A provocative argument for a new way of seeing Israel Zionism and the two-state solution.
Haifa Republic: A Democratic Future for Israel is an urgent wake-up call. The philosopher Omri
Boehm argues that it is long past time to recognize that there will not be a two-state solution
to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian people. After fifty years Israel s
occupation of the West Bank constitutes annexation in all but name even as the legitimate
claims of the Arab population soon to be a national majority remain unaddressed. Meanwhile
daily life goes on under conditions rightly likened to apartheid. For liberals in Israel and
America to continue to place their hopes in a two-state solution is a form of willful and
culpable blindness especially now that Israeli leaders across the political spectrum have
begun to speak of ethnic cleansing. A catastrophe is in the making. But Haifa Republic also
offers grounds for hope. Catastrophe can be averted Boehm contends by reconfiguring Israel as
a single binational state in which Palestinians and Jews both possess human rights and equal
citizenship. The original Zionists Theodor Herzl Ze ev Jabotinsky and early in his career
David Ben-Gurion all advocated such a federation and as prime minister Menachem Begin
successfully submitted a kindred plan to the Knesset. A binational federation offers a last
chance for the two peoples who call Palestine home to live in peace and mutual respect and to
have a truly democratic future in common.
