On this edition of Parallax Views, a MASSIVE, wide-ranging conversation with Hussein Ibish, a Senior Resident Scholar at The Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington and a contributor to publications like The Atlantic and the UAE's The National, that delves into the history of the Israel/Palestine conflict and where it is headed. We go through the diplomatic failures, the formation of Israeli and Palestinian national identities, the Bill Clinton and George W. Bush era efforts to bring about a political solution, the 2000 Camp David Summit and its controversies, the ongoing Occupation by Israel of Palestinian territories since 1967, the BDS movement and why Hussein considers "Divestment" to be where activists should focus their energies as opposed to "Boycott" and "Sanctions", the two-state solution vs. the one-state solution, riparian rights (ie: issues related to water) concerns related to a two-state solution, the rise and fall of the American Task Force on Palestine, Condoleezza Rice's forgotten approach to Israel/Palestine in the Bush years, Elliot Abrams and how pushes for a two-state solution have been diminished by shifting focuses of administrations over the years, Israeli and Palestinian competing narratives over 1948 (for one it meant independence; for another it meant destruction and the "Nakba" or "Catastrophe"), Hamas and the psychology of rage in Gaza, the Israeli operation in Rafah, cycles of violence, Israeli obstinance and the one-state reality, Benjamin Netanyahu and the Likud Party, the Gaza War, terrorism and how Israel's current approach is creating a recruitment boom for Hamas, the power asymmetry in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), the potentially for explosive violence in the West Bank to lead to an ethnic cleansing campaign, Hussein's close friend the late Christopher Hitchens and Hitchen's stance on Palestine, and much, much more.
A note that this was recorded on 5/29/24.
