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Trudy Mickel
Sara Price
Policy Paper
14 January 2016

The Path to Peace for the Israelis and Palestinians

Although Palestine has many refugees living in unstable conditions, Israelis legally
settled in Israel and deserve to stay in their homeland due to their religious connections
to many holy sites, history in Israel, and the fact that the return of the Palestinians will
create more conflict and war.

The turning point for the Israeli Palestinian conflict was World War II. A huge population
of Jewish people fled and were in need of a new home. They decided to settle in
Palestine because of the Jewish settlements and people already there that have lived in
peace with the Palestinian government for many years. They also had religious
connections to many of the holy sites in Palestine. After the war, the Jewish immigration
into Palestine became uncontrolled. As more settlers entered, the word of a Jewish
state spread and eventually fighting broke out. The first Israel Palestine war was from
1947-1948. Since the war, conflict have been unsteady creating a tremendous amount
of damage. Currently, Israel is in control of most of the land being fought for, with the
Palestinians in control of the Gaza Strip and a scattered West Bank. People in Israel
live in fear because of the violence emerging in the state. Children struggle to get to
school, and parents to work because of the daily threats exchanged and danger
between the two groups. Israel is constantly defending themselves from hateful
terrorist attacks produced by the Hamas terrorist group and Palestinian people. Due to
this, they view themselves in a constant state of defense for the security of their
citizens, sovereignty, land, and identity. (Coleman) Many solutions have been
proposed over the years, but none have continued to work. One solution that has been

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present for many years is the Two State solution. "Then came the partition plan in
1947, with the suggestion of an Arab state alongside a Jewish state. The Jews agreed,
the Arabs refused. (Sherwood) When this solutions was proposed, the Israelis
accepted it and supported if it meant moving towards peace. The Palestinians refused
and disregarded the solution even though it would benefit them and give them more
land. This shows that the Israelis have tried to create peace and are willing to make
compromises to create consensus between the two groups. Overall, the conflict is
growing greater and it is in everyone's, including Israel's and Palestines, best interest to
generate a solution creating peace between the Israelis and Palestinians.

The conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians has persisted for many years creating
lots of tension in the entire middle east and must be addressed. Israel and Palestine
are in need of a solution to help create global consensus and live in peace. The
current, off-again/on-again, process of negotiation is not very encouraging. (Kelman)
Clearly, Israel and Palestine are in need of a solution. As Israel, we should pursue a
two solution. To show our commitment to the solution, we agrees to halt all future
settlement of Israelis into any settlements disputed in Palestinians land. To further
enhance the path to peace, we as Israel, propose that every year there is not a
Palestinian attack against Israelis, we will withdraw our settlements a mile towards the
Green line for up to ten years. After three years of peaceful progress towards the
solution, we will allow free visitations to the holy sites by the Palestinian people. We will
also have peaceful transportation for Palestinians families and friends to cross and visit
others in the Gaza strip or West Bank. The Israeli, Hilik Bar, member of the Labor Party
and Chair of the Knesset Caucus to Resolve the Israeli-Arab Conflict, describes Israeli
recognition of Palestinian statehood will tangibly advance the two-state vision and will
eliminate the dangerous one-state vision that extremists on the right and the left are
advancing, among us and among the Palestinians. We have to be honest with

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ourselves. There is simply no option beyond a two-state solution that will preserve the
Zionist dream. (Bar) The two state solution is a realistic solution that will benefit both
groups and help the world work towards global consensus. It is in everyone's best
interest to consider the two state solution as the path towards peace. In any condition,
it is clear that a solution must be met to create peace between the Israeli and
Palestinian people.

Coleman, Valerie. "Israel's Perspective on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict." Israel's

Perspective on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. N.p., Aug. 2008. Web. 17 Jan. 2016.

Sherwood, Harriet Sherwood. "Binyamin Netanyahu: Occupation Is Not Cause of

Conflict." Theguardian.com. N.p., Oct. 2013. Web. 17 Jan. 2016.

Kelman, Herbert C. "A One-Country / Tw0-State Solution to the Israeli-PalestiniAn

Conflict." N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Jan. 2016.

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Bar, Hilik. "Is a Two-State Solution (Israel and Palestine) an Acceptable Solution to the
Israeli-Palestinian Conflict? - Israeli-Palestinian Conflict - ProCon.org." ProConorg
Headlines. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Jan. 2016.