It Is Deadly and Oppressive, but Is It One State? Assessing Three Recent Books Advancing a One-State Reality Paradigm

Abstract A one-state reality paradigm has emerged among an esteemed group of scholars and policy analysts of Israeli policies, which holds three main premises. One is that the Oslo Accords briefly opened a path toward a two-state resolution. Two is that this path vanished because of Israel’s cumulative colonization of the occupied territories and hardening of its political culture. Three is accepting that Israel intends to maintain permanent control over all of historic Palestine. This extended review engages three books promoting this one-state reality paradigm: Paradigm Lost by Ian Lustick, One State Reality, edited by Michael Barnett, Nathan Brown, Marc Lynch, and Shibley Telhami, and Haifa Republic by Omri Boehm. The author welcomes these works for both giving academic prominence to the ugly realities of Israeli rule and US complicity and inspiring fresh normative approaches. To carry on such rethinking, this review addresses several limitations and unaddressed issues, including whether the one-state characterization best captures the complex nature of Israeli domination. Informed by the long-enduring binational character of historic Palestine, the author argues that it is most important to advance a pathway toward an egalitarian and collaborative binational future rather than advance conventional one-state or two-state programs.