WEBVTT - Recognizing Palestine as a State: Meaningful Farce feat. Dana El Kurd 0:00:01.680 --> 0:00:05.920 Col Zone Media. 0:00:06.600 --> 0:00:08.440 Hello everyone, and welcome to say it could happen here. 0:00:09.039 --> 0:00:12.080 My name is Dana al Kerd. I'm a writer, analyst, 0:00:12.119 --> 0:00:16.000 and researcher of Palestinian and Arab politics. I'm an associate 0:00:16.040 --> 0:00:19.360 professor of political science and a senior non resident fellow 0:00:19.400 --> 0:00:22.639 at the Arab Center Washington. What a wild time in 0:00:22.680 --> 0:00:25.279 the Middle East? Am I right? I mean not to 0:00:25.280 --> 0:00:28.680 be flippant. That's putting him mildly. Today before I recorded, 0:00:28.920 --> 0:00:32.240 Israel bombed the capital of Katar, Doha, in an assassination 0:00:32.320 --> 0:00:36.040 attempt against Tamas leadership. They bombed in a residential area 0:00:36.360 --> 0:00:40.040 in the middle of the city, surrounded by nursries, schools, 0:00:40.479 --> 0:00:43.839 businesses and you know people. I have a lot to 0:00:43.840 --> 0:00:46.800 say about Arab Israeli relations historically and what's happening on 0:00:46.800 --> 0:00:50.280 that front today and the sometimes shared interests of Arab 0:00:50.280 --> 0:00:52.760 regimes with the Israeli state. So stay tuned for a 0:00:52.760 --> 0:00:55.920 deep dive episode on that topic soon. Today I want 0:00:55.920 --> 0:00:59.240 to talk about the issue of Palestinian statehood. It's been 0:00:59.280 --> 0:01:01.840 in the news quite a bit these days. A number 0:01:01.880 --> 0:01:05.360 of different countries have expressed a willingness to recognize Palestine 0:01:05.360 --> 0:01:08.120 as a state. In July, for example, France announced it 0:01:08.160 --> 0:01:11.320 would recognize Palestinian statehood, and it was soon joined by 0:01:11.400 --> 0:01:14.479 a number of other countries, Canada, Malta, Belgium, the UK. 0:01:15.080 --> 0:01:17.720 Kir Starmer, the Prime Minister of the UK, actually made 0:01:17.720 --> 0:01:20.880 it into an explicit threat. Basically, we will recognize the 0:01:20.880 --> 0:01:23.640 state of Palestine if the Israelis don't agree to a ceasefire. 0:01:24.240 --> 0:01:26.560 I'd like to underscore the absurdity of that comment for 0:01:26.600 --> 0:01:29.760 a second, but we'll get back to that one. For 0:01:29.840 --> 0:01:33.000 all these countries, they say that they are recognizing Palestine 0:01:33.000 --> 0:01:36.000 as a state because they desire a two state solution. 0:01:36.840 --> 0:01:40.679 Their condition for recognizing Palestine as a state also includes 0:01:41.120 --> 0:01:45.160 Hamas being completely out of the picture quote demilitarized in 0:01:45.200 --> 0:01:48.960 the language of French President Macron. As NPR reported back 0:01:49.000 --> 0:01:53.000 in August first, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Karney also said 0:01:53.080 --> 0:01:56.680 that the Palestinian authority needs to hold elections in this scenario, 0:01:56.960 --> 0:02:00.440 but one that excludes Hamas. So all of these recent 0:02:00.480 --> 0:02:04.520 announcements are coalescing around the same conditions. I guess the 0:02:04.520 --> 0:02:07.560 big deal here is that these are major powers, France 0:02:07.640 --> 0:02:10.079 and the UK, who have veto power in the UN 0:02:10.120 --> 0:02:14.480 Security Council. For example. So the plan to recognize Palestinian 0:02:14.520 --> 0:02:17.600 statehood has gotten a lot of press and attention, But 0:02:17.680 --> 0:02:20.840 the thing is, one hundred and forty five countries already 0:02:20.880 --> 0:02:24.480 recognize Palestine as a state. Palestine was given observer status 0:02:24.480 --> 0:02:27.840 at the UN in twenty twelve, and the Palestinian authority 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:30.639 has been working for quite some time to get more 0:02:30.680 --> 0:02:34.040 recognition internationally and to be able to use the international 0:02:34.120 --> 0:02:38.359 legal system to advocate for themselves. So what does this 0:02:38.520 --> 0:02:44.480 recognition actually mean a state that is occupied entirely by 0:02:44.520 --> 0:02:48.400 another and is currently undergoing ethnic cleansing at different levels 0:02:48.400 --> 0:02:52.000 of severity in all parts of its territories. What state 0:02:52.280 --> 0:02:56.160 is actually being recognized here? What does statehood mean in 0:02:56.200 --> 0:02:59.960 the context of occupation ethnic cleansing. It might help to 0:03:00.120 --> 0:03:02.080 go back to the Osclocords that were as signed by 0:03:02.080 --> 0:03:05.799 the Palistine Liberation Organization the PLO, and the State of Israel. 0:03:06.520 --> 0:03:08.800 This was the first time that Israel and the Palestinians 0:03:08.840 --> 0:03:12.120 agreed to something directly. A stipulation of the OSCLO Accords 0:03:12.280 --> 0:03:16.360 was mutual recognition, meaning Israel would recognize that the PLO 0:03:16.639 --> 0:03:19.480 was the representative of the Palestinian people, and the PLO 0:03:19.520 --> 0:03:23.480 would recognize Israel's right to exist. This was later criticized 0:03:23.480 --> 0:03:27.920 as uneven by Palstdian negotiators such as Hannan Ashtroi, because 0:03:27.960 --> 0:03:31.640 the PLO was already internationally recognized as the representative of 0:03:31.639 --> 0:03:35.560 the Palestinian people. So her argument more recently has been 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:40.040 they accepted Israel's control for getting recognition in return. The 0:03:40.160 --> 0:03:42.840 US ambassador to Israel at the time, Daniel Kurtzer, concurred 0:03:42.880 --> 0:03:45.320 with that assessment, saying to The New York Times that 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:48.920 the OSCLO agreement was full of holes. The mutual recognition 0:03:49.280 --> 0:03:52.560 was asymmetrical, and that was to hurt the Palestinian negotiating 0:03:52.560 --> 0:03:56.920 position for years to come. End quote. Nevertheless, the OSCLO 0:03:56.920 --> 0:03:59.640 Accords of nineteen ninety three are widely understood to be 0:03:59.680 --> 0:04:02.080 the attempt to bring about a two state solution of 0:04:02.120 --> 0:04:05.800 some kind, and it's been the framework that many international 0:04:05.840 --> 0:04:09.680 powers have paid lip service to ever since. By the way, 0:04:10.000 --> 0:04:13.240 September twenty twenty three marked the thirty year anniversary of 0:04:13.240 --> 0:04:16.160 the accords, we all know what happened October seventh, just 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:19.760 a few days later. The thing is, the also framework 0:04:20.080 --> 0:04:24.520 didn't say two states. The ASCO Accords just said that 0:04:24.720 --> 0:04:29.080 they would continue negotiations on some eventual final framework. Now 0:04:29.279 --> 0:04:33.159 Palestinians wanted a state, of course, and Israelis were committing 0:04:33.200 --> 0:04:37.000 to negotiations. So the Palestinians were told to start building 0:04:37.040 --> 0:04:39.480 up a sort of state, a quasi state, in parts 0:04:39.480 --> 0:04:44.120 of the occupied territories, to start governing themselves in particular ways, 0:04:44.480 --> 0:04:47.600 and this was called the Palestinian National Authority. I talked 0:04:47.600 --> 0:04:49.640 about this at more length than the episode for it 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:53.479 could happen here titled Palestine's Stolen Future, so if you're interested, 0:04:53.480 --> 0:04:56.920 you can listen to that one. The Alco Accords split 0:04:56.960 --> 0:05:01.040 the occupied territories into three parts A, B, and C, 0:05:01.880 --> 0:05:04.960 all of which remained under the Israeli occupation's control, but 0:05:05.080 --> 0:05:07.919 still there were some differences between them. In Area A, 0:05:08.000 --> 0:05:10.080 which is less than twenty percent of the land, that's 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:12.320 where a lot of the urban centers are, the palisten 0:05:12.440 --> 0:05:15.440 And Authority was allowed to function, build and run institutions 0:05:15.440 --> 0:05:18.080 of governance. So if you go to Romalo, for example, 0:05:18.160 --> 0:05:22.200 you'll see big buildings with palstin And Authority insignia. An 0:05:22.279 --> 0:05:26.000 Area B, the palsten And Authority had partial access, and 0:05:26.080 --> 0:05:29.000 an Area C, which is the majority of the territories. 