A Digression from Obama to Qaddafi

As I was scanning Thursday's Times I was struck by the author of an Op-Ed article titled 'The One State Solution". I usually read the pundits with a degree of skepticism, and justifiably so since they tend to exhibit their prejudices in their writings.

This one though was not written by one of the Times' stable of columnists but by the head of an Muslim African state, Muammar Quaddafi the ruler of Libya. This once world terrorist who has metamorphosed into the champion of appeasement was proposing a unique solution to the Israeli-Palestine conflict.

He suggested that instead of two separate nations occupying what was know as Palestine before 1948 that there be one nation combining both the West Bank/Gaza Palestine lands and present day Israel. This would make sense politically, militarily, and economically. There would be only one problem to work out. Could the Israelis retain their religious freedom?

Quaddafi is right when he mentions that a two state solution could (he used the word "will") create an unacceptable military threat to Israel be an armed Arab state at the 1948 border lines. He also notes that any solution that keeps Palestinians in refugee camps and does not offer a solution within the borders of Israel/Palestine would be no solution. He points out that Acre, Haifa and Jaffa now part of Israel were old Arab towns. Of course Acre was a Crusader stronghold. He also acknowledges that the Jewish historical kingdoms of Judea and Samaria as well as the lands of the twelve tribes now compose the West Bank.

I would submit that there is merit in Quaddafi's argument. First there would have to be have be to be a methodology by which one religious group would not overwhelm the other. That has been Israel's fear that in their present country if the refugees were allowed to return and given the full citizenship rights that the Arabs who never left now have, that within a generation their birthrate would make them the dominant ethnic group in Israel. This could well be followed by anti-Jewish laws.

Therefore any unified state must have guarantees for equality the two major religious groups plus representation from the present minority religions. This did work in Lebanon until Syria and Iran chose to seize power.

We have forgotten the the refugees fled Palestine not because the Israelis forced them out, but the Arab nations advised them to flee and then would not accept them as equals in their countries. Those countries must be part of the solution even if it meant to resettle these individuals not in their lost homes but in unoccupied parts of the West Bank, or even in a could be productive Negev.

Yes Qaddafi given his history cold still be the wolf in grandmother's clothes, but his premise should be given major consideration. If it could be workable it would be the only practical solution for the area. But who will convince Hamas and Hezbollah that they should disband?

While we ponder this, I still intend to post my comments on Obama's Inaugural speech and perhaps the initial signs from this new administration.