S9 Ep12: Can a Federation Heal the Divide between Israel and Palestine with Nigel Roberts

[00:00:01] Due to the themes of this podcast, listener discretion is advised.

[00:00:07] Lock your doors, close the blinds, change your passwords. This is Secrets and Spies.

[00:00:27] Secrets and Spies is a podcast that dives into the world of espionage, terrorism, geopolitics, and intrigue.

[00:00:33] This podcast is produced and hosted by Chris Carr.

[00:00:37] The Israel-Palestine conflict has been a decades-long struggle, but is a two-state solution still viable?

[00:00:43] Nigel Roberts, a retired World Bank director, joins us to challenge conventional wisdom and present a groundbreaking solution.

[00:00:52] I hope you enjoy this episode.

[00:00:54] The opinions expressed by guests on Secrets and Spies do not necessarily represent those of the producers and sponsors of this podcast.

[00:01:18] Nigel, welcome to the podcast. And for the benefit of the audience, please can you just tell us a little bit about yourself and your experience with the conflict between Israel and Palestine?

[00:01:27] Sure. Well, thanks Chris. And I appreciate the invitation and chance to talk about this.

[00:01:33] I spent about 13 years working on Israel and Palestine for the World Bank between 1993, which is the beginning of the Oslo peace process, and 2006, which is when Hamas won the Palestinian Legislative Council elections,

[00:01:53] and effectively ended the Oslo peace process.

[00:02:00] Five years of that period, 2001, 2006, I was the World Bank's director in Jerusalem.

[00:02:07] So I was on the ground then.

[00:02:09] Subsequently, I've had some intermittent involvement.

[00:02:15] But since October the 7th last year and Hamas's attack on Israel and Israel's subsequent response in Gaza, I was drawn back into policy issues,

[00:02:30] trying to look for an alternative to the Oslo peace process formula, which had so manifestly failed as the events of the last year have demonstrated.

[00:02:42] And I've worked with a group in Geneva, a group of independent experts, Israeli, Palestinian, American, European,

[00:02:52] to try and come up with some other formulation that might have a better chance of success than the two-state solution did.

[00:03:01] Thank you for that.

[00:03:02] So today we're going to look at an alternative to the two-state solution that is often touted as the solution to the Israel and Palestine conflict, but so far it has failed.

[00:03:14] So can you first of all talk just about what the two-state solution is and how it came about?

[00:03:20] Yeah, sure.

[00:03:22] So this is a long-standing approach to trying to solve the problem of having two different peoples living in a very small space.

[00:03:33] If you go back to the British mandate in the 1930s, the British produced a potential map of how they thought the territory could be divided.

[00:03:43] This was highly contested, particularly by the Palestinians, since they felt it awarded to the Jews in Palestine far too much land.

[00:03:54] You then saw in 1947 a UN partition plan, which again the Palestinians rejected on similar grounds.

[00:04:03] Also, by the way, many of them arguing that there should be one unified state rather than a divided space.

[00:04:11] You then fast forward through a series of Arab-Israeli wars until you get to 1967 and then the occupation of the West Bank and of Gaza.

[00:04:23] And subsequently and gradually PLO thinking began to tend away from the notion of a single unified state to accepting what was effectively 22% of historical Palestine as a Palestinian state that was essentially occupied West Bank and Gaza in return for recognition and peace.

[00:04:52] And that was the paradigm picked up, first of all, by the United States after the Gulf War.

[00:05:00] And then subsequently in the Oslo negotiations and the Oslo peace process that was then launched 92-93 and turned into the Oslo Accords, which were an attempt to carry forward that division of Palestine into these two separate but contiguous states.

[00:05:21] So what is the problem that you see with the two-state solution?

[00:05:25] The fundamental problem was the unwillingness of various people on both sides to accept that division.

[00:05:36] And most particularly the religious extremists as manifest both in Hamas and in the Israeli settler movement.

[00:05:49] So if you look at the founding charters of both the Likud party in Israel and of Hamas, both of them lay claim to all of the land between the river and the sea as a holy endowment.

[00:06:07] And whereas in the 90s, though the advocates of those extreme solutions were on the margins of both societies, as the violence persisted throughout the Oslo period, so the moderates were pushed away and those extremists had more and more say on both sides of the divide.

[00:06:32] And that unwillingness, if you like, to forego violent options to achieve maximal objectives, essentially torpedoed the whole process.

[00:06:44] So you now have a situation where a solution that was at least arguably viable in the early 90s is now no longer acceptable to either population, nor really feasible in light of the massive expansion of settlements in the West Bank since 1993.

[00:07:07] In your paper, you talk about the demise of the two-state solution.

[00:07:12] Can you talk to us about this?

[00:07:14] Yeah, I've mentioned already the persistence of violence.

[00:07:21] And that emerged within a year of the signing of the Oslo Accords, both from settler violence in the West Bank and from Hamas's campaign of suicide bombing in Israel.

[00:07:37] That intensified over the years.

[00:07:40] It was fueled by the rapid expansion of settlements and responses to that.

[00:07:49] So in a fundamental sense, significant parts of both the Palestinian and the Israeli polity never really accepted a process that would be conducted

[00:08:05] absent all violence in order to achieve the various objectives that people were pursuing.

[00:08:13] Second, if you look at the Oslo process itself, this was designed as a five-year interim process, interim period, in which confidence between two very suspicious parties would be built through the process of the Oslo Accords.

[00:08:38] And what was envisaged was that the really tough issues, the so-called final status issues, such as the future of the settlements in the West Bank, the return of Palestinian refugees, the status of Jerusalem, the delineation of borders, and the return of the refugees.

