At the time of the ending of the British mandate, Jerusalem belonged to the Palestinians. Only in 1948 did Israel capture West Jerusalem and only in 1967 during the Six Day War did Israel capture and annex East Jerusalem. UN Security Council Resolution 242 of November 1967 calls on Israel to withdraw from "territories occupied." Until this piece of history is put right, no deal will have anything like 80 percent of Palestinian opinion behind it.
This is not meant to be provocative. It is simply stating reality -- a state of affairs that is non-viable cannot be turned into the acceptable by the willpower of politicians alone. Too much water has gone under the historical bridge.
For now what needs to be bought is time. Time for both a Palestinian state to be created (covering 90 percent or so of the West Bank as Barak offered) and time after that for Palestine to learn to live cheek by jowl with Israel, and vice versa. One day, perhaps, not too far into the future, there can be a common market and free migration of labor (which both sides desperately need, as any economist on the spot will tell you). From that could grow a joint sovereignty over the heart of Jerusalem. (There has never been a need, accept a rhetorical one, to talk about the whole of Jerusalem -- this is a city that is over four times the size it was in 1948.)
Meanwhile, both sides should step back from their confrontation over the city and make the heart of Jerusalem an internationally administered city of peace. Let the local government of this part be run by neutral outsiders for a decade or two whilst the two communities learn the art of making the most of their proximity. Is not this city, holy to three great religions, meant to be for all of them the earthly prototype of the heavenly Jerusalem?
RSS