0:05:29.560 --> 0:05:32.680 The Palsten Authority was and continues to not be allowed 0:05:32.680 --> 0:05:35.600 to function, But the PA did use this as an 0:05:35.600 --> 0:05:40.080 opportunity to create the basis of a state, creating ministries, 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:44.880 beginning of parliament, writing laws, and importantly creating security forces. 0:05:45.920 --> 0:05:51.240 Throughout all this, Israel maintained military control over the entire territory, 0:05:51.640 --> 0:05:56.400 and Israeli settlements continued to expand. So what the Israeli 0:05:56.400 --> 0:05:59.680 has got out of the Also Accords was they got 0:05:59.720 --> 0:06:03.400 out of providing certain services and they let Palestinians do 0:06:03.480 --> 0:06:07.080 that for themselves, but they didn't actually seed meaningful control 0:06:07.240 --> 0:06:10.760 over any part of the territory. Now it's important to 0:06:10.800 --> 0:06:15.800 pause here. An occupying force is obligated under international law 0:06:16.200 --> 0:06:19.760 to provide services to the population it occupies and to 0:06:19.839 --> 0:06:24.120 return the land to the sovereign the occupied people as 0:06:24.160 --> 0:06:27.680 soon as possible as The European Society of International Law 0:06:27.760 --> 0:06:32.240 notes quote the nineteen oh seven Hague Regulations, the nineteen 0:06:32.279 --> 0:06:35.560 forty nine Fourth Geneva Convention, and modern Body of international 0:06:35.640 --> 0:06:39.240 Human rights instruments contain a number of provisions which protect 0:06:39.240 --> 0:06:44.560 the lives, property, natural resources, institutions, civil life, fundamental human 0:06:44.640 --> 0:06:48.400 rights and latent sovereignty of the people under occupation, while 0:06:48.480 --> 0:06:51.760 curbing the security powers of the occupying power to those 0:06:51.880 --> 0:06:57.520 genuinely required to safely administer the occupation end quote. And 0:06:57.960 --> 0:07:02.560 if the occupier occupies indefinitely, then it's not really an 0:07:02.560 --> 0:07:05.800 occupation anymore, is it Again? As the European Society of 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:10.000 International Law notes, the concept of prolonged occupation may well 0:07:10.040 --> 0:07:14.240 become illegal guise that masks a de facto colonial exercise 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:18.080 and defeats the transient and exceptional nature which occupations are 0:07:18.080 --> 0:07:22.560 intended to be. End quote. But that is exactly what 0:07:22.680 --> 0:07:35.960 has continued before and after the ascol Cords. The ASCO 0:07:36.000 --> 0:07:40.280 Accords never ended, the occupation never gave back land to Palestinians. 0:07:40.680 --> 0:07:44.400 Alla did is stripped the occupier of its responsibility under 0:07:44.440 --> 0:07:48.240 the guise of working towards a two state solution. And really, 0:07:48.520 --> 0:07:51.640 anybody who has looked at what has transpired honestly would 0:07:51.640 --> 0:07:53.840 say that there has always been a mismatch between what 0:07:53.880 --> 0:07:56.600 the Israelis wanted and we're willing to give and what 0:07:56.640 --> 0:07:59.560 the Palestinians wanted, even to the degree of what both 0:07:59.600 --> 0:08:02.800 sides meant when they said state has always been mismatched. 