European Council on Foreign Relations
Security
A quiet security environment is widely considered most conducive to progress toward a two-state solution as it gives breathing space to political decision makers and facilitates public support for negotiations and compromise. This category looks at different factors that shape the security environment.
First, a new round of Palestinian violence against the Israeli civilian population could easily empower those who argue that Israel can never be safe alongside a future Palestine and decrease public support for an agreement. Second, unchallenged violence perpetrated by the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF, the Israeli army) or, increasingly, by elements of the settler population reaffirms Palestinian perceptions that their nominal security institutions do not protect them and that they remain vulnerable to violence from Israeli actors, again undermining support for a deal. The last factor analysed in this category is the PA’s monopoly on the use of force, which consists of three elements: the problems associated with the duopoly between Hamas and Fatah in Gaza and West Bank respectively; the ability of the central authority to regulate the behaviour of armed groups, both within and outside of their direct control; and the effective control over Area A, which is theoretically under full Palestinian control but is subject to incursions by Israeli security forces.
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