This is a piece written by Gershon Baskin (influential peace activist and hostage negotiator who has negotiated with Hamas on behalf of Israel for two decades) in which he lays out a five step path to peace after the war.
From the article-
“How will we get out of this hell of ongoing war? What state of mental health will we be in the day after the current war? The two nations are now going through their greatest trauma since the establishment of the State of Israel. Without comparing, October 7th was the most traumatic event for the people of Israel since the Holocaust. For the Palestinians, Hamas brought the Palestinian cause back 75 years and today the Palestinians are experiencing a second Nakba. We as Israelis have lost our security and the sense that there is a country behind us that protects us. The Palestinians have never had a state that protects them and cares for their well-being.
The victory picture of this war must be political. The massive killing and destruction within the Israeli communities on the Gaza border and in the Gaza Strip itself will remain etched in our collective memories, Israelis and Palestinians, for many years to come. A new chapter in our narratives is being written these days and the two nations will use these new chapters as another layer in our shared refusal to recognize the rights of each other to exist as a sovereign nation on part of the common homeland.
The history of the two nations during our hundred years war of survival has had almost no break from our so-called national duty for collective mobilization of our national movements to continue fighting until the death, our own and the death of the other side. The history of the two nations here is so full of blood, hatred, religious-divine-messianic impulses, and the sense of the righteousness of our cause (on both sides) along with the burning pain in each of us that drives us to seek revenge has been so much stronger than the logic that requires us to find a way to invest in the sanctity of life rather than the sanctity of death. Haven’t we had enough martyrs already? Didn’t we bury enough of our children?
How will we get out of this hell of ongoing war? What state of mental health will we be in the day after the current war? The two nations are now going through their greatest trauma since the establishment of the State of Israel. Without comparing, October 7th was the most traumatic event for the people of Israel since the Holocaust. For the Palestinians, Hamas brought the Palestinian cause back 75 years and today the Palestinians are experiencing a second Nakba. We as Israelis have lost our security and the sense that there is a country behind us that protects us. The Palestinians have never had a state that protects them and cares for their well-being.
After this terrible war, there must be an “epiphany” on both sides that will make us look ahead, focused and sober, towards creating a new reality in which our energies will be invested in rebuilding our lives and communities based on the acceptance of the very simple principle (but probably very difficult to accept) that everyone who lives between the River and the Sea is entitled to the same right to the same rights. Until both sides recognize the legitimacy of the existence of the other side as a people with an equal right to live here in the common homeland – in the Land of Israel, in the Land of Palestine, the killing, terror, destruction, hatred and desire for revenge will not end.
Obviously, those who brought us to this point must go home. Neither the Israeli leadership nor the Palestinian leadership has the right to continue to lead us. They brought us, all of us to this point and they must go. We Israelis must get out of the delusion that we can rule over another people for fifty-six years and expect to have peace, or to imprison two million people in a closed, small and dense area like the Gaza Strip with abject poverty and with a very young population devoid of any hope for a better future and expect to have quiet. The Palestinians must get out of the illusion that the Jewish people have no connection to this land, that they are occupying foreigners whose existence as a people in this place is illegitimate. This is the meaning of having the same right for the same rights. This is the foundation on which we can build together instead of continuing to kill and destroy.
The day after tomorrow, when the war ends and Gaza will be completely occupied by Israel again, it must be clear to everyone that Israel has no intention of staying in Gaza. The extremist voices in Israel calling for resettlement in Gaza must be shut down immediately. The delusionary Israeli messianic voices calling for mass deportation of Palestinians in Gaza must be stopped even with the threat of arrest because mass deportation is clearly a war crime.
[…]
The five components are:
1. Palestinian leadership heading the process of stabilization in Gaza while carrying out deep reforms in the Palestinian Authority, including democratic elections for the parliament that must win the legitimacy of the Palestinian people.
2. Stationing a multinational Arab force invited by the Palestinian government and led by the Palestinian security forces with a limited mandate of the United Nations Security Council.
3. International commitment to a peace process designed to bring about a two-state solution.
4. International mobilization for the financing and reconstruction of the Gaza Strip and accelerated economic development of the Palestinian state.
5. New leadership in Israel and Palestine
The basic premise of the entire plan proposed here is that Hamas as a military and governmental force no longer exists. The idea of Hamas and the public support for it will still exist and there is no military way to fight against this. Ideas and ideology need to be challenged with better ideas and ideology. The intention of the plan detailed here is to replace the ideas of resistance and the sanctity of death for Palestine with the possibility of living for Palestine and a well-founded hope that the future will bring independence, freedom and life with dignity.“
