Construction in E1 – The End of the Jewish Democratic State

By: Erel Morris

The approval of construction in E1 by the right-wing government of Al-Mala is the end of the democratic Jewish state. In the beginning, it was an integration that was only possible temporarily due to the dependence on a Jewish majority, but now it is over. The annexed state will not be Jewish because 7 million Arabs also live in it (without us noticing that the abolition of the Palestinian state also makes us responsible for the 2 million Palestinian refugees broken in Gaza).

The right has always been able to firmly say "What's not!" but has not felt the need to answer the obvious question "What is?" The unilateral annexation that ends the narrative of national definition in a Palestinian state will define democratic Israel as a binational state and not a Jewish state. Alternatively, annexation will turn Israel into a state of Jewish supremacy - full-blown apartheid, and therefore not a democratic state. This will be followed by boycotts, internal struggles, terrorism, and wars, and it will fall apart long before the climate crisis explodes in our faces.

In the choice between these two, which all residents of the country will have to accept, the large majority among Jews and certainly among Palestinians will choose, as complicated as it is, a binational state in which two large national minorities learn to live side by side.

I don't think that's what the members of the right-wing government, which relies on Trump's messianic-divine support, intended. They certainly didn't receive a mandate from the people to dismantle the Jewish nation-state. They don't bother to understand that Trump has no problem with Arab (Qatari) money flowing here and doing its economic, social, and political work until we become an Arab state and the Jews will once again be an ethnic, cultural, and linguistic minority and probably not particularly popular, only this time in their historical homeland. Smotrich and his heroic supporters are afraid of becoming a Jewish ethnic minority in the Palestinian state, in the territory where they chose to establish their home (mainly for quality of life considerations). Out of this legitimate fear, they are acting with illegitimate force to keep us in the same boat with them, which they will turn into an apartheid state and later also into a halakhic state. And the government of lies? All in all, they were elected in a Jewish and democratic manner and want to survive in power, and they are also allowed to decide when and how this whole thing ends, so why not now, which will probably come tomorrow?

These are very big decisions for a minority sectoral government that the people have long since grown weary of supporting. Every day they remain in power is another day of doom. They remain there simply because no one in the opposition knows how to overthrow them and no one knows how to deal with the terrible mess that the failed gang leaves behind.

What is important to say and especially important for the settlers to hear is that it is your right to live in homes built under Israeli rule in Judea and Samaria and our duty as a people and state to protect you as a Jewish and Israeli minority living in the Palestinian territory. In light of this, you are not alone and should not act forcefully to promote a solution that does not have a shred of broad consensus. We may choose to promote a one-state solution or we may choose to choose two, but unilateral annexation is not the way.