Letters to My Palestinian Neighbor

by Yossi Klein Halevi

A peace agreement should frankly accept the legitimacy of each side’s maximalist claims, even as it proceeds to contract them. Partition is an act of injustice to both Palestinians and Israelis. It is the recognition of the borders to our dreams. Not only the land but justice itself is being partitioned between two rightful claimants. Neither side can relinquish its emotional claim to territorial wholeness. Yet not every claim must be implemented in full. The state of Israel cannot be identical with the land of Israel, the state of Palestine with the land of Palestine. Each people will exercise national sovereignty in only a part of its land. We need to separate the abstract justness of the entire claim from the practical injustice of its fulfillment.