Israel can’t go on like this.

7 October and Israel’s subsequent invasion of Gaza laid bare the cracks in its foundations. It was unveiled as a country unable to protect its citizens, divided between messianic theocrats and selective liberals, resented by its neighbours and losing the support of Jews worldwide. While its leaders justify bombing campaigns exceeding the worst atrocities of World War 2 and a spiralling humanitarian catastrophe in the Gaza Strip, Israel is becoming a pariah state. Its worst enemy is not Hamas, but itself.

Ilan Pappe paves a path out of the Jewish state, rooted in restorative justice and decolonisation, including the return of refugees, the end of illegal settlements, and building bridges with the Arab world. The future can be one of reconciliation, not endless war.

About the Author

Ilan Pappe is an Israeli historian and socialist activist. He is a professor of history at the College of Social Sciences and International Studies at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom, director of the university's European Centre for Palestine Studies, and co-director of the Exeter Centre for Ethno-Political Studies. 

He is also the author of the bestselling The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (Oneworld), A History of Modern Palestine (Cambridge), The Modern Middle East (Routledge), The Israel/Palestine Question (Routledge), The Forgotten Palestinians: A History of the Palestinians in Israel (Yale), The Idea of Israel: A History of Power and Knowledge (Verso) and with Noam Chomsky, Gaza in Crisis: Reflections on Israel's War Against the Palestinians (Penguin). He writes for, among others, the Guardian and the London Review of Books.