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Let’s play the Israel-Palestine impossibility game. It’s timely because the two-state peace for which I have long argued is now widely deemed unattainable. The answer, as one of the most thoughtful observers of the conflict, Peter Beinart, has recently argued, must be one state with equal rights for Jews and Palestinians, “a Jewish home that is not a Jewish state.”
Beinart, the editor at large of Jewish Currents and a longtime two-state advocate, changed his mind. Yes, it’s still possible. He gave up a core conviction, based on the evidence. I salute that rare capacity in an America of declaimed certainties, even as I disagree.
The impossibility game goes like this: You list the reasons that a two-state outcome is impossible, before listing the reasons that a one-state solution is impossible, and then you decide which of the two is less impossible. As you do so, set aside the fact that history is a catalog of “impossible” events. Lastly, draw conclusions that reflect the enigma of personal conviction.
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