[00:09:04] And mutual security issues.

[00:09:07] And mutual security issues.

[00:09:07] Those would be negotiated in an environment which was hopefully sufficiently specific to encourage cooperative process.

[00:09:17] However, I've already mentioned the violence that torpedoed that.

[00:09:21] And that violence ignited the power imbalance between the two parties.

[00:09:29] So Israel, as the occupying power and as militarily far more powerful than anything that the Palestinians created, was able to, first of all, continue to condone the expansion of settlements, which from a Palestinian point of view constituted serious bad faith in terms of Israeli willingness to endorse a Palestinian state.

[00:09:56] And second, in response to deteriorating security, Israel was able to enforce fairly draconian movement restrictions, both between Gaza and the West Bank and within the Palestinian territories.

[00:10:14] Also restricted work permits to Israel and on occasion withheld import taxes that Israel collected on behalf of the Palestinians and was supposed to remit to them.

[00:10:30] These measures all had the effect of massively compressing the Palestinian economy and gradually eroding any notion of a peace dividend in terms of an improvement in livelihoods and lifestyle.

[00:10:47] Not only in the economic sense, but in the political sense of being so severely restricted and surveilled.

[00:10:54] So that imbalance that was activated through the process of violence became very detrimental to the support, particularly of Palestinians, for a two-state solution.

[00:11:05] A third critical issue was that in a situation like this, where you have an interim period imbalance of power to very suspicious cooperants, some kind of referee process was required.

[00:11:23] And it was assumed that the United States would play that role of the neutral arbitrator.

[00:11:31] The US being the only credible superpower and with a massive involvement and credibility in both Israeli and Palestinian societies was obviously the party to play that role.

[00:11:43] However, the US did not play that role in a balanced manner.

[00:11:52] The US sympathies and geopolitical and domestic political pressures always meant that the US would tend to find for the Israelis and to take their part in this disputed negotiation process.

[00:12:13] And evidence of that is in the US failure to constrain Israeli settlement in the West Bank, even though they understood very clearly how detrimental this was to the peace process.

[00:12:29] So you had a process that I think was to be a process that I think was honestly conceived, where you would have a gradual process towards the separation of the two societies and the creation of two parallel states side by side living in peace, but in a contentious environment that was improperly refereed.

[00:12:53] From a Palestinian point of view, this gradually resulted in a loss of faith in the Palestinian Authority.

[00:13:04] There were certainly strong perceptions of corruption, but it was also the perceived inability of the Palestinian Authority to negotiate effectively with the Israelis and also to provide security.

[00:13:20] Indeed, many Palestinians saw the Palestinian Authority as being enrolled by Israel in its own bid for greater security for Israelis at the expense of Palestinians.

[00:13:35] This led to the Palestinian Authority.

[00:13:40] This led to the Palestinian Legislative Council in the Palestinian Legislative Council election 2006.

[00:13:44] That in turn led to the isolation of Gaza and to a series of persistent violent confrontations between Hamas and the government of Israel and continued expansion of settlements in the West Bank.

[00:14:03] At the same time, as a persisting Palestinian Authority that had less and less legitimacy and had not been refreshed through any democratic process.

[00:14:17] That then led to what we see today, the violent eruption of Hamas violence against Israelis on October 7th.

[00:14:27] And then this extremely strong response by Israel and the destruction of much of Gaza.

[00:14:34] Yes, yes, indeed.

[00:14:37] Yes, indeed.

[00:14:37] Well, what are the alternatives then to the two-state solution?

[00:14:42] You mentioned three in your paper.

[00:14:45] Yeah.

[00:14:46] Well, if you accept that the two-state solution is not a solution, and I think the evidence, as I've said, is in the progress that it took and where it's taken us to.

[00:14:58] What indeed are the other range of options that are available?

[00:15:02] Well, first is a kind of continuation of the status quo.

[00:15:07] What we have in effect today is a single space governed by Israel, but in which the Palestinian populations of Gaza and the West Bank are under occupation.

[00:15:24] In the case of Gaza, in the case of Gaza, under the case of Gaza, under the West Bank, under increasingly aggressive settlement expansion.

[00:15:37] This, I think, is some people would see this as a kind of de facto non-solution that could continue indefinitely.

[00:15:47] But the implications of it are terrible for everybody concerned.

[00:15:53] First of all, the Palestinians facing continued occupation, potential expulsion, and continued violence and compression of their economic prospects and daily livelihoods.

[00:16:09] From the Israeli point of view, this notion of extreme separation has not brought security to Israel.

[00:16:16] And the evidence of that is October the 7th.

[00:16:21] Here you had a situation of a part of the West Bank and Gaza, i.e. Gaza Strip, that was sealed off and guarded, and yet that degree of separation did not protect Israel.

[00:16:36] It's also a situation in which Israel's international capital will continue to be eroded and its international position continue to deteriorate, both regionally and globally, which is absolutely not in Israel's interests.

[00:16:55] It's also a diplomatic disaster for the United States and for its European allies in the eyes of much of the world.

[00:17:05] They're seen as enabling something that's truly unjust.

[00:17:09] And from an Israeli perspective, Israel is, and the last year has shown, Israel is highly dependent on the United States to pursue these kinds of policies.

[00:17:22] And that is an unstable thing to bet on over the long term.

[00:17:27] Many may think that for the next few years, those kinds of policies can continue to be pursued.

[00:17:34] But that doesn't provide any guarantees either about the state of United States public opinion, as reflected in its politics, or indeed in the long term relevance of the United States in the Middle East.

