The awakening: Why the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is about more than borders

For decades, a significant portion of Israel's Left and Center operated under the assumption that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was fundamentally a territorial dispute. The prevailing view held that exchanging land for a Palestinian state would eventually lead to peace. This premise underpinned the Oslo Accords and numerous negotiations, where substantial proposals were made to the Palestinians.

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What if the conflict is not only about where the border will be drawn, but also, and perhaps primarily, about the very legitimacy of a Jewish state existing in this region?

However, recent events, most notably the October 7 massacre, have profoundly challenged this long-held assumption for many Israelis. A more difficult question now arises: Is the conflict not solely about drawing borders, but perhaps more significantly, about the very legitimacy of a Jewish state in the region? While acknowledging that not all Palestinians seek Israel's destruction, it has become impossible to disregard the substantial influence of Islamist religious ideology within Palestinian society.

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For Hamas, the struggle does not end at the 1967 lines, and the land is not merely territory subject to political negotiation. It is part of a much broader religious and historical vision.

Hamas openly articulates a worldview where the struggle is not confined to the 1967 lines, viewing the land not merely as territory for negotiation but as part of a broader religious and historical vision. Western nations have often struggled to grasp this, attempting to interpret the conflict through familiar concepts like borders, settlements, sovereignty, and national rights. These elements are indeed part of the conflict, but they fail to explain the intensity of hatred, the glorification of martyrs, or why Gaza, after Israel's 2005 withdrawal, transformed into a Hamas military stronghold rather than a prosperous state.

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Israelis who believed that economic improvements, jobs in Israel, and eased civilian restrictions would reduce the motivation for confrontation discovered how dangerous it can be to assume that the other side operates according to the same logic.

The October 7 massacre served as a defining moment, revealing the danger of assuming the other side operates on the same logic. Israelis who believed economic improvements and eased restrictions would quell motivation for confrontation were proven wrong. The attack targeted communities like Be'eri, Kfar Aza, and Nir Oz, located within sovereign Israel, demonstrating that for the perpetrators, even these areas were considered part of an "occupation." This realization is sparking an "awakening" among parts of Israel's Left and Center, suggesting that the debate over dividing land may have long concealed a deeper question about Israel's fundamental right to exist.

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For the terrorists who entered those communities, that, too, was considered “occupation.”