This article was originally published by Bitterlemons.org and is republished with permission.

A Palestinian assesses the damage to his home after last week's Israeli incursion in the West Bank city of Nablus. (Rami Swidan, Maan Images)

It is sometimes interesting and useful to revisit important chapters in the history of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to draw lessons from the past that can benefit the present. One example is the 1937 findings of the Peel Commission. These findings on the one hand captured the dilemma of the British Mandate, and on the other reached a conclusion that continues to guide efforts to solve the conflict today.

It is somewhat ironic to recall that the Peel report concluded that, "Neither of the two national ideals permits of combination in the service of a single State," and therefore recommended that, "Partition offers a chance of ultimate peace. No other plan does." The commission reached that conclusion after looking at the reality on the ground and the interests of the United Kingdom - representing those of Europe and maybe the West in general.

The commission realized at the time that neither maintaining the British Mandate nor allowing one party to dominate and govern the other would help bring peace to the country. Rather, the options would either leave the country under continuous outside oppression or at war. Each side had, and has, strong feelings toward and narratives about the land. In addition, Britain and other superpowers at the time had different interests - strategic, religious and economic - in that part of the word. In retrospect, it is safe to say that the failure of the two parties and the international community to agree and implement the partition plan is a major reason for continuing conflict and suffering.

Partition, meanwhile, has continued to crop up throughout the history of the conflict and is the main foundation of most peace efforts and proposals. It is the underlying premise on which the Madrid and Oslo peace processes were built, and the most recent version of partition is what is called now the "Bush vision".

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However, in the period since the Peel Commission published its report, the behavior of the parties and the role of the international community have not been conducive to implementing a just solution. Israeli practices in Palestine, both the part that was taken and became Israel in 1948, and the rest - the West Bank including East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip that were occupied in 1967 - reduced the practical and political feasibility of partition, or in modern terminology, the "two-state solution".

The racist treatment of the Palestinian minority in Israel, combined with the establishment of Jewish settlements in the occupied territories, has had an enormously detrimental effect on any possible reconciliation and compromise on the basis of partition/two states. In addition, the attitude and behavior of the international community - or sometimes, the lack of behavior - often directly encouraged these Israeli polices.

Indeed, the statements of US President George W. Bush during his recent visit to the region were not at all helpful. First, he dismissed the legal right of return of Palestinian refugees by saying that a solution to their plight should be sought in the context of a Palestinian state. He then expressed near-formal acceptance of the illegally built Israeli settlement blocs in the occupied West Bank. Finally, he adopted the Israeli position that Israel is a "Jewish state", ignoring not only the right of return of Palestinian refugees, but also 20 percent of the country's population. Such positions from the US will only serve to defer and preempt attempts at resolution based on partition that the Peel Commission endorsed those many years ago.

What revisiting the Peel Commission report above all prompts are questions, both to the parties and the international community: Are we serious in our endeavor toward a two-state solution as a strategic option to resolving the conflict? If yes, we must ask ourselves what positions and behaviors are most conducive to such a solution.

Ghassan Khatib is coeditor of the bitterlemons.org family of internet publications. He is vice-president of Birzeit University and a former Palestinian Authority Minister of Planning.

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