[00:17:51] Many things can change over time, including the relative strength of the world's superpowers and their ability to influence events outside their borders.

[00:18:04] So a continuation of a deteriorating status quo is no solution at all.

[00:18:10] Yeah.

[00:18:11] So you look at what, then what are the options if you, if the two state solution is off the table?

[00:18:17] One is to go back to the old notion of a single unified democratic space that covers all of historic Palestine.

[00:18:26] The problem there nowadays is that the two societies have become so, at the present state, driven and to some extent captured by their extremist fringes,

[00:18:43] that it's very difficult to see how you would move from today's situation into a situation where human rights are universal, political rights are universal.

[00:18:59] You essentially envisage a thriving, multi-ethnic democratic society.

[00:19:07] From an Israeli perspective, given fears and concerns that they have about Palestinian militancy, the demographics of that solution do not look acceptable.

[00:19:22] At the moment, you have roughly 14, 15 million people in historic Palestine and a relative balance between Jews and Arabs.

[00:19:39] But if you then factor in the 6 million or so Palestinian refugees who, under the UN definitions, have some kind of, have a right of return,

[00:19:52] then the demography is going to tip inexorably against Jews in Israel.

[00:19:58] And that would undermine the concept of Israel as a global refuge for Jews and a potentially safe space for Israeli citizens,

[00:20:12] and is therefore fundamentally unacceptable from an Israeli point of view.

[00:20:18] So what does that leave you with?

[00:20:20] In my view, in the view of a number of other people, some kind of federation of the two peoples that is not based on dividing them,

[00:20:35] but which acknowledges their separate identities, but also brings them together in various forms of cooperation that are arguably essential,

[00:20:47] but most certainly beneficial to both societies in the long run.

[00:20:51] So how would this federation of two territories work?

[00:20:55] And what inspired this idea?

[00:20:57] Yeah, so the ideas for this go right back.

[00:21:02] You can trace them in the writings of Zionists and pre-Israeli citizens in the 1930s and 40s.

[00:21:16] And in which there was a strong discussion of what was then called bi-nationalism.

[00:21:23] The notion being a shared space in which the cultural and political requirements of the two nationalities would be respected and preserved.

[00:21:37] If you think, why would you reject a concept of separation and go for what sounds like a much more idealistic concept of cohabitation and the sharing of state functions?

[00:21:55] First of all, I think it's worth considering the physical space that we're looking at here.

[00:22:00] As I mentioned earlier, you have some 15 million people now.

[00:22:03] You would assume that number would increase significantly under a just and stable political solution.

[00:22:15] Since a proportion of the Palestinian refugees who now live in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon would elect to come back.

[00:22:24] We don't know how many, but certainly we can assume some.

[00:22:28] You're talking about 15 plus million people in an area roughly the size of Wales, which has around 3 million people in it.

[00:22:40] Or the size of Vermont in the United States, which has less than a million people in it.

[00:22:48] And these people are not currently separated.

[00:22:52] They live very close to each other.

[00:22:56] You have, for example, 2 million Palestinians who are citizens of Israel, who are already fully integrated into Israel.

[00:23:03] You have 700,000 settlers living in the West Bank.

[00:23:08] So the populations are very much intermixed.

[00:23:11] So how would you go about trying to resolve something that this separation into two states has not been close to able to achieve?

[00:23:23] I think the idea that we have here and that we've written about is that you would have two distinct territories that would territorially currently map, roughly map current day Israel and current day West Bank and Gaza, albeit with certain border adjustments.

[00:23:43] So one easy border adjustment would be along the western face of the West Bank, where a significant number of settlements are congregated.

[00:23:55] So there have been discussions in the past, informally, about land swaps that would give over part of those areas to the Israeli territory in return for land of equal value and size that would go to the Palestinian territory.

[00:24:19] And which probably should include some kind of land bridge between Gaza and the West Bank.

[00:24:25] So you'd have two entities within this federal state.

[00:24:32] These two entities would be largely self-governing.

[00:24:35] Each would have their own parliament, their own elected parliament.

[00:24:38] And then for federal purposes, you would have a federal parliament that would deal with federal matters like, for example, defense, foreign affairs, foreign trade.

[00:24:50] Monetary policy.

[00:24:52] Monetary policy.

[00:24:52] Those things that can't be handled entirely separately at the territorial level.

[00:24:57] And for there, you'd need some kind of balanced parliament.

[00:25:01] It couldn't be done on a one man, one vote basis because again, you'd get into the demographic issues.

[00:25:08] But would somehow be balanced either by the two different ways of doing this.

[00:25:16] The two parliaments could then themselves elect members up to the federal parliament or there would be other ways of doing that to ensure a balance.

[00:25:26] The two parliaments could then be balanced.

[00:25:27] Now, crucially, in a federation of this kind, the borders would be open.

[00:25:33] And what that would mean is that a citizen of the Palestinian territory would be allowed to be a resident in the Israeli territory and vice versa.

[00:25:48] Not for voting purposes, but for residents purposes.

[00:25:52] You understand the distinction here that you'd want to maintain, if you like, the sovereignty of the Palestinian sovereignty over the Palestinian territory and likewise the Israeli sovereignty over the Israeli territory.

[00:26:07] But if you allowed this residence, this would be a way of dealing with possibly the two most difficult issues or the final status issues that Oslo came nowhere close to resolving.

[00:26:26] One is the status of the settlements and second is the return of refugees.

[00:26:31] So, if you take these one by one.

[00:26:35] Under this arrangement, you can envisage a situation which would clearly have to be very carefully negotiated, where certainly some of the settlers in the West Bank would be allowed to remain as residents of the West Bank.

