MONTHS, NOT YEARS:

Likud Debates a Palestinian State to Save Israel (JAMES BENNET, December 13, 2003, NY Times)

Within the Likud, the dominant right-wing party, leaders who once advocated holding every inch of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and who for three years argued that Israel could make no concessions because it lacked a Palestinian peace partner, are now debating how quickly to concede how much of that territory.

The Likud is publicly grappling with a prospect long raised by Israel's left: that within a few years Arabs are likely to be the majority in Israel and its occupied territories, and that they may switch from demanding their own state to demanding the right to vote in Israel, threatening its Jewish identity.

The result is a breathtaking inversion: Though the Likud's platform opposes a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River as a threat to Israel, some members of the party say they have concluded that only the creation of such a state can save Israel as a Jewish democracy.

The debate within Likud is the most surprising development in a fall that has brought a two-month lull in the violence here and, with it, a series of official and unofficial initiatives for peace. [...]

Mr. Sharon's advisers say he is committed to the road map, the peace initiative promoted by the Bush administration. They say he is formulating possible unilateral steps to take if, in six months or so, that initiative fails.

It's hardly surprising, since this has always been the only possible solution.

Posted by Orrin Judd at December 13, 2003 07:58 AM