
An appeal to Alan Dershowitz: Renounce two-statism!
(Kindly consider “liking”, sharing, tweeting – please use hash-tag #IntoFray)
The jury is no longer out on the two-state paradigm. Given the accumulating evidence, unequivocally demonstrating its folly and futility, Dershowitz must accept the unavoidable verdict of its failure
It appears this week on the following sites (in alphabetical order):
ALGEMEINER:
ISRAELI FRONTLINE: http://www.israelifrontline.com/2018/01/fray-appeal-alan-dershowitz-renounce-two-statism.html
ISRAEL NATIONAL NEWS: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/21579
ISRAEL RISING : (To be posted)
ISRAPUNDIT: https://www.israpundit.org/into-the-fray-an-appeal-to-alan-dershowitz-renounce-two-statism/
JERUSALEM HERALD : https://www.jerusalem-herald.com/single-post/2018/01/19/INTO-THE-FRAY-An-Appeal-to-Alan-Dershowitz—Renounce-Two-Statism
JEWS DOWN UNDER: https://jewsdownunder.com/2018/01/19/fray-appeal-alan-dershowitz-renounce-two-statism/
MEDIUM: https://medium.com/@martinsherman/into-the-fray-an-appeal-to-alan-dershowitz-renounce-two-statism-9e2e471bc1d0
JEWISH PRESS: http://www.jewishpress.com/indepth/columns/into-the-fray-martin-sherman/into-the-fray-an-appeal-to-alan-dershowitz-renounce-two-statism/2018/01/21/
Several short excerpts:
The idea of a two-state solution should be dead today, because unfortunatel,y a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria would bring about Israel’s demise – Yuval Steinitz, currently Israel’s Minister of National Infrastructures, September 14, 2008.
Israel is a colonial project that has nothing to do with Jews – Mahmoud Abbas, before the Palestine Liberation Organization’s Central Council, January 14, 2018.
Prof. Alan Dershowitz has been a stout defender of Israel for years—often in distinctly inclement circumstances. For this, he deserves our commendation and appreciation. After all, as an acclaimed academic, he could have chosen a less a harrowing path …
Two ill-advised choices
Dershowitz however, made two other choices, which largely (arguably, completely) undermine his otherwise stalwart pro-Israel efforts…The one was his ill-advised (two-time) support of Barack Obama…The other is his dogged (the less charitable might say, dogmatic) support of the two-state formula—despite the accumulating mountain of evidence as to its folly, futility and failure.
Endorsing Obama is “water-under-the-bridge”; endorsing two-statism is not
The jury on two-statism is no longer out.
…Back then, with the heady—the less charitable might say “hallucinatory”—optimism that accompanied the signing of the 1993 Oslo Accords, there were proponents and opponents of the idea. …Today, it is clear that by any reasonable standard, the jury is no longer out. The proponents of the two-state paradigm have been proved tragically wrong; while its opponents have been proved —equally tragically—right….
The paradox of two-statism: Liberal support for tyranny
However, empirical evidence is not the only reason for professed liberal-democrats (and liberal Democrats)—such as Dershowitz—to reject two-statism. There are also– or at least should be – matters of moral principle…Indeed, one of the most perverse paradoxes in the political discourse on the Israeli-Arab conflict is that the people who supported the two-state principle should have been its fiercest opponents…
Two-statism: An anathema to liberal values
Just what an anathema a Palestinian state would be to anyone with Dershowitz’s liberal worldview is vividly illustrated in a recent Algemeiner article by Mitchell Bard. It reveals not only what is almost certainly to occur if a Palestinian state were to be established in Judea-Samaria, but has already occurred in areas administered by the Palestinian Authority (PA…What liberal could condone such realities?
Two-statism: “… compulsive temptation to attack Israel…”
However, it is with regard to its security implications, particularly in light of the past precedents in which Israel has relinquished land to Arab control, that the specter of two-statism has, arguably, its gravest impact. Indeed, it was none other the arch-architect of the Oslo Accords himself, Shimon Peres, who warned that setting up a Palestinian state would “in itself create compulsive temptation to attack Israel from all directions”.
Security: Dershowitz’s perplexing position
On the security issue, Dershowitz has, of late, been expressing some decidedly perplexing positions….Thus, in a 2015 Fox interview, he conceded that even if Israel ended its “occupation” [of Judea-Samaria] immediately, as it did in Gaza, the violence would probably increase rather than decrease…
Gaza: The ultimate indictment of two-statism
But even if one relinquishes a partisan pro-Israel perspective, and views the rationale and record of the two-state prescription from a purely Palestinian angle, the condemnation of two-statism is, if anything, even harsher…For it has wrought nothing but devastation and deprivation for the common man in the Palestinian street, left awash in untreated sewage flows, with well over 90% of the water-supply unfit for drinking…
Abbas’s rant: Carpe diem and renounce two-statism
It is time for Dershowitz to resign himself to recalcitrant realities and renounce his support for the ill-conceived notion of two-statism—before he has occasion to rue his mistake even more than his ill-advised endorsement of Obama. Fortunately, he has been provided an honorable way to step away for his previous position by none other than PA president, Mahmoud Abbas himself, who in his recent rant wished ruin upon the house of the American president. After all, if this is the face of Palestinian moderation…
So Prof. Dershowitz, carpe diem! And renounce two-statism!