[00:26:54] Now, of course, they would be subject to Palestinian law.

[00:26:59] And similarly, you could envisage the return of certainly some refugees to the Israeli territory.

[00:27:09] Again, as residents, they would be citizens of the Palestinian territory, but residents in Israel and subject to Israeli law.

[00:27:18] Now, how many in each case is less, I think, a matter in this case for legal absolutes, because there are legal absolutes that apply in both cases.

[00:27:32] In the case of settlers, they are all illegal settlers under international law, and the implication is they should all leave.

[00:27:39] And under the UN resolutions, the 6 million Palestinians all have some degree of right of return to Israel.

[00:27:48] And that's clearly unacceptable from an Israeli point of view, just as the remaining of all of the settlers in the West Bank would presumably be unacceptable.

[00:28:04] But those legal absolutes can be finessed in a political negotiation and an internationally approved agreement.

[00:28:14] There is scope for doing that.

[00:28:16] It's controversial, but it is a possibility.

[00:28:19] It's the kind of compromise that's necessary to look at in order to get close to any kind of solution to the conflict that you have at present.

[00:28:32] So essentially, this gives you an opportunity to maintain the ethnic identity of both groups and their attachment to land while creating a functional governance, economic, and legal space.

[00:28:49] One that would be potentially economically highly dynamic, because it would access Israeli technology and capital, Palestinian entrepreneurship and labor skills, and could provide a real entrepreneurial hub for the Levant and the Middle East as a whole.

[00:29:15] Of course, getting to that point is very difficult.

[00:29:19] Any kind of federation of this kind is built on a constitutional process.

[00:29:25] At the moment, neither state has a formal constitution.

[00:29:31] Israel has an informal constitution, and the Palestinians have a basic law which is a precursor to a constitution.

[00:29:41] But in pursuit of a federation, you would need an extended process of consultation that would lead towards a constitution.

[00:29:55] And the constitution would be the basis in which all of these arrangements are set up and understood, and would provide the grounds for contesting and appealing them, and mediating.

[00:30:10] So that the mediation would no longer be done by third parties, but would be built into the constitutional process itself.

[00:30:19] Let's take a break, and I'll be right back.

[00:30:37] Is there an example of a similar kind of federation that kind of works on the lines of what you're thinking?

[00:30:45] There are many examples of federations or confederations, well, federations essentially.

[00:30:51] So roughly, I think it's 30% of the world's population live in various forms of federation.

[00:31:00] The most notable examples being the United States, Brazil, India.

[00:31:08] And as a confederation, well, the European Union is effectively has a federal structure.

[00:31:22] And where certain functions are devolved to the European Union, and other sovereign functions are retained in the state level.

[00:31:33] So there are many examples that can be drawn on.

[00:31:37] None of them will fit exactly.

[00:31:40] So, for example, most federations have a bicameral federal structure.

[00:31:46] Like in the United States, you have the Senate and the House of Representatives.

[00:31:50] And the House of Representatives typically will be elected on a universal franchise basis.

[00:31:57] And I've said earlier, I don't think that would work in this case because of the history of the identity history and the population dynamics,

[00:32:07] and the need to maintain a balance that cannot be overturned by demographic pressure.

[00:32:14] But there are many examples that can be followed.

[00:32:18] But what would be essential in negotiating this process?

[00:32:24] The negotiation process becomes the peace process.

[00:32:27] And the way that that's invoked is not simply by appealing to the governments of the entities that are in place at the moment,

[00:32:36] but by broadening that discussion to all affected parties.

[00:32:40] And that's quite a wide range of people.

[00:32:43] So you have not only the inhabitants of Israel and the inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza, but you have the diasporas in both cases.

[00:32:52] So the Israeli diaspora essentially has the right of residence in Israel,

[00:32:58] and the Palestinian diaspora has the right of return under various UN resolutions.

[00:33:05] And it seems to me essential and correct, and in all probability, moderating to bring in that whole community into the discussion that leads to the formation of the Constitution itself.

[00:33:22] So that itself would, as I said earlier, would constitute in itself a peace process,

[00:33:29] and a process of discussion and of normalization of relations.

[00:33:33] Therefore, probably a very long, extended and complex process.

[00:33:38] And how would you select the people who would create that constitution?

[00:33:44] Because in America you have the founding fathers, etc.

[00:33:47] Who would be the equivalent founding fathers here?

[00:33:51] Well, clearly leadership is essential, right?

[00:33:54] And you do not have that leadership in place, either in Israel or in the Palestinian community or in the United States, which remains for the near future, at least, a critical player in this.

[00:34:13] So certainly that leadership is deficient.

[00:34:19] But in many ways more important than that is how you invoke popular participation.

[00:34:26] So the case of Iceland, for example, is interesting.

[00:34:33] So a constitutional process took place in Iceland, where you had a randomly selected group of citizens who initiated the constitutional discussion.

[00:34:46] And then you had elected citizen bodies to actually form that constitution.

[00:34:52] And then you had a universal referendum to approve it.

[00:34:56] So a process that is extremely inclusive is probably your best guarantee, not of simplicity or of getting anything done quickly, but of being able to work through these issues and give once again the moderate voices that have been driven to the edge of the discussion.

[00:35:20] Once again, a stage to think about something that is durable and in the interests of all of the inhabitants and potential inhabitants of Palestine.

[00:35:32] Well, this all sounds like a really great idea.

[00:35:33] So I mean, what is it going to take to get this idea to kind of become a reality?

[00:35:38] Well, it's not going to become a reality at the moment because the level of violence and mistrust is as high as it's ever been.

