Inside Sari Nusseibeh - or why peace is a Zionist cause

The heart of this interview with Sari Nusseibeh, A Liberal in Jerusalem: The Paradoxes of Sari Nusseibeh:

 

 The so-called "One State solution," being the direct by-product of a failed Palestinian state, naturally puts into question the moral underpinnings of the Jewish state. To avoid this from happening, the fervent Palestinian nationalist and the equally fervent Israeli Zionist, both as it were riding the same train to the same sacred city of Jerusalem, become allies in advocating for a successful Palestinian state in which individual Palestinians enjoy basic political and economic rights and freedoms on their side of the Green Line, including East Jerusalem.

In this scenario, the Palestinians will get their state - and the sole responsibility to manage it in a rational, transparent, demilitarized, and democratic manner - and the Israelis will be assured that future Palestinians will not put to question the Jewish state through a one-man-one-vote campaign or the insistence on the right of return.

As Nusseibeh told an audience at the Hebrew University shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States, when talk of the "clash of civilizations" was in the air: "Our shared future has to provide Israel with a secure guarantee for its existence as a Jewish state, but it has also to provide Palestinians with a secure guarantee for their freedom and independence in their own state. Israelis and Palestinians. If anything, we are strategic allies.

Nobody says all Palestinians believe that, but this essay is worthwhile reading for those who are skeptical of finding a peace partner.

Ami Isseroff