‘Palestine 2030’ concluded that, in light of developments in Israel, the region, and the wider world, the next decade will leverage the clarity that has come to the surface from all stakeholders while pressing forward for independence and freedom, and realistically unifying and renewing the Palestinian national polity, in all its forms, to collectively define the way forward.
On Israel, ‘Palestine 2030’ notes Israel’s abandonment of the principle of dividing the land within the scope of a negotiated settlement with the Palestinians. Furthermore, it chronicles how Israel has been consolidating as a Jewish supremacist settler-colonial regime based on racial segregation that survives based on its animosity towards its regional environment and its rejection of understanding or dialogue with it. Some examples are the 2018 Israeli addition to its Basic Laws, ‘Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People’, and Israel’s unity government rallying around yet another act of annexation of Palestinian lands.
On the issue of Palestine and the region, ‘Palestine 2030’ depicts a reality of a region preoccupied with its national issues but harboring limitless public support for the Palestinian struggle. The report notes a few of the Gulf countries driving change in the region when mixed with their domestic unrest, serve as ingredients for more chaos in the region.
When addressing the seismic transformations happening on the international scene, the report points to the toxic mix of neo-liberal capitalism, military intervention, economic interests, and the COVID-19 Pandemic, as seriously threatening today’s rules-based global system of governance. The Palestinian issue is one of the visible arenas where the world can act to safeguard a rules-based world and avoid the current downward spiral to a ‘might is right’ system of governance.
Palestinian political agency
The report boldly addresses the issue of Palestinian political agency as well, stating that the PLO and the State of Palestine will also need to face their clarity and renewal in the coming decade as the Oslo Accords process has come to a formal end and the US has entered into attack mode with the administration of President Trump. In particular, the report states the importance of maintaining and strengthening the centralized and legitimate representation of the Palestinian people and their just cause (represented by the PLO). It also notes that the PLO must reaffirm its national and political role as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, and not take any agency legacy for granted.
Lastly, on the Palestinian front, the report makes a clarion call that time is of the essence, noting that never-ending hollow calls for institutional reform will be replaced in the coming decade with clarity and renewal in actual institutional reaffirmation, a prerequisite to advancing the struggle toward results.
As a strategy exercise, the report does not prescribe solutions, but it does state that there is a sense of “nurturing hope and creating change” moving forward. This is articulated in the three scenarios the report ends with:
1) Reciprocity: responding to all acts of Israeli colonialism in kind and not limiting Palestinian actions to where negotiations may have reached during the Oslo period
2) Renewal: Palestinians must build their capacity and impose national independence, especially given the majority of the countries of the world have already recognized this expected outcome.
3) Full circle: given all of the transformations taking place on all fronts, Palestinians may revert to a strategy calling for one de-colonized state between the river and the sea.
The report notes that elements of all three scenarios may be strategically necessary at various points in the ongoing struggle for the realization of Palestinian national rights, depending on opportunities and circumstances.
In conclusion, the report makes it clear that everything starts with the Palestinian people and that all options are now open in this decade of clarity and renewal.
PSG is an independent project under the auspices of the Oxford Research Group (UK) and the ‘Palestine 2030’ report was supported with funding from the Representative Office of Norway to the Palestinian Authority and the European Union.
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Sam Bahour | Radio Free (2020-08-05T00:00:00+00:00) Palestinians refuse to stop thinking forward. Retrieved from https://www.radiofree.org/2020/08/05/palestinians-refuse-to-stop-thinking-forward/
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