[00:35:47] If you look at the, I mean, as a barometer of this, the support for the two state solution, which still remains the only diplomatic option that's discussed to the extent that any solution is being discussed by diplomats.

[00:36:06] The support for that has created and it's created largely because, not because people think that it was a bad idea, but because it just seems completely infeasible.

[00:36:19] Mm-hmm.

[00:36:20] And an Israeli pollster called Dalia Schindlein has actually examined the difference between the lack of support for it and the underlying conditions that dictate that lack of support and has indeed indicated, has identified this loss of hope and the apparent lack of practicability of coming, of taking such a solution forward.

[00:36:49] And that lack of practicability is a function of the militarization of the conflict, but also of the dominance in Israeli politics of the extremist settler lobby.

[00:37:06] And the perception that that will lead to further colonization of the West Bank and to the possible expulsion of Palestinians, at least from part of Gaza, and even the potential resettlement of parts of Gaza itself.

[00:37:24] So under that scenario, perceived scenario, you can understand that very few Palestinians have faith and therefore vest very little hope in the two state solution.

[00:37:39] Whereas from an Israeli point of view, the trauma of the trauma of the 7th last year, profound trauma that that created in Israel, has certainly turned people away from the kinds of solutions that have been spoken about up to now.

[00:37:59] Yeah. And so the first thing towards getting towards a solution of this kind is that some unwinding of the current level of violence, because any kind of rational negotiations are impossible in this environment.

[00:38:20] Indeed, indeed. So how do you think the public in Israel and Palestine are going to react to the idea of a federation?

[00:38:29] And what challenges would need to be overcome to gain public support for this idea?

[00:38:34] Well, as I say, I don't think there's much support at the moment for this.

[00:38:37] This would be seen as an idealistic, unrealistic.

[00:38:45] But you then have to say, OK, well, then what are the alternatives that are really there in place of this?

[00:38:53] What is it that you're actually suggesting works better than this?

[00:38:56] And then you go through the options.

[00:38:58] And as we've discussed earlier, you don't find any.

[00:39:01] So part of the problem here is getting this concept socialized and understood and discussed.

[00:39:11] Very little of that is happening at the moment.

[00:39:15] Diplomats are still stuck in the same groove of the two-state solution.

[00:39:19] You'll notice, though, that over the last year, when diplomats and policymakers do look beyond an immediate ceasefire to, quote, the day after,

[00:39:33] many of them do say they mention the two-state solution and then they stop.

[00:39:38] Nobody is telling you what that now consists of, why something that has failed for 30 years is now still viable,

[00:39:48] or what it would take to walk back towards that.

[00:39:53] And that's why you have to go to these alternative solutions and go through them, as we have done,

[00:40:01] and look at the extent to which they're feasible and the extent to which they're not.

[00:40:07] And difficult as it might be, some kind of federal solution seems to me the only really viable option open at the moment.

[00:40:16] You could also ask, Chris, how do you get the public, how do you get the extremists,

[00:40:22] who are in such important positions in both societies,

[00:40:26] to turn away from violence towards a concept of this kind?

[00:40:31] I think part of the answer is that any extremist leadership relies on its base.

[00:40:38] And when the base itself becomes sufficiently disillusioned with the solutions that they're being offered by their leadership,

[00:40:47] then they are going to push those leaders to take other positions.

[00:40:51] You see some evidence of that now in Gaza, in terms of what we understand to be the declining support for Hamas.

[00:41:01] They've seen where Hamas's policies have taken them.

[00:41:06] You don't see that with the settler movement at the moment,

[00:41:10] because the settlers essentially continue to be enabled by the United States and its European allies.

[00:41:16] So a change in understanding and in policy is essential in Europe and the United States

[00:41:24] if we're going to move that group of extremists and those who rely on them

[00:41:31] to thinking more constructively about what's in their best long-term interest.

[00:41:36] Yes, indeed.

[00:41:38] I'm intrigued with regards to Hamas and the declining support,

[00:41:45] because I think there is evidence of that.

[00:41:46] But the only problem in that scenario is obviously the leadership of Hamas are heavily armed individuals

[00:41:53] and are effectively holding that populist hostage in some regards, aren't they?

[00:41:59] And I think it's, I don't know, I wonder if it's going to be hard for the general population

[00:42:06] to kind of challenge people like that.

[00:42:09] It could be wrong, but that's sort of my feeling there.

[00:42:12] Yeah, I think it's very difficult.

[00:42:13] And I don't think we should disregard the increased popularity of Hamas in the West Bank.

[00:42:19] That, I think, is a consequence of a sense of hopelessness,

[00:42:25] a sense of further encroachment on Palestinian land by settlers,

[00:42:30] and anger and a desire for revenge.

[00:42:34] But it's also a testament to a lack of any proffered alternatives.

[00:42:45] I think it's essential that those groups who are behind a solution of this kind

[00:42:53] are given space and given audience.

[00:42:55] And here I need to recommend and mention one of the key inspirational groups

[00:43:03] in terms of any of the work that I've been doing with my Geneva colleagues over the last year.

[00:43:08] And that is an Israeli-Palestinian organization called A Land for All.

[00:43:15] And you can easily Google them, A Land for All.

[00:43:18] Their ideas are simply, carefully explained.

[00:43:21] They're very similar to what I've been discussing.

[00:43:24] There are some differences of detail, but the fundamental concepts are the same.

[00:43:30] They are a highly credible group of individuals.

[00:43:34] They are gaining slightly more traction, but their solutions, that discourse should, in my view,

[00:43:45] be at the center of U.S. and European diplomacy vis-a-vis Palestine, Israel, and the Middle East as a whole.

[00:43:54] As I say, because the other alternatives that are put forward either are disastrous in terms of a continuation of the status quo,

[00:44:04] unacceptable in terms of a single unified democratic state, unacceptable from an Israeli point of view,

[00:44:14] or dead and buried, which is the classic Oslo-style two-state solution.

[00:44:21] So those are the groups that need to be listened to.

[00:44:25] Those are the groups that the public need to listen to and to be educated by in terms of how these alternatives arise.

[00:44:35] Not me, but those are the ones who can really carry that argument.

[00:44:40] And if I can do anything, it's to point people in their direction and support what they've been doing.

[00:44:46] Let's take another break, and I'll be right back with more.

[00:45:05] You mentioned earlier trauma, because there's a lot of trauma with regard to this ongoing conflict.

[00:45:10] So how do we help both sides of this conflict heal and trust one another,

[00:45:16] especially after the Hamas attacks of October 7th and obviously Israel's devastating response?

[00:45:22] Is there something akin to that South African sort of peace and reconciliation process possible, do you think?

[00:45:28] Yes, I do.

[00:45:30] Let me start with trauma.

[00:45:31] Both these societies are thoroughly traumatized.

[00:45:36] The foundation of the state of Israel was based on massive Jewish trauma,

[00:45:41] and the fear of a repetition of what happened throughout Eastern Europe

[00:45:49] for the previous many decades culminating in the Holocaust.

[00:45:56] That is lived history in Israel.

[00:45:59] So you have a high level of trauma that is enhanced by the day-to-day violence of the environment in which Israelis live.

[00:46:09] Palestinian trauma began, certainly there's been a process of confrontation for well over 100 years,

[00:46:23] and the seminal traumatic event for Palestinians was the Nakba in 1948,

[00:46:29] and the expulsions of many of the residents of former Palestine.

[00:46:36] And that trauma has increased through dispossession, exile, occupation, and persistent and recurrent violence.

[00:46:48] Both societies have a massive trauma load.

[00:46:53] I think we understand from, at the family level, how trauma is inherited through the generations,

[00:47:00] and behavioral models replicate in the descendants of those who are severely traumatized.

[00:47:09] So you can't expect anything else but to see that in both Palestinian and Israeli society.

[00:47:17] There have been a significant number of what you call people-to-people initiatives to try and address this,

[00:47:25] to try and understand the perceptions and the perspectives of the other party,

[00:47:31] to appreciate and honor their history,

[00:47:34] to understand what happened to their opponent rather than simply what happened to them.

[00:47:41] A recent novel by Colin McCann called A Paragon is an account of just one of these groups.

[00:47:51] This is a group of Palestinian and Israeli parents who've lost children in the conflict,

[00:47:59] and who, through that loss and trauma, have been moved to try and understand

[00:48:06] the situation of those who are on the other side of the green line.

[00:48:12] There are many of those underway.

[00:48:14] They're much, much harder in today's climate.

[00:48:18] And many of the groups, the pro-peace groups,

[00:48:21] and the groups of citizens who try to find common ground

[00:48:26] have found it much more difficult in the last year

[00:48:28] in this violent environment to carry out that work.

[00:48:34] And that's unfortunately what you'd expect at a time of high violence.

[00:48:39] At some point,

[00:48:42] a reckoning between the two societies needs to happen.

[00:48:47] In the process of federalization,

[00:48:52] that would constitute an important part of the whole constitution formation process.

[00:49:00] And you can certainly envisage a constitution

[00:49:03] that in its preamble acknowledges the trauma that each society has inflicted on the other,

[00:49:10] and a willingness to move,

[00:49:13] and a determination to move beyond that,

[00:49:15] and to try and heal those wounds.

[00:49:17] I certainly think there will be place for some kind of truth and reconciliation process.

[00:49:24] I don't think it will work right now.

[00:49:26] I think those that have been successful,

[00:49:30] those in Latin America and South Africa,

[00:49:33] even Rwanda, have taken place after the end of gross violence.

[00:49:40] And during a period where there is an effort underway to reconstruct a more plural society,

[00:49:47] and to deal with the enmities of the past in a peaceful manner.

[00:49:53] But certainly, I think that's an absolutely essential part of the whole process.

[00:49:58] Yeah, yeah, I agree.

[00:50:00] So, the problem is, obviously, in both of Israel and Palestine,

[00:50:03] there are people who take a hardline position on the issues that we've talked about,

[00:50:09] who believe that the other side should not be there, and those people then typically turn to violence.

[00:50:15] What do you think it's going to take to persuade them to back this idea of a federation?

[00:50:19] Well, I think some of them will never be persuaded,

[00:50:24] and they need to be marginalized by their own populations.

[00:50:28] The weight of public opinion needs to turn against these desperate solutions

[00:50:33] that are themselves, in many cases, the product of either religious fundamentalism or trauma.

[00:50:43] Mm-hmm.

[00:50:44] And it's for new civil leadership to arise, and for new ideas to be given them to work with.

[00:50:54] That's why I think it's so important that these ideas get out there,

[00:50:59] that they become part of the current of discussion,

[00:51:03] that then citizens then press their governments to make them part of the political dialogue,

[00:51:09] instead of taking refuge in what's essentially virtue signaling,

[00:51:18] which is saying, I'm committed to a two-state solution.

[00:51:21] Mm-hmm.

[00:51:21] In many ways, that's a way of saying, I'm committed to letting things carry on as they are,

[00:51:26] and I'm committed to enabling a continuing occupation.

[00:51:31] Citizens have to tell their leaders that that's what they're doing,

[00:51:34] but then give them practical, feasible, detailed tools for getting out of that process.

[00:51:41] And that is the process whereby eventually these extremists will be marginalized.

[00:51:50] And what role do you see the US and the international community playing in this proposal?

[00:51:55] Well, the US and the international community are very much party to what's happened

[00:52:03] in Mandate Palestine, historic Palestine.

[00:52:07] For commendable reasons, they all supported the creation of a homeland for the Jews,

[00:52:14] particularly in the wake of the Holocaust.

[00:52:17] But by doing so, they also became party to the dispossession of the Palestinians.

[00:52:22] So they owe a moral debt to both societies, continuing moral debt to both societies,

[00:52:29] as well as it being very much in their own political and strategic interests,

[00:52:34] and their reputational interests, to see a solution to, a just solution to what is

[00:52:43] a continued violent and unjust sore on the face of the Middle East.

[00:52:54] What I think that Europe should do, I think European governments and

[00:53:03] leaderships are probably more open at this present stage to ideas of this kind

[00:53:09] than is necessarily the case in the United States. You have an administration that's coming in

[00:53:17] that is going to be just as hardline pro-Israeli, or more so than its predecessor,

[00:53:27] and is not, from what I understand, looking for these kinds of creative, consensual solutions.

[00:53:35] But I think that European diplomats and an increasing US population that is very dissatisfied

[00:53:44] with US policy in the Middle East need to bring to their government and argue to them

[00:53:52] the validity of these more practical, as well as more just solutions.

[00:53:58] Both, as I say, from a moral humanitarian perspective, and from the perspective of the

[00:54:04] self-interest of European and United States governments.

[00:54:09] Yeah, one fear I sort of have with regards to at least, should we say, American and UK

[00:54:15] public views on this topic, I've noticed certainly in the last year that the

[00:54:21] ideas of the extremes of both sides seem to be getting more traction

[00:54:25] in public discourse than the practical solutions.

[00:54:29] And I don't know whether that's, you know, whether that's role of misinformation or something else,

[00:54:33] but certainly like when you see the protests, the pro-Palestinian protests, a lot of them are

[00:54:37] using like from the river to the sea and using kind of language that sounds a bit genocidal

[00:54:42] towards the Israelis. And then you have the Israeli pro-Israel counter protests

[00:54:47] that can't, you know, sometimes indicate that they want the Palestinians to go as well.

[00:54:51] What do we, what can we do to better educate the public in the West about this, this topic?

[00:54:58] Yeah, you make a really good point, because I think politics these days is turbocharged by,

[00:55:04] particularly by social media.

[00:55:07] So, and social media plays to extreme emotion rather than to rational analysis.

[00:55:14] Yeah.

[00:55:14] Yeah.

[00:55:15] Yeah.

[00:55:15] Yeah.

[00:55:15] And the extremists have, have tended to be much better at working social media

[00:55:23] than the less interesting moderates. But I think that one of the,

[00:55:31] one of the things that's vital to progress a federal solution is to work

[00:55:40] determinedly in that social media space. I think conventional journalism is much less

[00:55:48] determinant in terms of forming public attitudes now than social media and extreme journalism.

[00:55:56] And I think that the messages that people like I and Land for All have need to be adapted and filtered

[00:56:04] through that ecosphere in ways that are appealing and will catch the imagination of people who otherwise

[00:56:14] would tend to take an over-simplistic view and over-simplistic that tends to be

[00:56:22] exclusivist. And exclusivist in this context can tend towards expulsionist and even eliminationist.

[00:56:30] And those trends are deadly for all concerned and need to be counted, I think, in a very smart way

[00:56:38] through new approaches in social media.

[00:56:40] I agree. I agree. What reactions have you had to this proposal? And has there been any support or

[00:56:46] any kind of pushback at all?

[00:56:48] It's still, so, so the, the paper that, that emerged from these Geneva discussions just came out this

[00:56:56] last week and it's on the Geneva Graduate Institute website, but it's not going to be formally rolled

[00:57:06] out until next month. There's going to be a launch and a discussion and discussions, a podcast within the

[00:57:16] Geneva Graduate Institute sphere of influence that will, will launch those discussions in Europe. So,

[00:57:22] it's early days. Um, informal discussions that I've had here, um, show that those who are in, in, in,

[00:57:34] in positions of influence, uh, have still felt obliged to stick by the two-state solution

[00:57:43] because they feel that by doing so they're signaling that it's necessary there be a solution and that

[00:57:50] the current status quo should not continue on its disastrous course. But they also, almost to an

[00:57:59] individual, uh, have, have little trust in the two-state solution itself. Um, so there, there is, um,

[00:58:10] I would say an increasing degree of interest in looking at what were once seen as very esoteric and

[00:58:17] complicated solutions to what should have been a much more simple set of arrangements, but which have

[00:58:23] now proven to be non-viable. So I, I would say cautiously so there's, uh, there's a gradual increase

[00:58:30] in, in, in policy, at the policy level in, in, in interest in this, but that really has to be, um,

[00:58:38] pushed and promoted much harder. And those of us who are engaged in, in trying to do so, uh,

[00:58:44] need to get much more active and much more effective in how we, we spread the message.

[00:58:50] Yeah. Yeah. And despite the challenges, what gives you hope that a federation is a viable solution for

[00:58:55] the future of Israel and Palestine?

[00:58:57] Chris, I would start that by saying, uh, I don't think there are any other alternatives, uh,

[00:59:03] uh, that have been suggested that are more viable than this one. That might not be a particularly

[00:59:08] optimistic way of starting it, but I think it's important. Uh, we have the current deteriorating

[00:59:14] status quo, which has edged the region to wall out war on a couple of occasions and could have gone much

[00:59:22] further than it has. Uh, it's, uh, it's, it's, uh, demeaning for Palestinians. It's unsafe for

[00:59:31] Israelis. It's a diplomatic disaster for the friends of Israel. Um, do we really want this

[00:59:38] to persist for another 20 or 30 years? No. Second, uh, the, many of the protesters in the

[00:59:47] US and Europe over the last year have demanded a single state, uh, a single state that presumably

[00:59:55] would be inclusive and democratic in which there will be rights for all. But given the demographics

[01:00:02] of that and the implications of that for Israelis and for global Jewry in terms of preserving a safe,

[01:00:10] uh, space, uh, for Jews, uh, that's not going to work because the demographics, uh, under a

[01:00:18] confrontational situation such as we have now would not work. That leaves you with the two-state

[01:00:26] solution, which I, I hope I've managed to persuade your listeners is not viable. Uh, if it ever was,

[01:00:32] uh, it is now no longer feasible because it provides no answers for how you, uh, honor the,

[01:00:42] or exceed to the rights of 6 million Palestinian refugees, uh, or how you deal with 700,000 settlers,

[01:00:52] uh, on the periphery of Jerusalem and in the West Bank, many of whom would resist violently, uh, their,

[01:01:01] um, extraction. And in a situation where you would have to doubt the willingness or even the capacity

[01:01:10] of the Israeli government to remove them. Uh, that solution is passé. Uh, it had its,

[01:01:19] it had its short window in the early nineties where it might have worked, but it hasn't. And that then

[01:01:26] leaves you, um, with a solution that abandons the notion of separation and says, yeah, counterintuitive

[01:01:35] as this might be under these circumstances, the only really viable way of approaching this is to

[01:01:43] recognize that you have two peoples on a very small piece of land, both of whom have legitimate claims

[01:01:50] and both of whose claims need to be honored in some form. The way to do that is not to absolutely

[01:01:58] separate them, but to create an arrangement where the identities of both are preserved in a Palestinian

[01:02:08] and an Israeli territory, but in which there is sufficient interpenetration of those societies

[01:02:14] that will over time normalize that situation as well as providing plausible solutions to these two

[01:02:22] twin dilemmas of, uh, uh, of settlers, settlement and, uh, refugee return through this, uh, device of, uh,

[01:02:32] residency versus citizenship. Cool. Thank you for that. Um, now, is there anything listeners here can do to

[01:02:40] help with this issue? Because that's always an interesting question. Yeah, I think there is. I think if, you know,

[01:02:46] my advice would be go to, um, the website for a land for all and read what they have in mind and you'll see

[01:02:54] that this is, um, this is a practical, it's idealistic, but it's also practical and it's endorsed by, um,

[01:03:05] by moderates on both sides of the green line, by Palestinians and by Israelis. It's a truly joint event.

[01:03:11] There's a similar program, uh, called that you can also look at online called the Holy Land Confederation,

[01:03:19] which is a variant of a similar process. And again, that is, uh, a joint Israeli-Palestinian civil society

[01:03:27] effort. Um, you can also read our paper if you want to do so. That will be, you can find it on the

[01:03:34] Geneva Graduate Institute website. Uh, you have to look for war in the Middle East and then you can drill down

[01:03:41] and find that paper. Um, but what I think that concerned citizens should do, uh, is to understand

[01:03:52] that the two-state solution that is still trotted out by their political representatives is no more

[01:04:00] than a figment. Uh, it's not, it's not serious diplomacy. And I think citizens can play a very

[01:04:07] important part in going to their representatives and saying, look, there is actually a solution there.

[01:04:15] It's difficult. It will take years, but it's a way forward. So please stop parroting this,

[01:04:21] this language about a failed solution, something that has been discredited over the last 30 years

[01:04:28] and try something else. It may be bold. It may be idealistic, visionary, and very difficult to achieve.

[01:04:36] But please look at this and start thinking, you know, more, more seriously towards the kind of

[01:04:43] solution that everybody in the world needs for this part, this small part of the world.

[01:04:47] Nigel, thank you so much for your time today. Do you have any sort of final thoughts before we part company?

[01:04:53] Yeah, I do. This is a longstanding, it's a hundred year struggle. It's a struggle, uh, of two extraordinary

[01:05:02] peoples around issues of identity, safety, and land. Uh, land is a key part of this solution,

[01:05:13] a just division of the land and a sharing of the land. To begin that process, it's essential that

[01:05:22] the West Bank settlement enterprise, uh, cease. This has been a dagger at the heart of the peace process

[01:05:30] ever since the beginning of Oslo in the 1990s. The most sincere expression of faith in a consensual

[01:05:41] solution that Israel can give is to stop settlement and to give an indication that it is prepared to

[01:05:50] negotiate the presence of settlers in the West Bank into the future. That would be taken by Palestinians,

[01:05:57] I believe, as something new and meaningful, um, in an environment where they have become very cynical

[01:06:07] of most of the offerings from the international community or from Israel itself, from the government

[01:06:13] of Israel. If that can happen, then I think we have a process. We have the beginning of a process.

[01:06:20] Brilliant. Well, Nigel, thank you very much for joining me today.

[01:06:23] Thank you. It's a great pleasure and privilege, and I really appreciate the opportunity to

[01:06:28] discuss some of these important questions.

[01:06:31] My pleasure. Thank you.

[01:07:02] Thanks for listening. This is Secrets and Spies.

[01:07:05] Thanks for listening. This is Secrets and Spies.