ABSTRACT
The 1967 war, which left Israel in control of the West Bank and Gaza, had three consequences, accentuated by the 1973 war: It increased the readiness of the Arab states neighboring Israel to disengage from the conflict with Israel; it strengthened an independent Palestinian national movement, engaging in armed struggle but also contemplating an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza; and it created a division within Israel between those who saw the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza as an opportunity to create a “Greater Israel” and those who saw it as an opportunity to end the conflict through an exchange of land for peace. These developments led to an increasing Palestinianization of the Arab–Israeli conflict and new opportunities to resolve the conflict by establishing a Palestinian state in the occupied territories. The chapter proceeds to discuss the ways in which a two-state solution would serve the interests of the parties to the Arab–Israeli conflict, the barriers to such a solution on the Palestinian and Israeli sides, and the ways they overcome these barriers through a pre-negotiation process designed to bring about mutual recognition of the other’s right to national self-determination in the land they both claim and must ultimately share.