0:08:03.480 --> 0:08:06.840 So I'll explain what I mean. Palestinians have always wanted 0:08:06.880 --> 0:08:10.559 a legitimate state. What does that mean. Well, a state 0:08:10.640 --> 0:08:14.920 has sovereignty, It has control over its own territory, it 0:08:14.960 --> 0:08:17.720 has the monopoly on the use of violence within its boundaries. 0:08:18.120 --> 0:08:21.840 That's the most basic definition of state sovereignty. Israel never 0:08:21.920 --> 0:08:25.720 intended for any of that. Prime Minister Yitzak Rabin, who 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:28.120 signed the Oscil Accords, in his final address to the 0:08:28.160 --> 0:08:30.800 Kanesset before he was assassinated by a right wing Israeli 0:08:31.360 --> 0:08:34.359 clearly stated that what was on offer for the Palestinians 0:08:34.760 --> 0:08:38.640 was something quote less than a state. Yitzak Rabin was 0:08:38.679 --> 0:08:41.800 in the Labor Party. But again, if people are being honest, 0:08:41.880 --> 0:08:45.959 this is a bipartisan position Israel. Israeli political leaders have 0:08:46.160 --> 0:08:49.720 at best offered something less than a state, and at 0:08:49.760 --> 0:08:56.079 worst offered surrender or annihilation. I'm not being hyperbolic here. Besides, 0:08:56.160 --> 0:08:58.720 Motrich of the Religious Zionist Party, who is now the 0:08:58.760 --> 0:09:03.680 Finance Minister, has for years actively promoted his quote decisive Plan, 0:09:04.200 --> 0:09:07.160 which has become the policy of the state today. The 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:10.760 plan proposes that one any Palestinian who is willing and 0:09:10.840 --> 0:09:15.000 able to relinquish the fulfillment of his national aspirations would 0:09:15.040 --> 0:09:17.720 be able to stay and live as an individual in 0:09:17.720 --> 0:09:21.240 the Jewish State, not as a citizen. And two, any 0:09:21.240 --> 0:09:25.360 Palestinian who is unwilling or unable to relinquish his national 0:09:25.400 --> 0:09:30.240 aspirations will receive assistance from them to immigrate to one 0:09:30.240 --> 0:09:33.480 of the Arab countries. So essentially, what he's saying is 0:09:33.960 --> 0:09:36.800 Palestinians have to either give up and be a subject 0:09:37.280 --> 0:09:42.840 or leave, surrender, or transfer. The US as a supposed 0:09:42.920 --> 0:09:46.160 mediator and third party has not really straight from that. 0:09:46.960 --> 0:09:50.640 Sovereignty has always been approximated with self governance from the 0:09:50.720 --> 0:09:54.560 United States perspective. Jared Kushner, for example, in his Peace 0:09:54.600 --> 0:09:57.600 to Prosperity plan, which was the lynchpin of Donald Trump's 0:09:57.600 --> 0:10:01.200 Israel Palestine proposer back in the first Trump administration, invokes 0:10:01.240 --> 0:10:04.679 the idea of sovereignty, only to insist that it should 0:10:04.720 --> 0:10:08.000 no longer be the crux of negotiations. According to the 0:10:08.000 --> 0:10:12.080 Trump administration quote, the notion that sovereignty is a static 0:10:12.160 --> 0:10:16.319 and consistently defined term has been an unnecessary stumbling block 0:10:16.520 --> 0:10:21.040 in past negotiations, and this amorphous concept is best put 0:10:21.080 --> 0:10:26.600 aside to focus on pragmatic and operational concerns. Ironically, the 0:10:26.679 --> 0:10:30.000 liberal version of a two state solution espoused by every 0:10:30.000 --> 0:10:35.400 democratic administration essentially envisions the same endpoint, a Palestinian entity 0:10:36.000 --> 0:10:41.400 demilitarized and subordinate to Israel's economic and security concerns. But 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:44.920 Palestinians want a state. They want a state in the 0:10:44.920 --> 0:10:47.360 full meaning of the term, and that state has to 0:10:47.400 --> 0:10:50.560 be legitimate, not only internationally, but in the eyes of 0:10:50.559 --> 0:10:55.280 the Palestinian people. Political scientist Tanya Alberts argues that sovereignty 0:10:55.480 --> 0:10:58.720 is an identity