The Two-State Solution: History and Challenges

The two-state solution has long been the primary focus
in negotiations to resolve the Palestine-Israel conflict,
favored by the United States, the European Union, most
of the world’s democracies, and the United Nations. It
advocates “two states for two people”, i.e., an independent
Palestinian state alongside Israel with both sides running
their countries peacefully and independently. While widely
considered the only way to achieve a just and lasting peace
between Israelis and Palestinians and still officially endorsed
by a significant majority of states and organizations, there
have been increasing voices and warnings that the two-state
solution is on the verge of collapse, if not dead altogether.
Indeed, by 2023, it seemed to have lost its momentum and
become secondary to de facto absent on the agendas of
the international community, which has turned a blind eye
to Israel’s continuous policy of changing the facts on the
ground in ways that made a two-state solution increasingly
impractical. However, Israel’s war against Gaza after the
Hamas attack in southern Israel on 7 October 2023, has
brought the Israeli-Palestinian conflict back into international
spotlight – and with it the untenability of the status quo ante
and the need for a two-state solution as the only post-war
horizon for a lasting solution and sustainable peace.