British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband announced that the United Kingdom will impose sanctions on illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, calling the measure “overdue” and essential to “salvage” a two-state resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
He made these remarks on Tuesday as 11 other nations joined the UK in either endorsing or considering restrictions on trade involving settlement goods, which are viewed as an impediment to a future Palestinian state.
However, analysts argue that this action is insufficient to generate momentum for Palestinian statehood, which faces escalating threats from expanding settlements in the West Bank and a growingly hostile Israeli political climate.
Tahani Mustafa, a lecturer in international relations at King’s College London, told Al Jazeera that the recent anti-settlement measures are “modest” and unlikely to significantly advance Palestinian statehood ambitions.
“After three decades of rapid settlement expansion, Palestinian territory is held together only by its sinews,” Mustafa stated. “If what remains is still territorially viable as a state, it is only barely so. Much more decisive action is required to salvage the two-state solution and achieve a durable resolution to the conflict.”
Settlements dividing Palestinian territory
Over three decades after the Oslo Accords initiated a negotiating process aimed at resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, establishing a Palestinian state alongside Israel has remained the cornerstone of international peace efforts.
Yet since the Oslo process began in 1993, the number of Israeli settlers in the West Bank, including occupied East Jerusalem, has surged from approximately 260,000 to over 700,000, according to the Palestinian Bureau of Statistics, presenting a glaring obstacle to the plan.
The challenge extends beyond the sheer number of settlers to their geographic distribution. Today, many Israeli settlements are deeply embedded within West Bank areas necessary for a contiguous Palestinian state, including near major Palestinian urban centers such as Nablus, Salfit, and Hebron.
Israel’s recent E1 settlement plan, which proposes constructing thousands of illegal housing units between the settlement of Maale Adumim and East Jerusalem, exemplifies this issue. The plan would effectively bisect the West Bank and fully sever it from East Jerusalem, which Palestinians seek as their future capital.
Experts have long maintained that Israel will need to dismantle some West Bank settlements, as it did in the Gaza Strip in 2005, to accommodate a cohesive Palestinian state. However, many settlements closer to Israel’s pre-1967 borders would likely need to be addressed through land swaps.
“A complete withdrawal from some of the deeply embedded settlements is highly unlikely,” meaning land swaps would be the only way to establish some form of Palestinian “territorial integrity,” Andreas Krieg, associate professor at King’s College London, told Al Jazeera.
However, such an arrangement—where Israeli settlements near the pre-1967 borders become part of Israel and some “northern Arab-Israeli communities are integrated into a Palestinian state”—would be “highly controversial” and face backlash from multiple communities, Krieg noted.
He argued that Israelis would certainly oppose any forced withdrawal from West Bank settlements, while some “Arab-Israelis may not want to live within a Palestinian state.”
Palestinian citizens of Israel constitute approximately 21 percent of the overall population but face institutional discrimination. According to rights groups, several dozen Israeli laws actively discriminate against Palestinian citizens in areas such as education and housing.
Israeli ‘consensus’ against Palestinian state
Beyond the physical barrier created by settlements lies the Israeli political landscape, where the concept of a Palestinian state has become toxic.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government appears to be among the most hardline in Israel’s history on this issue. Netanyahu has firmly ruled out the prospect of a Palestinian state, while his far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who also oversees West Bank settlements, has celebrated blocking Palestinian statehood as a badge of honor.
Netanyahu’s most influential domestic critics hold similar views. His top rival in elections slated for October, former military chief Gadi Eisenkot, has vowed not to allow the establishment of a Palestinian state. Far-right rival Naftali Bennett fervently opposes Palestinian statehood.
Regarding the Israeli public, a June poll by the Council for a Secure America found that only 22 percent of Jewish Israelis favor a two-state solution, while 63 percent oppose it.
“The consensus within Israel, socially and politically, does not allow for any party to make any steps towards a Palestinian state,” Krieg said.
Meanwhile, Israel’s closest ally, the United States, is unlikely to exert significant pressure over Israel’s settlement policy as long as President Donald Trump remains in office for the next two and a half years, he added.
Krieg stated that a “best-case scenario” involves Israel’s next elected government reversing some recent settlement advances.
John Strawson, professor at the University of East London, said any new Israeli government is “unlikely to support a Palestinian state,” but a more moderate government might at least “stop the ethnic cleansing and other moves aimed at making that impossible.”
“Removing Netanyahu is the first step towards a two-state solution,” Strawson concluded.
Two states are the ‘only alternative to violence’
If the two-state model survives at all, it is largely due to international community pressure.
More than 150 countries, including the majority of European Union nations, have recognized Palestinian statehood. Several Arab states seeking better ties with Israel have indicated that Palestinian statehood is a precondition for normalization.
Krieg described Tuesday’s UK-led move as an “overdue step in the right direction,” but also noted it “shows the laziness and lack of creativity on the part of the international community to actually think outside the box in terms of a two-state solution.”
Anders Persson, a political scientist specializing in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, said that while the settlement sanctions concern Israel, previous anti-settlement measures, such as 2013 EU restrictions on funds for Israeli entities in occupied Palestinian territory, “changed little on the ground.”
He suggested the latest sanctions may be “too late” and “too limited … to save the two-state solution.”
Strawson stated that while a two-state solution may “seem optimistic,” it is the only alternative to “permanent war and violence.”
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