of states. It's constituted by the norms 0:10:58.720 --> 0:11:02.679 of international society. States are recognized as sovereign if they 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:06.480 achieve self determination for a group of people. The fact that, 0:11:06.559 --> 0:11:10.120 on rare occasions, the international system has refused to recognize 0:11:10.120 --> 0:11:14.320 certain political entities as states, specifically because they had violated 0:11:14.360 --> 0:11:17.880 the right of self determination, highlights how we now think 0:11:17.960 --> 0:11:22.040 of political authority. So, for example, the international community did 0:11:22.040 --> 0:11:25.200 not recognize Rhodesia as a state because it violated the 0:11:25.200 --> 0:11:28.319 self determination of the black majority in that country, even 0:11:28.360 --> 0:11:32.199 though white people in Rhodesia did exercise material control over 0:11:32.240 --> 0:11:36.000 that country. In other words, the state's right to sovereignty 0:11:36.480 --> 0:11:40.640 must flow from some sort of legitimacy. A state rules 0:11:41.200 --> 0:11:45.880 because society approves. This doesn't mean that every sovereign state 0:11:45.920 --> 0:11:50.079 is democratic, but simply that states derive their status from 0:11:50.160 --> 0:11:53.760 the citizens buy in, and because the state claims to 0:11:53.800 --> 0:11:57.160 represent the will of maybe a certain ethnic or civic identity, 0:11:57.600 --> 0:11:59.920 it's understood as an executor of the law in act 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:03.600 acted by the people who are sovereign. So sovereignty, then 0:12:03.920 --> 0:12:07.800 should also be understood as the ability of people who 0:12:07.880 --> 0:12:11.319 consider themselves of that place to exercise control over a 0:12:11.440 --> 0:12:14.840 territory and have a say in its future. Populist movements, 0:12:14.920 --> 0:12:18.520 secessionist movements, and other movements that challenge a certain state 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:23.200 sometimes claim popular sovereignty, legitimizing their assertions with reference to 0:12:23.240 --> 0:12:27.679 their historical legacy or continuity or indigenity, even in the 0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:32.760 absence of a representative state, and Palestinians are one such group. 0:12:33.280 --> 0:12:36.319 They've struggled not merely for the right to exist, but 0:12:36.440 --> 0:12:40.840 also for political control in state institutions that represent and 0:12:40.920 --> 0:12:45.839 uphold their national identity. And the legitimacy of their sovereignty 0:12:45.840 --> 0:12:50.360 claim stems not only from their long ties to the territory, 0:12:50.760 --> 0:12:53.400 but also from the fact that they have long conceived 0:12:53.400 --> 0:12:57.400 themselves as a nation, a nation that has never ceded 0:12:57.400 --> 0:13:01.080 its demand for a sovereign state with the promise of subjugation, 0:13:01.600 --> 0:13:06.240 subsistence or integration into another state. So, to make this 0:13:06.559 --> 0:13:10.880 very clear, Palestinians want the state that is sovereign. They 0:13:11.040 --> 0:13:15.000 certainly don't mean self governance. And Palestinians, after thirty years 0:13:15.040 --> 0:13:18.960 of OSLO that has only left them worse off, certainly 0:13:19.000 --> 0:13:21.559 don't want to go back to trying the same process again. 0:13:22.720 --> 0:13:26.640 So when these countries recognize Palestine as a state as 0:13:26.640 --> 0:13:30.120 a way of pretending to pressure for the two state solution, 0:13:31.000 --> 0:13:33.960 they're not saying anything about what happens to the territories 0:13:33.960 --> 0:13:37.360 that are currently being wiped out, like literally all of 0:13:37.400 --> 0:13:40.520 Gaza and even parts of the West Bank. They're not 0:13:40.520 --> 0:13:45.480 saying anything about Israeli settlements, They're not saying anything about reparations. 