Ideas for a Solution

If there ever was an impossible assignment for a class related to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, this would be it. There have been so many ideas for how to end this conflict for good, but thus far, none of them work.

Why is this so hard? I've come up with five reasons that make a solution hard to come by.

1. It must please the Israelis.
2. It must please the Palestinians.
3. It must please any interested religious institutions.
4. It must be accepted by the UN and other international communities (i.e. must protect human rights, etc.)
5. It must last.

These are just a few reasons that I will work off of, but there are plenty more.

So is there really any way to fulfill all these requirements? It seems impossible if we were just working with the first two. Alas, I will make an attempt anyway.

The two state solution, as discussed by many (predominantly American political figures) will not work. 1967 is out of the picture, because we have come too far since then. There is new development within both conflicting sides that has spawned since 1967.

But a two state solution sounds beautiful, no? So maybe we reconsider the supposed divisions, and begin to consider other ways of splitting land. I think the West Bank is a good place to start. Let's say the West Bank goes to Palestine, and, I'll even go so far as to say that since they have long been connected to the Palestinian situation, Jordan should give some land to the creation of Palestine too. But Israel worries, because it is a security threat if Palestine is not watched from it's Eastern front also. So we leave a small part of land in Israel's hands. But then there's Gaza. Do we work with Gaza also? If we are going to work with Jordan, we might as well work with Egypt and do something down South too.

There are just way too many facets of this, and the two-state solution is not so easy to come by. So lets forget it.

It's a sad reality, but I just don't see a two-state solution ever being possible. So maybe the best solution is what we have now? How can we idealize the current situation? Can we create a sense of peace, even if the agreement is based on the idea that "we don't want our people dead, and neither do you, so let's stop."

If this is possible, what do we do with Jerusalem? I suppose we look to the world for help on this. If we can't come to an agreement on our own, then there is a dire need for international help.

One last idea- maybe we un-incorporate the whole area of land at conflict. Every community could build it's own, self-governed, city-state. And maybe everybody with interest in the region could live out their own agendas in their own small lands? But this is 2013, that wouldn't work.

To be honest, I could pitch ideas all day, but in the end, I will always revert back to "that wouldn't work."

I don't think that either side wants to stop fighting enough to come to a solution. The international community can't actually make things happen... only propel ideas. So my answer to the question of "how do we end this?" is... "I don't know... and neither does anyone else."