The Dean of Birzeit University, Ali Jarbani, came to Columbia on Monday April 3rd and gave us his very interesting perspective on what he considers are the best solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. For him, there are three possible alternatives:

1.- The “2 state solution” where you have an Israeli State and a Palestinian State based on the 1967 borders. Israel should leave Gaza and the West Bank, Palestinians should organize their state and, at a second stage, bridges could be built between both states.

2.- The “1 State solution”. Different people would call it different things, but the concept would be the same: A country where both Israeli and Palestinians live in peace together under a secular and democratic nation. For a while, this would create an “apartheid” regime where you have to classes of citizens, but in the long run, the new state would follow the steps of South Africa.

3.- The State of Israel plus a “State of Leftovers”; which entails squeezing the Palestinians as much as possible by building the infamous wall outside of the UN recognized Israeli borders, keeping the checkpoints in place, building settlements, etc. Ali Jarbani made it clear that this is what the Israeli government is intending and, at the same time, what Palestinians will never accept while only provoking resentment and hatred.

The prime obsession for the Israeli government is now, rightly, the demographic issue. Palestinian reproduction rates are much higher than those of their Israeli neighbors. Therefore, they will never accept the 1 state solution, -Ali Jarbani’s favourite option- since this would lead to, in the long run, having an Israeli state with a muslim majority. On the other hand, one could argue that this would not be the case, since higher standards of living and education would lower the Palestinians reproduction rates to those similar to the Israelis.

The reason Palestinians should work towards option number one, Ali Jardani insists, is because the current situation favors Israel and its “state of leftovers” policy. By allowing the existence of the National Palestinian Authority (the NPA) they can blame the entire fault on an “authority” which is completely bankrupt and is therefore economically and politically squeezed to accepting the third option. That is, the NPA is an authority which is everything but an authority.

The creation of the NPA was a beautiful way of permitting Israel to savie face vis-à-vis the international community while building more settlements. Ali Jardani is in favor of dismembering the NPA. Israel would then be forced towards option number one, which in turn would slowly but surely end up creating a 2 state solution: “Israel should be alarmed with the demographic issue and therefore will not accept Palestinians as Israeli citizens. Palestinians will never accept the current apartheid situation therefore the only alternative is the 2 State solution”. It is nevertheless important to note that other Palestinian scholars and leaders, such as Arafat, are completely against such a policy.

As Ali Jarbani interestingly noted, the “left-over Palestinian region is the only area in the world where you live in an autonomous region, outside of a state, where its inhabitants do not have the citizenship of the state”. Also interesting, was his definition of occupation as a “situation where you loose control over your destiny”. Food for thought.