J Street U and Students for Justice in Palestine Talk about the Future of Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

GW students are following the developments in the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine. On Thursday night two students groups dedicated to discussing the conflict presented two very different solutions to how the conflict should end.

J Street U, a new student organization on campus advocating for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Paletinian conflict, co-hosted an event with Students for Justice in Palestine in the Marvin Center to explore possible solutions to the conflict.

Both student groups had three of their members represent their organization. The evening was moderated by Jeff Richards, a GW student majoring in Middle Eastern Affairs. The evening began with Richards asking for people in the audience to gather in groups of three or four people, preferably with people they didn't know, and talk about why they had come to the event. 

Following the small group conversations, Richards revealed the purpose of the evening was to talk about the two-state solution that J Street U is advocating versus the one-state solution SJP is in favor of. 

Group founder Rory Silver read J Street U's opening statement. In it he said a two-state solution would return the borders of Israel to 1967 lines and would include land swaps and the sharing of Jerusalem. Silver also said that J Street's stance was that you could still support Israel overall while being critical of it at the same time.

In Rosshandler's opening statement for SJP, he spoke of a one-state solution where Palestinians and Israelis lived together in the same state under the same laws with no discrimination, "religious hierarchies" or "illegal occupations" of Palestinian communities.

From the beginning tensions in the room were high. After Silver described the event as a "discussion" in J Street's opening statement, Akkad, in his first remarks of the night for SJP, said that he disagreed with Silver's characterization that the evening was a discussion but that he believed it was a "debate." He explained this was how the event had been "presented to SJP." As Akkad said this, Silver could be seen slightly shaking his head. Silver later said that on the Facebook event page the night was described as a "discussion."

Both sides said that their solution would be the best one for sustaining a long-term peace in the conflict and agreed that the one- and-a-half state set-up currently in place was not acceptable. SJP, however, felt that the two-state solution was very similar to the current situation. They argued throughout the more than two hour event that the two-state solution was supported by Jews as "a last ditch effort to preserve Zionism."

SJP also argued that a two-state solution would hurt Palestine because of the geographic separation of the two Palestinian territories in a two-state solution: the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. They used the unsuccessful separation of Pakistan from India into West Pakistan and East Pakistan (which later became Bangladesh) as an example.

Meanwhile, J Street U argued that a one-state solution would not work because of the built-in tensions between the two groups. They used the tensions in Belgium, a county where Dutch and Flemish people have had many conflicts over the years as an example of how a one-state solution would not be successful.

Tensions reached their peak during the Q & A session. Instead of questions, however, supporters from both sides began to comment on and question the validity of points made during the evening by the other side. Several times Richards reminded both sides to ask fair questions and to "keep it friendly" but both sides had a difficult time following this request.

Despite the tension, both organizations later commented that they hoped this was only the first of many events they would co-sponsor together to discuss solutions to the conflict.