Qurei calls for reconsidering one-state solution

Former Palestinian Authority prime minister Ahmed Qurei, who was one of the architects of the Oslo Accords, on Saturday called on Palestinians to consider a one-state solution with Israel instead of a two-state solution.

Voicing frustration and disappointment with the peace process, Qurei, who played a major role in secret and public negotiations with Israel over the past two decades, said that the “one-state solution, despite the endless problems it embraces, is one of the solutions that we should be contemplating through an internal dialogue.”

• Did Florida endorse a one-state solution?

The Palestinians should be talking publicly about the onestate solution, putting it on the table as an option and throwing it in the face of Israel as “burning embers,” he said.

Qurei’s call for a one-state solution came in an article he published on Saturday in the pan-Arab London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper.

Qurei said that the two-state solution, which was first endorsed by the Palestine National Council (the PLO’s parliament- in-exile) in 1988, has lost its momentum.

He blamed Israel for “burying” the two-state solution by building settlements and creating new facts on the ground in the West Bank and east Jerusalem. It was relevant “before Israeli bulldozers buried this project,” he said, likening efforts to achieve a twostate solution to “ploughing the sea and a long political comedy.”

Israel has managed to “decapitate” the two-state solution through its actions and measures in Jerusalem and the West Bank, he charged.

Qurei accused the US and Western countries of failing to fulfill their promises to help the Palestinians achieve statehood.

He also blamed the Arab world for being preoccupied with other matters instead of focusing on the Palestinian issue.

Some Palestinians and political factions have begun talking seriously about the one-state solution, Qurei added.

PA President Mahmoud Abbas has come out against the onestate solution, emphasizing over and again that the two-state solution remains the first and last option for the Palestinians.

Qurei’s call for a one-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians came shortly after large posters promoting the idea appeared on billboards in various parts of the West Bank.

It was not clear who was behind the posters favoring a one-state solution. However, Fatah activists were quick to remove the posters.