No Sacred Dates
Part 8 of the series “The Palestine Question” · Section Three, Chapter Two (2)

“No Sacred Dates”:
Settlement after 2000 and Its Islamic Ruling

Twenty years of initiatives, maps and deals, and the result: no state, and settlements multiplying. Why? What does each side want from a settlement? And what do Muslim scholars say about it?

For high-school & university students5 themes · 35-minute readQuiz at the end

Timeline (2000–2020) · tap any point

Earliest on the left.

Three

The Settlement Track up to 2021

“Managing the conflict,” not “resolving the conflict.”

Israel’s negotiating strategy rested on weakening its opponent by every means until it accepted the only option Israel offered. Rabin’s phrase “There are no sacred dates” became the motto of its policy of pressure and coercion.

Twenty years in milestonesChoose a milestone

Three initiatives… what did they give Palestinians?Flip the cards

Trump and the “Deal of the Century”

From Biased Mediator to Full Partner

The US administration abandoned the “two-state solution” and stopped describing the West Bank and Gaza as occupied territory.

The “Deal of the Century” (28 January 2020)181 pages, 22 sections, 4 annexes

A Palestinian entity “that could loosely be called a state”: fully demilitarized, its capital in suburbs next to East Jerusalem, with the settlements carved out and annexed to Israel; the Jordan River and Gaza’s territorial waters under Israeli sovereignty; its crossings under Israeli control; the residents of the Triangle villages inside the 1948 lands transferred to it; the Gaza Strip enlarged with parts of the Negev; and a demand that it recognize the state’s “Jewish” character.

What was the deal aiming at? Flip the cards
Palestinians united against it, and the Trump term ended without its implementation. But 2020 saw normalization by the UAE, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco, which the author considers “a major setback.” After Biden’s election pressure over the deal eased, with no change to the substance of US support for Israel.
Four

Why Does Each Side Want a Settlement?

The author’s reading of the parties’ motives and positions.

Why did the Arabs and the PLO enter it?

  • Weakness and the imbalance of power: military liberation is impossible in the foreseeable future
  • Time: Israel is building facts on the ground, so better to save what can be saved before it’s too late

The author’s critique: treating temporary weakness as a permanent fate, failing to see the enemy’s pressing need for a settlement, and ignoring history’s lessons, which usually ended with occupation’s removal even after centuries. A revival requires freedoms, popular participation and consultative institutions, while regimes rely on the army and intelligence services.

Why does Israel need it?

  • To become a “normal” entity in the region instead of a “foreign body” to be removed
  • Because hostility spanning generations means it is threatened with extinction when the balance of power changes
“Israel has no long-term future without a peaceful settlement with the Arabs.”
Nahum Goldmann, President of the World Zionist Organization (1956–1968), who quotes Ben-Gurion telling him in 1956 that the state’s chances of survival over 10–15 years were “50%”

Israel’s “golden moment”Five elements that rarely come together, as the author lists them

Military power capable of defeating the Arab states combined.
Great Zionist influence over US decision-making and most major powers.
A strategic alliance with the strongest state in a unipolar world.
General Arab and Muslim weakness and helplessness.
The PLO having accepted recognition of Israel on 77% of Palestine.

The shared red linesFrom the far right of Zionism to its far left

The 1948 landNo concession on 77% of Palestine.
RefugeesNo right of return to the 1948 land.
JerusalemA large majority rejects giving up sovereignty over East Jerusalem, especially the Al-Aqsa area.
The stateIf one arises, it will not be fully sovereign: no heavy weapons, and guaranteeing Israel’s security.

The author argues that Israel rests on a triangle of security, land and Jewish identity, and that Israeli society is driven mainly by its anxieties over security and the economy. If resistance is patient and makes the costs higher than the gains, Israel seeks security in withdrawal, as happened in south Lebanon (2000) and the Gaza Strip (2005).

Five

Effects of the Settlement on the Region

Were it not for continued resistance, the Al-Aqsa Intifada and popular rejection, normalization might have gone much further.

Choose an area

Six

The Islamic Ruling on the Settlement

The author reports that the mainstream of independent Muslim scholars has ruled it forbidden, from 1947 to today.

There was something close to consensus on these rulings until Sadat’s visit (1977), when some official rulings from Egyptian institutions supported his position. The author argues that regimes generally turned to “salaried scholars” to justify their positions, while the scholarly mainstream held to prohibition. Hundreds of fatwas agree on five points:

Palestine is an Arab and Islamic land.
Palestine belongs to the generations of Muslims, and no one has the right to give it up, whoever he may be.
Jihad is the path to liberation.
The Zionists are aggressors and usurpers, and it is not permissible to confirm a usurper in what he has seized.
The cause must be returned to its Islamic identity and the community’s energies mobilized for it.

Examples of fatwas

Conditions for a peace treaty: are they met?From Dr. Muhammad Uthman Shubair’s study “The Ruling on Peace with the Jews” · tap each condition

Sheikh Hassan Ma’moun’s rule: a peace based on returning the occupied part to its people is permissible; one based on confirming and entrenching the aggression is void, “and whatever follows from what is void is void as well.”Grand Imam of al-Azhar and Grand Mufti of Egypt

For group discussion

  1. “Managing the conflict, not resolving it.” Where do you see this strategy in today’s news?
  2. The author says settlement supporters treat “temporary weakness” as a “permanent fate.” Do you agree? What makes weakness temporary?
  3. What is the difference between a peace that “returns the right to its owners” and one that “confirms the usurper”? How would you apply it to the agreements you studied in Parts 7 and 8?
Wrap-up

Test Yourself

12 questions on the settlement after 2000 and its ruling. This completes Section Three of the book.