What role should the US play in the efforts to achieve peace in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict?

Answer 1

This is a question asking for opinion, and so naturally, there will be dissenting opinions. This is my view on the matter.

Answer

The US should have a key role in moderating the discussion between Israelis and Palestinians. As the largest financial beneficiary of both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the US has a unique ability to leverage both countries and has the military power to back any tenuous solution with peacekeepers. However, the US should not impose a solution on the two countries, but rather help facilitate developing the tools, providing the spaces, and leading the initiatives that allow Israelis and Palestinians to find a solution. The US should also use its diplomatic clout to dislodge states that have adopted attitudes strongly favoring one side at the expense of the other, such as the Arab States, from this position.

Some of these moderating thoughts that the US should advocate in its relationships with both Israel and Palestine include:

1) Mutual Recognition: Israel would need to recognize a completely independent and sovereign Palestinian Government that would fully control a certain amount of the former British Mandate of Palestine (most likely Gaza and the West Bank). Israel would also have to confer on this state the unambiguous nature of being correct and necessary for Israel. Conversely, Palestine would have to recognize the Right for Israel to Exist as a Jewish State occupying the remaining amount of the British Mandate of Palestine (most likely 1949-Israel). Both sides would have to recognize the historical and emotional value that the land also has to the other.

2) Israeli Reparation Payments: Israel dispossessed many Palestinians of their property, either by malicious activities that took place during the Arab-Israeli Wars or by Ben-Gurion refusing to let Palestinians who left return after the 1948-9 War. Israel needs to pay the Palestinian government reparations for the land that was taken in this way.

3) Israeli Withdrawal from the Settlements: Israel must withdraw from the Settlements to provide Palestine with a viable infrastructure and complete sovereignty. The Settlers must return to Israeli territory. The buildings, however, should be left as partial payment of the above-mentioned reparations.

4) Palestinians Concession of the Right of Return:Recognizing the State of Israel as a Jewish State is meaningless if Palestinians en masse are allowed to Return to Israel. Therefore, Palestinians (and their backers) must abandon the notion that they can ever return to Israeli territory. Palestinians should leave the refugee camps and become proper citizens in this new country of Palestine.

5) Internationalization or Sharing of Jerusalem:Palestine and Israel both want Jerusalem and the only way to solve this is either divide the city East/West respectively and divide the Old City or Internationalize the City or some combination of Internationalization and division. Neither side will rest until it can assure its followers that its holy sites will be protected.

6) Liberal Thought: Just in general, people have to be willing to compromise and live with that compromise.