What Does Israel Fear from Palestine?

A poignant, incisive meditation on Israel’s longstanding rejection of peace, and what the war on Gaza means for Palestinian and Israeli futures.

When apartheid in South Africa ended in 1994, dismantled by internal activism and global pressure, why did Israel continue to pursue its own apartheid policies against Palestinians? In keeping with a history of antagonism, the Israeli state accelerated the establishment of settlements in the Occupied Territories as extreme right-wing voices gained prominence in government, with comparatively little international backlash.

Condensing this complex history into a lucid essay, Raja Shehadeh examines the many lost opportunities to promote a lasting peace and equality between Israelis and Palestinians. Since the creation of Israel in 1948, known to Palestinians as the Nakba, or catastrophe, each side’s perception of events has strongly diverged. What can this discrepancy tell us about Israel’s undermining of a two-state solution? And will the current genocide in Gaza finally mark a shift in the world’s response?

With graceful, haunting prose, Shehadeh offers insights into a defining conflict that could yet be resolved.

Raja Shehadeh is one of Palestine’s leading writers. He is also a lawyer and the founder of the pioneering Palestinian human rights organization Al-Haq. Shehadeh is the author of several acclaimed books including Strangers in the House, Occupation Diaries, Palestinian Walks, which won the prestigious Orwell Prize, and We Could Have Been Friends, My Father and I (Other Press, 2023), which was a finalist for the National Book Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Award.