[ ]J Street [ ]
Friend,

It's been nearly three weeks since Hamas terrorists launched the most
heinous crime against the Jewish people in my lifetime.

The pain for Israel and Jews globally is still very raw. The connections
to those lost and suffering are still being discovered. Over 200 people –
including many friends and relatives of people in J Street – are being
held hostage, and their safety and rescue remains at the front of our
minds.

Israel’s military response – which it has the right to pursue to defend
its citizens and hold those responsible accountable – is bringing searing
pain and suffering. Thousands of families have been devastated, more than
a million people displaced, and parents are struggling to feed and shelter
their children with no clean water and no path to safety.

J Street’s view is that while a targeted military response to this crime
against humanity is justified, the civilians of Gaza must not be made to
pay for Hamas’ crimes. As President Biden has said, the Israeli government
must adhere to the laws of armed conflict and to our values, which demand
that more be done to protect the lives of civilians in Gaza, more than
half of whom are under 18.

Earlier this week, I wrote with [ [link removed] ]thoughts on the near-term – and that
includes [ [link removed] ]J Street’s call for strategic, humanitarian pauses in the
fighting.

Yet, even as we debate what steps to take in the near-term, I’m reminded
of the wisdom of my friend Ami Ayalon, who was once Commander of Israel’s
Navy: "Even the best ship’s captain in the world can’t get you where you
are going if they don’t know the destination."

So, today, I write to address a question that’s part of every conversation
about this crisis: Even if Israel does succeed in removing Hamas from
operational control of Gaza, then what? What happens the "day after" the
fighting stops?

On Wednesday, the President himself said, "When this crisis is over, there
has to be a vision of what comes next." He made clear that vision is
grounded – as it always has been – in the need for two states and that it
will require "concentrated effort from all the parties – Israelis,
Palestinians, regional partners, global leaders – to put us on a path
toward peace."

Importantly, the President related that he had spoken to key leaders in
the Middle East "about making sure there’s real hope in the region for a
better future; about the need to work toward a greater integration for
Israel while insisting that the aspirations of the Palestinian people will
be a part of that future as well."

This is not just aspirational idealism – it’s vital to the goal of
defeating Hamas.

As security expert Ian Bremmer has written: "Hamas is as much an idea as
it is an organization made up of specific people: Israel can kill its
entire leadership and destroy its infrastructure, but the movement and
ideology will survive in one form or another so long as the political
conditions that underpin its support continue to fester."

Picking up on Ami’s admonition, I have some thoughts for the captain of
our national ship, President Biden, who on Wednesday began articulating a
vision and a destination.

While there’s no need for him to lay out today every fine point of a
program for post-war reconstruction and reconciliation, there is more the
President can and should say, even at this point:

* The United States should make a clear public commitment to lead – in
close partnership with nations in the region – a significant, earnest,
multinational effort to bring about a viable, independent state of
Palestine next to Israel in the wake of this conflict. Lip service to
a "two-state solution" is insufficient.
* The President should reiterate America’s commitment to full
normalization of Israel’s relations with the Arab and Muslim worlds
and make clear that regional normalization requires resolution of the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He could even call for a revived Arab
Peace Initiative to provide the parameters for such a path.
* The US should lead a new UN Security Council Resolution, with the
support of all the permanent members, that makes clear that at the end
of a set period of time (not immediate, but not too far off), that
there will be two independent states (with a border based on the 1949
armistice lines with adjustments, perhaps using maps such as those
negotiated around the Geneva Accords).
* The new state of Palestine must incorporate both what is today the
occupied West Bank and Gaza: One political entity – demilitarized –
with physical contiguity and a sustainable economy and political
system, given the assistance it needs to achieve key markers of
security and administrative capacity.
* The world – led by the US – must make clear to our ally Israel that
any pretense of potential long-term Israeli control over the West Bank
is over. The President should state clearly that post-war American
financial and diplomatic support for Israel must be matched with
actual Israeli movement to end settlement expansion and to roll back
the occupation of what will be the state of Palestine.
* He should make equally clear that the present leadership of the
Palestinian Authority must agree to a transition plan for leadership
that leads to early elections to re-establish the credibility of
Palestinian leadership with its own people.

As a first step, at the end of conflict, a multinational trusteeship
should be established for Gaza involving Arab nations in the region who
have sought and expressed interest in normalized relations with Israel
(Morocco, UAE, Bahrain, perhaps Egypt and Jordan, maybe even Saudi
Arabia).

That trusteeship should be authorized to administer Gaza in the immediate
post-conflict period. It and its member nations, as well as the US and
others, should engage with the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank,
retool it and invest in it, so as to:

* Build out a security infrastructure with regional and international
assistance that can provide the necessary security assurances to the
state-in-building’s neighbors (in particular, Israel, but Jordan and
Egypt as well).
* Invest economically with a massive Marshall Plan-like program that
jumpstarts an economy that allows Palestinians to have opportunity,
hope and dreams – precisely the antidote to the ideology of hate that
festers in endless occupation.
* Create a political infrastructure that leads rapidly to free and open
elections of a Palestinian political leadership ready to take the
reins of the new state and guide it to its place in the new regional
architecture.
* Revitalize Palestinian governance so that the more legitimate
Palestinian Authority that will result from elections can promptly
take over responsibility for Gaza from the trusteeship, regain the
trust the world had in the Palestinian Authority during the era of
Salam Fayyad, and take part in serious negotiations with Israel and
regional partners.

The message to Israel must be clear: You are a legitimate and recognized
state in the world. There is no question about the right of the Jewish
people to self-determination in the land of Israel and to security with
American support. Yet your right to self-determination in Israel does not
negate the rights of Palestinians to live by your side.

Parallel to America's commitment to building a state of Palestine, there
should be a commitment to invest in the rehabilitation of the southern
communities in Israel devastated by the barbaric Hamas attack of October
7.

The message to the Palestinian people must be bold and clear as well: The
world sees you and recognizes you and your right to freedom and
self-determination in a state of your own. Your legitimate rights will be
fulfilled in a state of your own, but the path to freedom and independence
can only be one of non-violence and renunciation of terror.

The world must recognize both Israel and Palestine as the national
homelands of their respective peoples – and so too, each of those two
states must recognize the other and their right to live next door in peace
and security.

Yes, this is a bold and wide-eyed vision. Yes, it stretches the
imagination and perhaps even credulity to think this way.

This vision must be developed quickly into an operational plan with a
defined endpoint, a clear sense of what Israel and the Palestinians each
must do, and a timetable.

The lack of a clearly defined destination was the downfall of the Oslo
Accords. There will be no patience for endless process this time around.

This is a dark hour in the Middle East.

Precisely in this dark hour, leaders must provide light.

It is at this moment that we need the President to illuminate the
destination on the horizon toward which we are headed and to provide his
assurance that the steps we take now will lead us to that better future.

As always, we welcome your thoughts and feedback. And I want to thank
everyone for the support and grace this community has shown each other in
this difficult time, especially to those of us most personally impacted.
It's meant a great deal. 

Yours sincerely,

Jeremy Ben-Ami
President, J Street


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J Street is the political home for pro-Israel, pro-peace, pro-democracy
Americans who want Israel to be secure, democratic and the national home of the
Jewish people. Working in American politics and the Jewish community, we
advocate policies that advance shared US and Israeli interests as well as Jewish
and democratic values, leading to a two-state solution to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict.



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