0:13:45.880 --> 0:13:49.280 And because of that, some Palestinians have argued that these 0:13:49.280 --> 0:13:53.839 statehood recognition things are a cynical ploy to distract from 0:13:53.880 --> 0:13:57.600 the inaction of these countries on addressing the genocide in Gaza, 0:13:57.720 --> 0:14:01.959 basically pretending to act without actually doing any. Palestinian analyst 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:05.439 Mahin Robani said this to NPR recently. Quote In the end, 0:14:05.640 --> 0:14:09.760 simply recognizing Palestinian statehood is a low cost option. It 0:14:09.840 --> 0:14:13.600 may placate a domestic audience demanding action, while doing very 0:14:13.640 --> 0:14:17.000 little to actually change the situation on the ground end quote. 0:14:17.920 --> 0:14:22.120 Others have argued even further that not only are these 0:14:22.560 --> 0:14:27.480 declarations of recognition a cynical ploy to distract, but they 0:14:27.520 --> 0:14:30.880 may even be a sort of trap. Legal expert and 0:14:30.920 --> 0:14:35.480 professor nuraa At and international lawyer and professor Shadhamuri wrote 0:14:35.480 --> 0:14:37.880 for Jidelia on this, which I'll link in the show notes. 0:14:38.480 --> 0:14:40.840 They argue effectively that the best thing to come out 0:14:40.880 --> 0:14:44.080 of this is a challenge maybe to the US. Quote. 0:14:44.440 --> 0:14:48.560 The greatest promise of this renewed statehood bid, the most 0:14:48.560 --> 0:14:51.520 recent push being in twenty eleven twenty twelve, is a 0:14:51.640 --> 0:14:55.120 united front to challenge US and transigent support for Israel 0:14:55.360 --> 0:15:00.520 end quote. However, they also point out that quote states 0:15:00.560 --> 0:15:03.320 do not need to recognize Palestine to end the occupation, 0:15:03.560 --> 0:15:07.080 to end the genocide and advance Palestinian self determination. They 0:15:07.200 --> 0:15:12.200 argue that states quote need decisive will to impose arms 0:15:12.200 --> 0:15:15.360 and energy embargoes and trade with and investment in Israel 0:15:16.000 --> 0:15:19.880 unseated from the un hold Israeli war criminals and complicit 0:15:19.920 --> 0:15:23.560 corporations accountable in their national courts, and arrest Prime Minister 0:15:23.640 --> 0:15:37.160 Benjamin Nataniehu in compliance with the ICC's arrest warrant end quote. 0:15:38.960 --> 0:15:43.000 So the bit for statehood doesn't solve problems. It only 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:46.760 gives states the fig leaf to actually delay solving problems. 0:15:47.280 --> 0:15:50.920 On top of that, it risks empowering illegitimate and corrupt 0:15:50.920 --> 0:15:55.520 Palestinian leadership in any future negotiations. I'm talking a leadership 0:15:55.600 --> 0:15:59.120 that includes Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas, who eighty percent of 0:15:59.120 --> 0:16:02.600 Palestinian's poll said they want him to resign, and an 0:16:02.680 --> 0:16:06.760 institution like the Palestinian Authority that only fifteen percent of 0:16:06.800 --> 0:16:10.320 Palestinians are satisfied with according to the latest polling as 0:16:10.360 --> 0:16:14.240 at that hamurin note quote. The terms of the High 0:16:14.320 --> 0:16:17.400 Level International Conference for the Peaceful Settlement of the Question 0:16:17.480 --> 0:16:20.560 of Palestine, convened in New York, led by France and 0:16:20.600 --> 0:16:24.320 the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia confirm these risks. The Palestinian 0:16:24.360 --> 0:16:28.520 Authority is glorified in at least seven clauses entrusted with 0:16:28.600 --> 0:16:32.480 governing the state, effectively paving the way for a police 0:16:32.480 --> 0:16:37.880 state alongside a settler colonial entity end quote. None of 0:16:37.920 --> 0:16:41.560 the talk of recognizing Palestine amid all of these conditions 0:16:41.600 --> 0:16:45.560 and stipulations ever say anything about the power imbalance between 0:16:45.560 --> 0:16:49.240 the two parties or address the root causes of conflict. Now. 0:16:49.280 --> 0:16:52.600 On the other hand, political scientist Paul Post, writing for 0:16:52.640 --> 0:16:56.880 a World Politics Review, says, quote, recognition isn't just theater. 