Making a Palestinian State Less Likely

Hindustan Times

14 hours ago

The Gaza aid crunch is starting to abate, as local prices fall. Why are Gazans paying for aid at all? Well, the United Nations says 87% of the aid trucks that it and its partners have tried to deliver since May 19 have been 'intercepted' by mobs or 'armed actors.' Much of the food ends up sold at market, with Hamas taking a cut. The U.N. rejects Israeli security escorts.
The U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which gives free aid to Gazans at large distribution sites, has been shunned by the established aid groups. This has hindered GHF efforts to scale up—the best way to shrink the crowds at each site. For now, large masses must trek past Israel Defense Forces lines to reach these sites, while Hamas instigates stampedes. Much hunger in Gaza has been concentrated in the north, where there are no GHF sites.
'The fastest way to end the humanitarian crises in Gaza is for Hamas to SURRENDER AND RELEASE THE HOSTAGES,' President Trump wrote Thursday on Truth Social. He's right, but why should Hamas give up when Israel is under massive international pressure?
Reveling in French, U.K. and Canadian plans to recognize a state of Palestine, Hamas has hardened its position and rejected new cease-fire talks. But even if recognizing a Palestinian state weren't a gift to Hamas now, it would still be a policy error.
The Soviet bloc and its allies recognized Palestine in 1988, but the West has long insisted that recognition follow the creation of a Palestinian state, not precede it. And to create such a state, the Palestinians would have to agree to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Otherwise, a state would merely be a base from which to expand the fighting. No one should want the West Bank to become another Gaza, devoted to sacrificing its people in perpetual war against Israel.
In 2000, 2001 and 2008, the Palestinian Authority (PA) rejected Israeli offers of statehood because it was unwilling to give up on the dream of a mass migration to rule all of the land 'from the river to the sea.' Instead, the PA has turned to an international pressure campaign. France, the U.K., Canada and a few others now vindicate the strategy.
The U.K. makes no demands on the PA, whose state it looks to recognize. France and Canada satisfy themselves with PA 'commitments' of reform they know it has no ability or intent to keep. Real actions aren't forthcoming, so much of the world has stopped asking.
Germany says sensibly that 'recognition of a Palestinian state is expected to be the end' of a peace process. But there will be no process so long as other states pressure only Israel and tell Palestinians they needn't compromise.
Canada asks that the PA commit to holding elections but exclude Hamas, the largest party, from a vote. It took 20 months for PA President-for-life Mahmoud Abbas to outright condemn the Hamas massacre of Oct. 7, 2023, and the last time he held an election, in 2006, Hamas won and violently purged the PA from Gaza.
The good news is that the decisions that matter aren't made in Paris, London or Ottawa. No Palestinian state is coming because the PA is weak, corrupt and intransigent, and Hamas wants to kill every Jew. International recognition can serve as a launchpad for legal warfare against Israel. But by showing Hamas that war works when fought cynically enough, and by showing the PA that it need never compromise, it pushes Palestinian statehood further away.