A Palestinian state cannot be recognized into existence.
External parties can dream about "Palestine" until they go blue in the face, but the reality is that Palestinians have zero capability to self-govern, no less zero desire to live in peace with Israel.
Please consider supporting our mission to help everyone better understand and become smarter about the Jewish world. A gift of any amount helps keep our platform free of advertising and accessible to all.
This is a guest essay written by Dena Tauber, a New York-based attorney who discovered a passion for Israel and Zionism following October 7th.
You can also listen to the podcast version of this essay on Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music, YouTube, and Spotify.
Barely had then-U.S. President Joe Biden recovered from the shock and horror of Hamas’s October 7, 2023 massacre in Israel before he began calling for the establishment of a Palestinian state.
He was soon joined by high-level American officials and a coterie of other government heads. Of all responses to a modern-day pogrom complete with infanticide, rape, and Hamas’ signature kidnapping, the suggestion of an independent Palestinian state is absurd.
Never mind that the Palestinians themselves weren’t asking for a state confined to the Palestinian Territories. If anyone had asked now-slain Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar why he orchestrated the October 7th massacre, does anyone think the answer would have been a Palestinian state?
Much of the Western world views Palestinian statehood as a panacea to the scourge of Palestinian violence. Historically, it has been assumed, against the weight of all available evidence, that providing the Palestinians with a state would quell their penchant for murdering Jews.
In Western Europe, where Jew-hatred permeates the highest echelons of government, leaders took the call a step further by preemptively recognizing a “Palestinian state” before it even had defined borders and the tools needed for independence.
This week, French President Emmanuel Macron announced the decision to join Spain, Ireland, Norway, and others in this particular Hall of Shame. Said Macron:
“I will do it because I believe that at some point it will be right and because I also want to participate in a collective dynamic, which must also allow all those who defend Palestine to recognize Israel in turn, which many of them do not do.”
This is Macron’s evaluation of the glorification of extreme violence against Jews paying some lip-service to Israel’s very right to exist. Note, Macron’s recognition of “Palestine” is not conditioned on reciprocity of any kind.
The Palestinians have consistently rejected proposals to create a state because they are unwilling to accept a state limited to the Palestinian Territories. As Professor Eugene Kontorovich, an expert on International Law and a fellow of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and a member of the Law Faculty of Northwestern University, observed, “… when [people seeking self-determination say] ‘no’ to internationally backed offers of full independent statehood … this means they accept the alternative, which is the status quo.”1
But Western leaders treat Palestinians like children who don’t know what is best for them (and Palestinians don’t, but that is beside the point). By failing to hold the Palestinians to account for their words and deeds, the West absolves the Palestinians of all responsibility for their actions and then blames Israel when it defensively responds to the aggression that constantly erupts from Palestinians. The sole purpose of recognizing a Palestinian state is to undermine Israel’s sovereignty and exclude Israel from the conversation. It is the height of disrespect.
The Palestinians already govern themselves via the Palestinian Authority. On October 7, 2023, the whole world saw what happens when the Palestinians are left on their own without military oversight from Israel. The result is billions of taxpayer dollars poured into underground tunnels and other terror infrastructure, not state building.
October 7th was preceded by years of rocket attacks from Gaza deliberately targeting Israeli population centers. Countries recognizing a Palestinian pseudo-state are essentially saying that the murder, rapes, and kidnappings of civilians perpetrated by Palestinians on October 7th can be effective tools of self-determination.
Recognizing a Palestinian state without a peace agreement not only ignores Israeli sovereignty and security concerns; it is also a violation of international law.
In 1967, after a consortium of Arab countries started and lost their third war of attempted annihilation against Israel, the Sinai Peninsula, the Golan Heights, the Gaza Strip, Judea and Samaria, and the Old City of Jerusalem all came under Israeli control.
At the conclusion of this Six-Day War, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 242 with the aim of establishing the guidelines for a “peaceful” settlement to the conflict. Accordingly, the resolution provides for “a just and lasting peace in the Middle East which should include the application of … withdrawal of Israeli armed forces … and respect for and acknowledgment of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force.”
The Palestinians have rejected the single obligation imposed on them by the resolution. Recognizing a Palestinian state at this juncture permits the Palestinians to make an end run around Resolution 242 by compelling Israeli withdrawal from parts of the Palestinian Territories without a commitment from the Palestinians to cease acts of terror against Israel.
The preemptive recognition of a Palestinian state is an exercise in wishful thinking. A state cannot be recognized into existence. Only after the building blocks of a state are coalesced into a coherent system of government within a defined territory can other polities recognize it as such, which is what happened when the modern State of Israel was created.
How can the Palestinians have a state when they have so dismally failed to build any infrastructure or independent government? If we posit that the Palestinian Authority is the governing body of “Palestine,” how can they form a state when they are reliant on Israel to manage the threat against them from Hamas who would certainly assume control of the West Bank, as they did in Gaza as soon as Israel withdrew.
The Palestinian Authority has (despite massive financial support from the European Union and many other states) been unable to build the infrastructure necessary for statehood. Palestinian elections have not been held since 2006, mainly due to the ongoing, internal conflict between Hamas and Fatah (which runs the Palestinian Authority).
Truth be told, civil war between rival factions wanting to rule a Palestinian state is probable, if not inevitable. Or, as Mosab Hassan Yousef, the son of one of Hamas’ founders, put it:
“There is no ‘Palestinians.’ There are tribes — the tribe of Hamas, the tribe of Islamic Jihad, the tribe of Khalil, the tribe of Nablus — and each one has different interests. And all of them are conflicted. If they did not have Israel as the common enemy, they would kill each other. This is the reality of what is so-called ‘Palestine.’”2
Even Fatah, the Palestinians’ most “moderate” faction, continues to devote significant resources to terrorism, such as payments to the families of terrorists (known as their “pay to slay” policy).
The subtext in declarations like Macron’s is that Palestinian statehood is the path forward to resolving the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. But there is no evidence to support this hypothesis.
The opposite is true.
Recognizing a Palestinian state without any commitment from the Palestinians to refrain from terrorism, let alone to accept Israel’s existence, is but one step in achieving the Palestinian’s true aspirations as repeatedly stated by every Palestinian leader and the Palestinian people themselves.
It is the destruction of Israel.
Interview with Sarah Haetzni-Cohent (April 8, 2018). “Why Israeli Rule in the West Bank Is Legal under International Law.”
“Dr. Phil Primetime.” Merit Street Media.
 | A guest post by
|
“October 7th didn’t happen because Palestinians were denied a state—it happened BECAUSE they were given one.
Gaza was theirs. No occupation. No settlers. No Jews at all. Just them, ruling themselves.
And what did they do?
They began preparing for war. Never forget that.”
Credit: Jews Fight Back
Good summary, MsTauber. Don’t worry too much about Macron. He has just let his mask slip to reveal the Jew-baiter he always was. Macron can’t even stop the migrant invasion now facing The UK, thus proving he is just another bullshitting French Diplomat. European History is full of them. Am YIsrael Chai.