0:16:57.440 --> 0:17:01.120 Recognition is a long standing legal institution that has the 0:17:01.160 --> 0:17:04.760 important function of identifying major actors in the international system. 0:17:05.080 --> 0:17:08.760 And for policymakers, recognition is the looseness in the rules 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:12.160 that allows them to use recognition not only to identify actors, 0:17:12.160 --> 0:17:15.240 but also to express opinions about them or to secure 0:17:15.240 --> 0:17:20.000 concessions from them. So, from his perspective, these declarations of 0:17:20.040 --> 0:17:25.080 recognition are meaningful in some shape or form. Here's my take, 0:17:25.400 --> 0:17:30.200 statehood recognition is not meaningless. In fact, it's probably dangerous 0:17:30.280 --> 0:17:32.840 in this current moment, because what it's trying to do 0:17:33.560 --> 0:17:36.960 is to cement the conflict in its place. These countries 0:17:37.000 --> 0:17:42.000 recognizing Palestine want to hurry the current Palestinian leadership into 0:17:42.040 --> 0:17:45.160 accepting a state and name only that is not sovereign. 0:17:45.520 --> 0:17:47.520 They want to force the Israelis to the table to 0:17:47.560 --> 0:17:49.960 do that, and they want these conditions to become the 0:17:50.000 --> 0:17:54.280 precedent for future negotiations. And we see signs of this 0:17:54.440 --> 0:17:59.000 in other ways. For example, the international community and regional 0:17:59.119 --> 0:18:03.880 powers pressured Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbass into changing the rules 0:18:04.200 --> 0:18:07.760 of the PLO's internal governance in order to appoint a 0:18:07.760 --> 0:18:10.280 successor because they were afraid he was going to keel over, 0:18:10.880 --> 0:18:14.800 and he appointed a very unpopular figure named senranchech As, 0:18:14.840 --> 0:18:18.040 I wrote for The Guardian alongside palestiniancially an activist Pablo 0:18:18.080 --> 0:18:22.160 of Abbufom in May of this year. Abbas also expanded 0:18:22.160 --> 0:18:25.320 the Central Council of the PLO and appointed friendly people 0:18:25.320 --> 0:18:29.080 to it. All of this shows that the international community, 0:18:29.320 --> 0:18:32.480 in pressuring the Pasteinian leadership in these directions, has no 0:18:32.600 --> 0:18:36.840 interest in democratic buy in, in actually getting the buy 0:18:36.880 --> 0:18:40.560 in of the Palestinian people, really thinking that a legitimate 0:18:40.560 --> 0:18:46.040 negotiation would ever be sustainable under these circumstances. This state 0:18:46.080 --> 0:18:50.480 of affairs, these schemes where international powers try to ignore 0:18:50.520 --> 0:18:53.760 what the Palestinian people want yet again, is the reason 0:18:53.800 --> 0:18:57.320 Palestinians don't really have any hope in any solution. In 0:18:57.400 --> 0:19:03.280 polling on Onesday Tuesday, et cetera. Forty seven percent prefer 0:19:03.359 --> 0:19:06.200 the two state solution based on the nineteen sixty seven borders, 0:19:06.560 --> 0:19:10.360 fifteen percent prefer confederation between the two states, and fourteen 0:19:10.400 --> 0:19:13.120 percent of Palestinians prefer the establishment of a single state 0:19:13.160 --> 0:19:16.040 with equality between the two sides. Twenty four percent of 0:19:16.040 --> 0:19:18.760 Palestinians polled said that they did not know or did 0:19:18.760 --> 0:19:22.600 not want to answer. Also, when asked about the public's 0:19:22.600 --> 0:19:25.760 support or opposition to specific political measures to break the 0:19:25.840 --> 0:19:31.040 current political deadlock, sixty eight percent of Palestinians supported joining 0:19:31.080 --> 0:19:35.560 more international organizations, but still fifty percent supported resorting to 0:19:35.760 --> 0:19:39.399 unarmed popular resistance. Forty six percent supported a return to 0:19:39.640 --> 0:19:43.000 armed Intafaldo, and forty two percent supported the dissolution of 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:46.479 the Palestinian authority. Twenty six percent supported abandoning the two 0:19:46.520 --> 0:19:49.400 state solution and demanding one state for Palstinians and Israelis. 