Discord behind the Table: The Internal Conflict among Israeli Jews concerning the Future of Settlements in the West Bank and Gaza
![handle is hein.journals/jdisres2005 and id is 17 raw text is: Discord Behind the Table: The
Internal Conflict Among Israeli Jews
Concerning the Future of Settlements
in the West Bank and Gaza
Robert H. Mnookin* & Ehud Eiran**
I. INTRODUCTION
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is deeply paradoxical: the basic outline of a
deal that might better serve the interests of most Israelis and most Palestinians is
reasonably clear and yet this violent conflict persists. Since the Camp David ne-
gotiations orchestrated by President Bill Clinton collapsed in the summer of 2000,
the entire Oslo peace process has disintegrated and in the following four years
more than 1000 Israelis and 3000 Palestinians have died in renewed violence.
The essential terms of such a deal are well known. President Clinton outlined
them to the parties in December of 2000. It would involve a two state solution.
There would be arrangements to insure a secure Israel, which would remain a
democratic Jewish state. The new Palestinian state would include Gaza and the
West Bank. All Jewish settlements would be evacuated, with possible exceptions
for those very near the Green Line or adjacent to Jerusalem.2 Those settlements
might be annexed to Israel in exchange for land that is presently part of Israel and
other consideration. Jerusalem would become a condominium of sorts. Those
portions of East Jerusalem presently occupied by Palestinians would become the
capital of the new Palestinian state, while the Jewish portions of Jerusalem would
remain the capitol of Israel. The Palestinian claim that their refugees have a right
of return would be definitively resolved in a way that insured that Jews remained
a substantial majority in Israel proper.
* Williston Professor of Law, Director of the Harvard Negotiation Research Project and Chair,
Program on Negotiation at Harvard University. This paper is a much-expanded version of the 2004
Distinguished Dispute Resolution Lecture at the University of Missouri-Columbia delivered by Profes-
sor Mnookin on April 12, 2004. The authors wish to thank Karen Tenenbaum and Rich Cooper, Har-
vard Law School students, for their invaluable research assistance. We also wish to acknowledge the
helpful suggestions of Professor Noah Feldman.
** Visiting Research Scholar, Harvard Negotiation Research Project.
1. See DENNIS Ross, THE MISSING PEACE: THE INSIDE STORY OF THE FIGHT FOR MIDDLE EAST
PEACE 752-753 (2004).
2. The Green Line was the cease-fire line, established in 1949, that became a provisional border
between Israel and the territory controlled by Jordan before the 1967 War. See Fr. Robert J. Araujo,
S.J., Implementation of the ICJ Advisory Opinion-Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall
in the Occupied Palestinian Territory: Fences [Do Not] Make Good Neighbors?, 22 B.U. INT'L L.J.
349,365-66 (2004).](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/jdisres2005&div=7&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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