Hey average I've never spent much time during my life thinking about the Middle East and the reasons for the continual wars there. I, like I think most, would have probably thought the two state solution a good option if only the Palestinian leaders would stop rejecting the options presented to them and then starting wars.
But now after a year of fairly intensive study I have formed a very definite view and it involves two states but not the two you might think.
Under the British mandate despite all the changes along the way the intention always was to create a Jewish state in what was once the Ottoman Empire.
Jordan was given to the Arabs in 1946, that's one state. 70% of the original mandate. The other intended state was current day Israel including Judea, Samaria and Gaza.
Arab violence and retaliation by Jewish groups ensued so the Brits tried another compromise and offered to divide what remained again. Jews accepted, Arabs rejected so that final partition never happened.
In effect Israel, because the partition plan never happened, always has been the whole of what was in 1948 called Palestine, the only reason it has never been seen that way is in the 1948 war, started by the surrounding Arab nations, Jordan captured and occupied the West Bank and Egypt captured and occupied Gaza.
Despite, what I believe is Israels right to the whole of Palestine, they have always tried to offer land for peace but to no avail. instead being thanked with more rocket fire, suicide bombings, stabbings and general violence.
As some of the cheerleaders in the pro Palestine marches in the West yell "We don't want a two state, we want all of it"
