Abstract
In recent years, many academics as well as local actors have started to question the feasibility of a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine. Activists as well as politicians on the left as well as on the right of the political spectrum, have with quite differing logics started to propagate a future one-state solution as a way to move beyond the current stalemate in Israel-Palestinian relations. This has led to renewed considerations with regards to a future where some sort of one-
state solution could materialize in the region. However, international policymakers, most prominently in the EU and the US, still cling on to the previously dominating narrative, where a future two-state solution was the only game in town. Also, international organizations like the UN
continuously propagate for renewed efforts at invigorating the two-state solution, which has been
the common position on the conflict in correlation with previous consensus in international Law
and a long array of UN Security Council resolutions emphasizing a two-state solution as the only
ethically sound way to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Thus, we witness a growing gap
between international academics and local actors on the one hand and international policymakers
on the other, on the preferred and/or realistic solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict. This article
takes its starting point with the above prevalence of a gap between the normative imperative of a
two-state solution and current realpolitik where the creation of two states in the area is becoming
near-to impossible, due to changing facts on the ground. We explore the gap between the two
positions through semi-structured interviews with EU officials and negotiators, thereby
contributing increased knowledge on what it would take to rock the internationally established
norm of a two-state solution to the conflict and adjust it to current facts on the ground.
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