Survey data collected by the Brookings Institution, a Washington research and policy-development organization, suggests Arab public opinion supports a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, but most Arabs don’t believe it can happen.
In a survey of 4,046 people in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Lebanon and Jordan, 73 percent said they accepted in principle an independent Palestine living side-by-side in peace with Israel, but 55 percent said they don’t believe it will ever happen and 27 percent said they believe the two-state outcome is inevitable but it’s going to take a very long time to achieve.
Researchers suggested that skepticism fuels violence, which makes a two-state solution very difficult to achieve. (See “New Research Shows Increased Arab Support for Two-State Solution.”)
Specifically, people who believe the two-state solution is either impossible or far in the future “end up in effect acting like they support militancy, and in fact supporting militancy,” Shibley Telhami, the Anwar Sadat professor at the University of Maryland, said at a Brookings briefing on the survey.
Is there an approach that will help translate the intellectual acceptance of a two-state solution into behavior that will support that solution? Or will the region remain trapped in an endless circle of skepticism?
Comments (5)
Abdul Salaam
15 July 2008, 3:05 EDT (#)
No solution is possible without the Israeli concurrence. Are the Israelis really interested in a two-state solution? The answer must be NO not only because the problems that a Palestinian state will create for Israel but also because it goes against the very core rationale of zionism which is to gobble up the entire Palestine.
The difficulties for Israel is to give up its illegal Settlements in the Occupied territories and, equally or more importantly, its dependence on the new Palestinian state for Water as a major part of Israel’s water supply comes from territories it has to vacate.
There will never be a two-state solution. The ONLY solution is the dismantling of the Jewish state and replacing it with a Palestinian state where both Jews and Arabs can live as equal citizens as they did BEFORE the creation of the zionist state.
Douglas
16 July 2008, 16:04 EDT (#)
A two-state solution and a one-state solution are not counterposed. There cannot be a one-state solution now, and those who advocate it are probably less than sincere about letting the Jews live as “equal citizens” after the Jewish state has been “dismantled” and replaced with a “Palestinian state”. In any case, that will never happen.
But a two-state solution now could give rise, in the far distant future when current fears and hatreds have receced into the distant past, to a one-state solution.
Let us not make the best the enemy of the good.
NSENGIYUMVA Pierre Claver
25 July 2008, 4:13 EDT (#)
A highly respected friend of mine once yesterday said that democracy belongs to humanity and so is governance. Why should Africans believe in a chronic incapacity to rise. I believe it is possible to envision an economic recovery especially if such a drive inspires itself from examples of developped countries fifty or more years ago. Burkina Faso can and other states likewise. It takes a new inspired leadership on the african continent where long vision-led initiatives are still possible in evryone’s sense.
Yohani Ntimbo
1 October 2008, 7:48 EDT (#)
There is no way of peace in the Middle East before our dear brothers Israelis have understood the need for lasting peace on the one hand and Palestian extremists have engaged in the road of tolerance and completely given away antisemitic hatred. The two sides have to let new generations of palestians and israelis and let children enjoy the holliness of their land. The truth is there won’t be peace anywhere in the world unless the middle east has completely stabilized, even here in Africa are suffering the indirect consequences of the grinding wars in the holy region.
Lubbykko
27 October 2008, 1:30 EDT (#)
Good site! Interesting information.