CMEP Bulletin: The Two-State Solution at Risk

CMEP Bulletin: The Two-State Solution at Risk

CMEP_logo.jpgIsrael’s Self-Inflicted Wounds [The New York Times]
Ronald S. Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, writes, “If current trends continue, Israel will face a stark choice: Grant Palestinians full rights and cease being a Jewish state or rescind their rights and cease being a democracy. To avoid these unacceptable outcomes, the only path forward is the two-state solution. … Over the last few years, settlements in the West Bank on land that in any deal is likely to become part of a Palestinian state, have continued to grow and expand. Such blinkered Israeli policies are creating an irreversible one-state reality.”
Poll: U.S. Public Sympathy for Israel at Record High [The Jerusalem Post]
“Two months after a Pew poll led to much hand-wringing in Israel because it indicated a deep partisan split over Israel, Gallup released its own poll this week showing that American public support for Israel has never been higher. … According to the poll, 64% of the US population say their sympathies lie more with Israel than the Palestinians, with 19% saying they sympathize more with the Palestinians. … Gallup, like Pew, found a significant partisan gap, but far less pronounced than the Pew findings,” according to The Jerusalem Post.
Israel Moves to Strip 12 Palestinians of Jerusalem Residency [Al Jazeera]
“Four of the 12 are affiliated with the Hamas political movement. … When the four were elected to the Palestinian Authority’s legislative body in 2006, Israel’s then-Interior Minister Ronnie Bar-On revoked their Jerusalem residency status, claiming a ‘breach of loyalty’ for being members of a foreign parliament and of Hamas. They were deported with their families to the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah. But last year, the Supreme Court ruled that the interior minister does not have the power to do so after a petition was filed by rights groups. In response, the Israeli government enacted the bill two weeks ago, giving the minister the legal means to strip the residency documents of any Palestinian whom he deems a threat,” according to Al Jazeera. CMEP opposes any legislation which would limit the ability of Palestinians to engage in nonviolent resistance and condemns any actions that would undermine a Jerusalem shared by Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike.