A Canadian helped design the 'two-state solution.' This Canadian says it remains the only answer in Israel
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'By chance, I had the good fortune of being Canada's first representative to the Palestinian Authority shortly after I landed in Israel as ambassador in 1992,' Norman says, setting the context for our virtual conversation.
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'I have some fond as well as some scary memories of walking around Gaza back then,' he continues, 'but these days, I mostly wonder how Israeli-Palestinian relations would have unfolded in the wake of the Oslo accords had Yitzhak Rabin not been assassinated.'
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Appointed by then-prime minister Brian Mulroney as Canada's ambassador in 1992, the year before the Oslo accords were signed, Norman had the good fortune of living in the Middle East during a period of peace.
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Reflecting back, Norman says he's not sure the two-state solution for Israel and Palestine, envisioned in the Oslo accords, ever had a chance after the Rabin assassination. Rabin, the prime minister of Israel, was assassinated in 1995 by an Israeli extremist opposed to his peace efforts.
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'I think Rabin came to the conclusion that there was no alternative — and he had the credibility that allowed him to take a chance with Arafat whom Israelis did not trust,' Norman says. 'After October 7,' he muses, 'there is even less trust of Palestinians and there's no Rabin in sight.'
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There is a faint hint of wistfulness in Norman's tone; his assessment of the current situation is deeply unsettling.
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From October 7 on, we've seen growing division and polarization and hatred in our own country. Progressives have made Gaza their cause (no one more than Alberta's own NDP MP, Heather McPherson) and conservatives hold loyal to Israel. Media outlets pick a lane and stick with it.
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Talking about Israel and the Palestinians has become so prickly, many refuse to wade into the conversation for fear of being attacked. The rhetoric is all part of the conflict, Norman accurately points out, 'Folks chanting or spray painting 'genocide' are generally not in favour of two states, one Jewish, one Palestinian, between the river and the sea.'
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Having spent considerable time in the Middle East region myself over the past 40 years, I know how this blame game twists and turns. Public opinion in Canada is heavily influenced by the atrocities of war conveyed on our television screens and in our media.
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