Articles > > Neither Time Nor Energy

Articles - Addostour - Date: 2020-04-29
By: Oraib Al Rantawi

I have neither the time nor the energy to keep track of how many times the PA and PLO leaderships have accused Israel of 'killing the two-state solution', 'putting a mercy bullet to its head', or 'hammering the last nail into its coffin.
 
I do not even have the energy to keep track of everything that brother [chief PLO negotiator] Saeb Erekat alone has said in that vein. For many years, precisely how many I cannot say, and with every Israeli move or decision when it comes to settlement in particular, someone from among the multitude of PA leaders comes out to remind us that Israel is 'killing off the two-state solution.'
 
How many times does the two-state solution have to be 'killed' before we wash our hands of it and turn our attention to options and solutions that are still within our reach? How many times does this solution have to die before we bury it? How many mercy bullets must be put to its limp body to euthanize the two-state solution? The two-state solution's coffin has come to resemble a sieve for all the nails hammered into it, where each is always the final one. The mercy bullets and last nails are never-ending.
 
Israel asked and Washington has granted its blessing to the annexation of the Jordan Valley, settlements, and the Northern Dead Sea. Next summer (June and July), we can look forward to measures being finalized and the crime being 'legalized'. There is no need to prepare a new list of charges of 'killing the two-state solution', or more final nails or mercy bullets. The murderers are openly known, and they boast of their crime. They even call on the international community to follow suit and add more nails and fire a flurry of more bullets into the two-state solution's front and back.
 
The question is not whether or not the two-state solution has been killed, or who killed it. Anyone who has an atom of fairness in their body and a single eye can see that the solution breathed its last long ago, that its corpse decayed after a long wait for someone to bury it, and that it is Israel with the Trump administration's backing who killed the two-state solution willfully and with premeditation.
 
The question is what will we do from now until next summer, and how will we act after that? The PA does not want people to say that it has lost the plot come summer. The Palestinian leadership's offices should have a ready answer to this question, and, in fact, they should have already made significant strides in translating their plan into action, at least since the leaks regarding the 'deal of the century' began circulating in the presses and media.
 
Now is not the time to develop a Plan B or even start implementing it; now should have been when we would be reaping its fruit. The landmarks on the road to the abyss have not only just become clear. Anyone who says otherwise is either blind and without foresight, or helpless and lacking in wherewithal, or is an accomplice conspiring to accept any solution or scenario on the grounds that it is not possible to come up with something better.
 
The PA has said its piece via the president: 'We will void all agreements with Washington and Tel Aviv in the event of annexation.' Will they follow through this time? Have they made preparations to plunge into a new phase of conflict? Have they prepared the Palestinian people to contend with various scenarios and possibilities, including the PA's financial, economic and security collapse?
 
Have they thought about and prepared to create supplemental leadership frameworks, should the existing frameworks cease to fulfill their functions?
 
Have they thought through the scenario of transferring their leadership abroad, and what 'abroad' even means, and if there is even an 'abroad' to transfer to in the first place?.