So far, there is nothing new in this unhappy litany. But in the last few weeks, we have seen a dramatic deterioration at a local level. What is now happening is not a series of isolated demolitions, but an effort to eradicate entire communities. At Ein Hilweh and Umm Jamal in the northern Jordan Valley, Palestinian shepherds were notified by leaflets left nonchalantly by the side of the road that their villages were about to be evacuated entirely. Hundreds will be left homeless. On December 4, the State Attorney’s office announced in a statement to the High Court of Justice that 40 percent of the village of Susya, in the south Hebron hills, is to be destroyed. Susya has already withstood repeated campaigns of demolition, but this one will cripple the village, perhaps irreversibly. Among the structures to be demolished is the village school. [...]
What has brought about this move toward mass demolitions and dispossession of Palestinian communities in Jerusalem and the occupied territories? Simply put: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his ministers think they can now get away with a campaign of slow ethnic cleansing. When Netanyahu claims, as he did recently, that Israel’s situation has never been better, he means, in part, that in his own mind he has smashed the Palestinian national movement once and for all. I have no doubt that this has been his goal all along. Indeed, Palestinians in the occupied territories are worn out, demoralized, fenced into small discontinuous enclaves where they lack basic human rights, where their land and other property may be appropriated at any moment, and where they may be arrested and incarcerated at the army’s whim. They are, by now, largely paralyzed by despair. Trump’s announcement may galvanize them back into action; we shall see. [...]
Of all Israeli illusions, the two most serious are, first, the idea that Israel can, by sheer military force, put an end to the national aspirations of millions of Palestinian people, and, second, that the conflict between Jews and Palestinians in the Holy Land is a zero-sum game, which only one side can win. The obvious truth is the opposite. Either the two sides fall together into some inescapable hell of their own contriving, or they will find a way to flourish together in some political system or another—two states, a single bi-national state, or a confederation that allows each side its own autonomy and security. In any such scheme, West Jerusalem will be the capital of Israel and East Jerusalem, however it is configured, will be the Palestinian capital. It would have been helpful if Trump had said something like that, instead of capitulating to the Netanyahu vision of brutal domination.
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