You say “the Islamic Palestinian state should be allowed to fall short of it (the UDHR) too as a starting position”.

The Islamic Palestinian state’s starting position is Sharia law and the discriminatory Cairo Declaration – not the UDHR. The UDHR and the Cairo Declaration are sets of rules. To judge the standards of adherence to the UDHR by an Islamic state is akin to judging the performance of a team playing cricket by the rules of football. They’re playing a different game by different rules.

Can you explain why you think an Islamic Palestinian state would abandon the rules in the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam and embrace what the OIC calls the Judeo/Christian/secular UDHR or agree to be judged by its principles?

When you write: “it would be better if they both acheived those standards…..” you are imposing your own western view of the world on Islamic states who do not share your worldview.

Sovereignty is the right to exercise, within a specific territory of a kingdom or a nation state, the highest authority by the law – and be answerable to no higher authority.

The Palestian Authority’s Basic Law states that Islam is the national religion and that Palestinian legislation is based on the principles of Islamic Shari’a law. On that basis, a Palestinian state is required to institutionalise legal and societal discrimination and can legitimately be called to account for failing to meet its discriminatory obligations set down in Shari’a law and the Cairo Declaration.

If Israel fails to meet its own egalitarian standard laid down in its egalitarian Declaration of Independence and Basic Law, it can legitimately be held to account – as it frequently is. The same principle applies to the British government being held to account for failing to ensure that women’s pay be equal to that of a male.

Are you suggesting that Israel abandons its founding egalitarian principles, and the UN Declaration of Human Rights, the western gold standard, and instead adopts Shari’a law and the Cairo Declaration in order to match an Islamic Palestinian state?

I did read the Cairo Declaration and I take your point. It’s not an enlightened document. There are muslim states out there who exceed the standards set down in it though, so it’s not like there’s no hope. In terms of matching Israel I would say that we’re not talking utopian standards here either. A 2005 US State Department report on Israel and the Occupied Territories talked about institutional, legal, and societal discrimination against the country’s Arab citizens. So that’s a low enough base to aim at.

If you’ve had time to research the Cairo Declaration, you will by now have realised that the putative Palestinian state can’t “match Israel in terms of minority rights”, nor can the two states “look as much like each other as possible”, unless the Palestinian state jettisons Islamic values.

I wasn’t accusing opponents of a two-state solution of not being clever if that’s what you thought. Like you say, that’s just the prevailing opinion I see on my TV and the websites I come across in my US/UK bubble. I hadn’t heard of Avrum Burg before but I definitely wouldn’t want to end up in the company of Olmert. I think we both have similar reservations about treating the establishment of a Palestinian state as an end. The aftermath, winning the peace so to speak, is going to be extremely difficult. The only thing you can do is try to sort out some of the peripheral issues of Syria, Lebanon, Iran and so on before you sign a deal. I think Syria looks desperate for a deal of its own from what I’ve been reading and some movement there might have a knock-on effect on the other problems. Then you have to make the two states look as much like each other as possible.

I think the US in particular has some strategic interest in a strong, committed ally in the region to do some of its dirty work but Europe less so which is reflected in the different political tone you hear. Europe doesn’t appreciate US and Israeli foreign policy radicalising their significant muslim minorities that aren’t as integrated as they are in the US. Obviously most people and all governments want this situation to go away with the minimum amount of trauma possible.

I’m kind of ‘onboard’ with the two-state-solution (because most of the clever people seem to be)…

It’s important to remember on whose behalf people are speaking. The two-state arrangement is definitely good for Europe and the United States. Europeans and Americans who oppose the two-state arrangement do so either out of divided loyalty, or out of a sentimental attachment to Israel, or out of stupidity. If anything, I’d say that it’s in the interests of those states to be strongly pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel. Since the end of the Cold War, Israel’s interests have been strongly incompatible with Europe’s and America’s true interests.

In Israel, there are lots of clever people on both sides of the debate, and lots of dumb people too. Remember that Avrum Burg and Ehud Olmert both support the two-state arrangement. Is that the kind of intellectual company one wishes to be in?

Regarding the costs of the current situation, it seems the rhetoric has shifted lately: now the rhetoric is, “What will Israel do in the near future when the settlements are too big to be evacuated and the Arabs demand a single state west of the Jordan? We must act now before it’s too late.” Or, interpreting the argument charitably: “Maybe you’re right that the two-state arrangement will make the conflict worse than it is now, but if you try to maintain the status quo then you’ll fail and things will get even more worse than what you fear.” Whatever the merits of that argument (I think it’s pretty weak), note that it does not argue against the status quo itself. In the narrow way I formulated the argument, it doesn’t even offer an improvement over the current situation.

Finally, I’d like to see predictions of what kinds of scenarios are most likely given a two-state arrangement, and what approach Israel might take in each scenario. Apparently Gershom Gorenberg is realistic enough to agree that the war will most likely continue after the Palestinian state is established.