Following my article in yesterday’s Crikey that discussed the Australian Greens and the one-state solution, the following letter is published today:
Michael Reich writes: Time may be rapidly changing in the Middle East but the one state solution is a throwback to the early part of the last century.
One state solutions were all the rage after World War 1 when the colonial powers were re-drawing the boundaries of many countries in the Middle East and elsewhere. The prevailing philosophy of the time of creating a one state solution that fits all, by simply drawing a boundary that disregards the ethnic make-up of the populations (let the Sunni, Shiites and Kurds etc. sought themselves out) has in retrospect not proved to be a great success.
Similarly the one state solution to the Balkans problem has also been problematic. Bosnia and Kosovo now have majority Muslim populations and, if… Loewenstein regards consistency as virtue, he should be agitating for a reunion of these states with Serbia so that the Muslims could then return to their cherished minority status.
The reconstitution of Yugoslavia from its now diverse constituent parts would be an ideal practice run for those whose delusions extend as far as support for a single state solution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict .