- The most promising way out of the quagmire, in my view, is what I call the “non-state solution” in which talks of states and statehood are abandoned for the time being in favour of a civil rights struggle for full equality, emancipation and enfranchisement.
Once this has been achieved, ordinary Palestinians and Israelis, long sidelined and ignored in efforts to resolve the conflict, can begin a people’s peace process in which everyone is involved in the quest for coexistence.
The line you quote above is one of many interesting lines in this article. The last line of the article is beautifully written and describes the saddest hopefulness:
Palestinians and Israelis share a similar Mediterranean outlook characterised, among other things, by the central importance of family and a casual attitude to regulations, not to mention an innate distrust of authority.
Is this true in your experience Cumol? the differences within societies are often greater than the disparities between them and others.
This seems true of the USA - California and the East Coast seem world's apart from many places in the US. Of course in Canada, there are also disparities between regions. We are divided by vast geographies compared to Palestine and Israel, crowded along their Mediterranean shores.Although it may take generations, I am convinced that a new dawn of peace and justice will come, but this dawn will come in gradual glimmers and not in a blaze of blinding sunshine, as many hope or dream.
In some of your posts, Cumol, about Palestinean and Israeli burners, lie those glimmers.
It is. Family is still an important factor in Israel/Palestine, no matter where you look. Even though it feels like it is losing its importance slowly in the Arab-Israeli and Arab-Jewish population. This is even more prominent in the "Ashkenazi" Jewish population (west European and American). The innate distrust of authority is well present. On different levels. In some case its distrust of the police (in my hometown, 1 murder a week for the past 5 years, no suspects) or distrust of the government with its corruption (I can't think of a recent minister or MP who was not charged with corruption, including Netanyahu). During my last visit home, I accompanied my father to a client (he is an architect) who wanted to build a house on top of her parent's house. The family was Iraqi-Jewish, and it turns out that the grandma still speaks a few words of arabic. My father and the client left to discuss business and I decided to chat the grandma up. I taught her some of the newer Arabic curse words (her arsenal was a little bit outdated). She still remembered the time she was a child in Iraq. Told me about her Arabic neighbors and how awesome her childhood was. Then her parents moved to Israel in the 60s. Back then, there was no wall, so they would drive to the neighboring Tul-Karem (now in the West Bank) for shopping and hummus. Now they can't anymore.
She was sad. She said that she has nothing against her Arab neighbors and would like to visit them again. And then she whispered to me: "They should take down that wall and let us leave together". One awesome grandma :) I really hope that at some point we will have a government that would just let us live and stop provoking. I get angry every time I hear that new settlements are built. This is not helping, this conflict needs time without provocations, from any side. And less power to the religious, they are fucking up everything.Is this true in your experience Cumol?