Amazon.com: The One-State Solution: A Breakthrough for Peace in the Israeli-Palestinian Deadlock: Books: Virginia Tilley

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46 of 61 people found the following review helpful:

The One-Book Solution, September 5, 2005

By	John Haines - See all my reviews

For anyone who is curious about the conflict in Israel-Palestine, for anyone
who would like to know the the whys and wherefores of this dispute that has
lasted for over a century, for anyone who doesn't have a lot of time on
their hands to read all the available literature on the subject (and no one
has that much time), just spend a couple of evenings with this book and you
will have a good handle on what is really happening over there and what
needs to be done to find peace between these Semitic peoples.

For anyone who is curious enough to look up the maps of the proposed
division of what was once called Palestine into two states, Israel and
Palestine, it is quite obvious: the 2-state solution cannot possibly happen.
In fact, as Tilley makes abundantly clear, the 2-state solution really never
existed as a factual possibility - it was a propagandistic diversion from the
real issue - how the Arabs and Jews in this tiny land could live together
without killing each other. It isn't as complicated as many would like you
to believe. Both Israelis and Palestinians want and need the same thing -
a place where they can raise their children in safety and enjoy God's
blessings - by the way, its the same God for both of them - but both want
the same land.

Why one group, the Israelis, should claim that their God gave them title to
the land that was once called Palestine and has been inhabited by people,
now called Palestinians, for centuries is beyond me. They claim it is decreed
in the Bible but one can read many interpretations into biblical texts - such
as, white immigrants to North America are manifestly destined by God
to remove, subjugate or destroy all indigenous people, because they had
suntans, and of course because they happened to be in the way.

What Virginia Tilley does is cut through all this crap and bring us to where
we are now. Israel-Palestine, in particular the West Bank (since they have
recently removed the settlements from Gaza), is so divided by immense
settlements (some are actually small cities) and roads to service these
settlements - much as Ariel Sharon predicted long ago with his
cut-them-up-like-a-pastrami-sandwich, facts-on-the-ground strategy - that
the possible establishment of two states is finished, dead, fuggedaboutit.

There is no way in hell that any Israeli politician can advocate the
dismantlement of these settlements which would entail moving hundreds of
thousands of Israelis to some other place in Israel. Therefore there is simply
no room or resources remaining for any second state to be established.

Another solution that is frequently mentioned, particularly by Zionist
fanatics, is that all the Arabs now living either in the occupied territories or
Israel proper be forcibly "transferred" to Jordan or other Arab countries
and be done with. After all, they say, there is so much Arab land and so
little for Israel. Tilley dismisses this possibility, a brutal ethnic cleansing
the likes of which hasn't been seen since the Holocaust, as unlikely due to
international outrage. I am not so confident.

But what about the idea that these two peoples can live together in the
same place? For that I suggest reading this book. If there is one book that
I could recommend on the Israel-Palestine issue, this book is it. I call it
The One-Book Solution.

33 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

Opening a "Forbidden Debate", June 13, 2005

By	J. L. Spates - See all my reviews

The great advantage of Virginia Tilley's new book, in this commentator's eyes, is that it should reintroduce an issue that, for reasons much too complex to go into here, has long been "off the table": the hypothesis that the only viable solution to the Palestinian-Israeli problem is to find a way for the disputing and warring sides to live together. In the early parts of her book, Tilley argues that the policy of "in-fill" of Jewish settlements into areas that might have, once, been part of a possible (if resource-poor, surrounded-by hostile others) Palestinian homeland, have made such a homeland utterly unfeasible. Given this, the only solution is to create a single state wherein, in the creation of that state, the two sides have worked long and hard to find ways to accommodate their differences. Tilley is of course powerfully aware that the practical obstacles--and arguments against--such a solution are enormous, but no more so, she contends, than the practical obstacles and arguments facing any serious two state solution. In the latter part of the book, Tilley attempts to wend her way through the rock and a hard place she has "created," as she tries to meet objections and "pave the way" for serious discussion of the issue. The only reason I give this book a "four" instead of a "five" is that, by book's end, it isn't clear, to me at least, that the "one-state solution" is going to work either--even if (and it's a big "if") those involved in the conflict get down to brass tacks concerning her thesis. However, that's a minor quibble: for generations, the problem has proved intractable and she should hardly be held responsible for not "solving absolutely" a conundrum that has perplexed luminaries and people of good will--on both sides--for a half century and more. But this much she has done--and it is much: a serious student of the region and its issues, a scholar empathetic with the problems faced by each side--particularly with the problems faced by Palestinians--she has given us a clear, sophisticated, well-argued "new idea" to consider about a major world problem. Her book's great contribution is its ability to put before us, seriously, an alternative way to continue intelligent debate about the central issues and enormous suffering going on in that small, incredibly important, seemingly God-forsaken, part of the world she takes as her subject. Very much worth reading and debating, in other words.

35 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

Scholarly and Balanced, November 24, 2005

By	Mahmoud N. Musa (Switzerland) - See all my reviews

Few people are as qualified to write about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as the author of this book. She is a professor of political science with a PhD from the university of Wisconsin with special emphasis on ethnic conflict. Further, Dr. Tilley has had twenty years direct experience with this conflict, including living there for two years. The book, is scholarly, well-documented, and illustrated with maps. It can serve as an excellent background for this conflict, and includes a discussion of the important international actors: the Zionist movement, the Arab States, the United States of America, Europe, and the United Nations.

Conflicts can be resolved by three ways: prevalence, compromise, and transcendence. The first alternative of prevalence, that is, of one party totally defeating the other has failed. Cleansing that land of historic Palestine of one ethnicity or the other has not been possible and is unthinkable, though some continue to advocate such a solution.

The second alternative is compromise: the two-state solution, one Jewish, the other Palestinian. This book convincingly argues that this is not a viable solution that will bring peace to the area and the world at large. Some of the reasons are:

1. The identity and mytho-history of both peoples are based on the total area of historic Palestine. Their collective consciousness will not rest with a fraction of the land.
2. Demographic mixture: Jews live in large numbers in the West Bank occupying 60% of the lad, and it has become unthinkable that they will vacate the area. Palestinians constitute 20% of the population of Israel. Any separation is tantamount to apartheid.
3. Natural resources, especially water, are impossible to divide, and will continue to be a source of tension. About two-thirds of the water Israel consumes comes from the aquifer under the West Bank.
4. Economic: the two economies and potentially the labor force are inextricably linked and interdependent.
5. Politico-legal legitimacy: basing a State on one ethnicity necessarily results with discrimination. Israel cannot be Jewish and also democratic.

A meta-conflict, such as this one, cannot be resolved with compromise and needs to be transcended by forming one democratic secular State for all concerned. After reading this book, I am left convinced of the statement at the end of Chapter 3: "Hence, the one-state solution is not an option to be argued. It is an inevitability to be faced."

This is not to say that this will be an easy solution. Dr. Tilley discusses the potential difficulties and offers proposals for their resolution. Rather than endlessly arguing how to divide this small piece of land, as has been done over the past fifteen years, the energy should be directed towards forming one-State.

Such a State will open the Arab and Muslim worlds for cultural and economic exchange. It will also serve as a bridge between the Middle East on one side and Europe and North American on the other side; contributing to the peace and stability of the entire world.

With this solution the concept of the "Promised Land" will be transformed from the physical to the moral. Rather than warring over a piece real estate, the struggle will be for human rights, justice, and the well-being of the individual. Could it be this is what the God of Abraham really meant by the "Promised Land"?

Professor Mahmoud N. Musa

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