0:19:50.160 --> 0:19:53.760 What this sort of polling shows is that Palestinians now 0:19:53.840 --> 0:19:58.480 understand very clearly that the international system is screwing them over, 0:19:59.000 --> 0:20:02.159 international law hasn't been able to help them, and that 0:20:02.160 --> 0:20:05.359 the solutions for a two state solution being proposed with 0:20:05.480 --> 0:20:08.360 all of these conditions won't ever actually get to two 0:20:08.359 --> 0:20:12.440 states and won't give them real sovereignty. The mass protests 0:20:12.440 --> 0:20:15.240 and actions that took place in twenty twenty one Palestinian 0:20:15.240 --> 0:20:18.679 activists called this the Unity Uprising or Intafalda, showed that 0:20:18.720 --> 0:20:22.160 this has always been about sovereignty. In the Unity Intafalda 0:20:22.200 --> 0:20:25.600 of twenty twenty one, Palstinian activists spoke of a shared 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:31.000 struggle against Israel's continued erasure of Palestinians. Palestinians living under 0:20:31.040 --> 0:20:34.720 Israeli rule across the country, whether they had citizenship or 0:20:34.760 --> 0:20:38.360 they didn't, rejected the old style of politics. They rejected 0:20:38.400 --> 0:20:41.879 what they saw as artificial fragmentation and they insisted instead 0:20:41.960 --> 0:20:45.640 on their national identity and shared struggle. As a result, 0:20:46.160 --> 0:20:49.160 at that time we witnessed an extraordinary amount of organizing 0:20:49.400 --> 0:20:53.199 across the Green line, so in the territories and in Israel, 0:20:53.240 --> 0:20:55.800 with Palestinian citizens of Israel, and it was a way 0:20:55.840 --> 0:20:59.919 of reclaiming Palestinian sovereignty. The same activists in groups involved 0:21:00.080 --> 0:21:03.880 in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Shechharrah linked up with those 0:21:04.000 --> 0:21:07.520 organizing in Heifa and Uml Fahm. They built on these 0:21:07.520 --> 0:21:11.080 connections to launch campaigns over and over in Masafietta, the 0:21:11.119 --> 0:21:15.920 Knockub and much more. Sovereignty has always been an animating 0:21:16.000 --> 0:21:19.880 demand for Palestinians since before October seventh, and that's surely 0:21:20.040 --> 0:21:22.280 on everyone's minds now that the war on Gaza has 0:21:22.280 --> 0:21:26.680 extended this long. So the takeaway here is recognition isn't 0:21:26.680 --> 0:21:30.000 the solution. Statehood may not even be the solution, at 0:21:30.080 --> 0:21:33.200 least not in the terms they're offering. Sovereignty has always 0:21:33.240 --> 0:21:36.879 been what the demand is, and these pushes for recognition 0:21:37.359 --> 0:21:41.200 miss that point yet again. That's it for me. Thank 0:21:41.240 --> 0:21:44.040 you for listening to another Palestine episode, and I'll be 0:21:44.119 --> 0:21:45.840 back with more soon. Take care. 0:21:45.840 --> 0:21:51.560 It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media. 0:21:51.640 --> 0:21:54.680 For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website 0:21:54.760 --> 0:21:58.359 coolzonmedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, 0:21:58.400 --> 0:22:01.800 Apple Podcasts, or wherever where you listened to podcasts, you 0:22:01.800 --> 0:22:03.960 can now find sources for It Could Happen here, listed 0:22:04.000 --> 0:22:06.680 directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening.