A Radical Vision for Israelis and Palestinians
7/7/20261 hr 26 min
The old solutions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict don’t seem to fit the present reality.
A two-state solution feels increasingly impossible, given the scale of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and the Palestinian determination for a right of return. And a one-state solution, in which Israelis and Palestinians would live as equal citizens in a single state, is hard to imagine, given how strongly both peoples seek political self-determination.
But what if those aren’t the only options?
A Land for All is an Israeli-Palestinian initiative that is proposing a confederation model: two sovereign states, structured to allow freedom of movement between them. It’s a theory of peace based on neither separation nor unification. It holds, first, that both peoples have a relationship to and claim on all the land and, second, that both peoples want to control their own political destinies.
I have been — and am — skeptical of solutions to a conflict that is so devoid of the political conditions for a settlement. But even if you’re far from your destination, it’s worth knowing where it is you hope to go. So could this be an answer for both peoples? How would it handle the problems that have bedeviled previous solutions, from security and violence to religious extremism?
Rula Hardal and May Pundak are the executive directors of A Land for All. Hardal is a Palestinian citizen of Israel who received her doctorate in political science from the University of Hannover in Germany, and Pundak is an Israeli lawyer, activist and social entrepreneur. They joined me to explain how A Land for All would work and why they think it might succeed where so much else has failed.
Mentioned:
Rula Hardal’s Book Recommendations:
The Holocaust and the Nakba, edited by Bashir Bashir and Amos Goldberg
States of Denial by Stanley Cohen
Israel: What Went Wrong? by Omer Bartov
May Pundak’s Book Recommendations:
Tomorrow Is Yesterday by Hussein Agha and Robert Malley
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
The Moomin series by Tove Jansson
Thoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at ezrakleinshow@nytimes.com.
You can find the transcript and more episodes of “The Ezra Klein Show” at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs.html
This episode of “The Ezra Klein Show” was produced by Jack McCordick. Fact-checking by Michelle Harris and Kelsey Lannin. Our senior engineer is Jeff Geld, with additional mixing by Johnny Simon. Our recording engineer is Johnny Simon. Cinematography by Marina King and Eric Laplante. Our executive producer is Claire Gordon. The show’s production team also includes Marie Cascione, Annie Galvin, Rollin Hu, Kristin Lin and Emma Kehlbeck. Original music by Pat McCusker. Audience strategy by Shannon Busta. The director of New York Times Opinion Shows is Annie-Rose Strasser. Transcript editing by Filipa Pajevic and Marlaine Glicksman.
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Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsMichael Sullivan0:00
[upbeat music] Hi, it's Michael Sullivan from Wirecutter, the product recommendation service from The New York Times. And today we're in the kitchen testing canned tomatoes. We're tasting for sweetness, acidity, definitely the color, the texture. These tomatoes, they're pretty velvety. Like, they break apart easily with a spoon. The guides that we write are living, breathing things. It's a piece of fruit in a can, so it's gonna change every year. At Wirecutter, we do the work so you don't have to. For independent product reviews and recommendations for the real world, come visit us at nytimes.com/wirecutter.
Ezra Klein· Host0:30
[gentle music] So I've been reluctant on the show to talk too much about imagined solutions for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I don't think any of the underlying conditions for political solution are present.
Michael Sullivan1:07
19 new settlements in the occupied West Bank.
May Pundak· Guest1:10
More than 81% of Gaza's buildings are at least partially damaged.
Michael Sullivan1:14
So many other Palestinian families are living with the threat of demolition.
Ezra Klein· Host1:18
We're in a pre-solutionary space, and I worry about it as a form of escapism. It's more comfortable to debate two-state models or one-state imaginings rather than confront