No End of Conflict: Rethinking Israel-Palestine

No End of Conflict: Rethinking Israel-Palestine

Yossi Alpher, a veteran of peace process research and dialogue, explains how Israel got into its current situation of growing international isolation, political stalemate, and gathering messianic political influence. He investigates the inability of Israelis and Palestinians to make peace and end their conflict before suggesting not â€œsolutionsâ€ (as there is no current prospect for a realistic comprehensive solution), but ways to moderate and soften the worst aspects of the situation and â€œmuddle throughâ€ as Israel looks to a somber bi-national future.

Alpher argues that a sober reassessment is long overdue in the way the West looks at the Israeli-Palestinian relationship. He submits that we have to stop talking about â€œthe peace processâ€ as if it still seriously exists, that 20 years of the Oslo process have failed for very substantial reasons that the professional peacemakers ignore at their risk, and that Israel is more likely to sink into a single-state reality than to remain truly â€œJewish and democratic.â€ Yet, his is a non-ideological, no nonsense book. Israel will not disappear, will not become impoverished, and will still find strategic partners.

The book opens with a true story of two sisters whose lives were separated in 1947, as a parable for what is still happening in Israelâ€™s relations with the Arab world in general and the Palestinians in particular. It then offers brief analyses of how Israel looks today in the world, from a rejection of deceptive nostalgia for imaginary â€œgood old daysâ€ to a discussion of Israelâ€™s increasingly problematic internal cohesion and the paralysis this generates in decision making regarding territories-for-peace issues. A discussion of Diaspora Jewish influence focuses on the Diasporaâ€™s anachronistic approach to the peace process. It is followed by a look at the highly negative effect regional developments are having on Israeli attitudes toward Arabs in general and peace in particular, using the summer 2014 war with Gaza-based Hamas as a case in point. Next comes a discussion of the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and peace process, looking at the principal processes and dynamics that have thwarted peace and coexistence since the 1930s. Alpher argues that peace process practitioners on all sidesâ€”Israel, Palestinians, other Arabs, the US, the UNâ€”have consistently ignored these dynamics or refused to take them seriously, producing todayâ€™s stalemate. The book concludes with a look at the scaled-down alternatives available today for avoiding, or at least delaying, total paralysis and a one-state reality. These include a UN approach and another unilateral withdrawal. It concludes with an examination of the increasingly influential Israeli proponents of a one-state solution and the spectacular damage their policies are bringing about.
Country USA
Brand Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Manufacturer Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Binding Hardcover
ItemPartNumber 3 maps
ReleaseDate 2016-04-12
UnitCount 1
EANs 9781442258587

Country	USA
Brand	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Manufacturer	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Binding	Hardcover
ItemPartNumber	3 maps
ReleaseDate	2016-04-12
UnitCount	1
EANs	9781442258587

No End of Conflict: Rethinking Israel-Palestine

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