Does Israel Recognize Palestine’s Right To Exist?

The claim that peace cannot exist between Israelis and Palestinians until Palestine recognizes the right of Israel to exist is predicated on a lie against Palestinians

Last week, Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock was a guest on Bill Maher’s show, where Maher engaged in his favorite topics—racism against Palestinians and xenophobia against Muslims. When Senator Warnock cited the gravity of Israel’s violence upon Gaza by referencing the horrific acronym, “WCNSF,” which stands for “Wounded Child, No Surviving Family,” Maher cruelly retorted, “and who’s fault is that?” Maher asserts that WCNSF is the fault of Palestinians for allegedly refusing peace with Israel, and refusing to recognize Israel’s right to exist. Of course, Maher is an incompetent talking head without the slightest understanding of history or present day reality.

There is a lot wrong with Bill Maher, and even more wrong with his anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab, anti-Muslim, and anti-fact thinking. But today I want to tackle one particular issue related to the “right to exist” argument. We often hear legacy media journalists ask politicians and candidates, “Do you believe Israel has a right to exist?” This is an AIPAC talking point and no politician can run for office without answering this question.

But on the contrary, notwithstanding that states don’t have rights, people have rights, you will never hear anyone in legacy media ask this question: “Do you believe Palestine has a right to exist?” Maher has certainly never asked it, and never will.

Because asking such a question would lay bare the hypocrisy of the initial question. While corporate media demands politicians answer whether Israel has the right to exist, and answer in the affirmative and only in the affirmative without any conditions—they won’t dare ask that same question about Palestine. Because they know the contradictory answer is no. And above all, the Israeli government itself does not believe in Palestine’s right to exist. While they will scream antisemitism at the slightest criticism of the State of Israel, their stated objective is to prevent any possibility of a Palestinian state—and this is not my opinion of their view, the receipts (that corporate media continues to ignore) prove this view. In this detailed analysis I share those receipts, because corporate censorship should not leave us in the state of Bill Maher, i.e. ignorant to history or present day reality. Let’s Address This.

Bill Maher and his Real Time guests – Senator Raphael Warnock (D-GA) and Larry Wilmore

Thirty-Eight Years of Good Faith, Met with Bad Faith

A December 8, 1988 New York Times report reads, “Yasir Arafat said today that the Palestine Liberation Organization accepted the existence of the state of Israel.”

This statement was reaffirmed in 1993. This year marks 38 years that Palestinian leadership has been unequivocal that they recognize the right of Israel to exist, and seek an equitable, fair two-state solution. Instead, seven American administrations later, Palestinians—and the world—have only seen regression. A regression caused not by Palestinian actions, but by Israeli aggression.

For example, illegal Israeli settlements have exploded across occupied Palestine from around 100,000 in 1988 to more than 600,000 now, all with seemingly silent approval from both parties, and all with no hint of slowing down.

Likewise, on ​May 14, 2018 the United States shifted its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, contrary to international norms and understanding. This provocation reflected a complete dismissal of Palestinian Muslims living in Palestine and Israel—and indeed dismisses the view held by most of the world. This move ignored Palestinian Christians—who called the move “dangerous and insulting.” It also ignored most Jews—80% of them—who opposed the move from Tel Aviv.

Palestinians have pleaded their humanity with peaceful protest, and instead suffered massive, violent, and disproportionate consequences as a result. The UN reports that during the 2018 Great March for Return, for example:

Israeli forces responded by shooting tear gas canisters, some of them dropped from drones, rubber bullets and live ammunition, mostly by snipers. As a result, 214 Palestinians, including 46 children, were killed, and over 36,100, including nearly 8,800 children have been injured. One in five of those injured (over 8,000) were hit by live ammunition.[3] During the same period, one Israeli soldier was killed and seven others were injured during the demonstrations.

These unarmed victims include the disabled and at least eight children, including 8 month old Leila Anwar al-Ghandour.

Israel justified the hundreds of Palestinian deaths by claiming it was merely “defending its borders,” but this too is a misdirection. Israel has not defined its borders, refuses to do so despite repeated demands, and continues to move them unilaterally to fit its needs. Neither did the previous, nor has the current White House administration challenged Israel’s constant border advancement, leading to more illegal settlements. Instead, the previous administration profited​ ​off of them.

Still, as recently as 2012, Israel’s own Supreme Court ordered the Israeli government to dismantle its illegal settlements. Similarly, the UN Security Council concluded in 2016:

Israel’s establishment of settlements in Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, had no legal validity, constituting a flagrant violation under international law and a major obstacle to the vision of two States living side-by-side in peace and security, within internationally recognized borders.

All of this was to no avail, as illegal Israeli settlements on Palestinian land continue unabated even as we speak.

And in Israel’s current genocide on Gaza, critics of Palestine deflect by citing Hamas—as Bill Maher did in response to Senator Warnock. As if to ignore Israel’s violent military occupation, its refusal to define its boundaries, and its illegal settlements altogether, the focus remains on Hamas in the Gaza strip.

So what do we do about Hamas?

Hamas Is the Reaction — Not the Instigation

First we must understand the root cause of how Hamas came to be. It’s critical to note that while Israel was created in 1948, Hamas did not exist until nearly 40 years later in 1987. In other words, Hamas is not the historical provocation, it is the reaction. The demands of Palestinians for fairness, equity, and a right to return home far precede Hamas.

Second, we have to understand how Hamas has persisted. I have yet to see any meaningful condemnation or accountability of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu for openly declaring his efforts to prop up and help fund Hamas to delegitimize the PLO and prevent peaceful resolution. These aren’t my words, but that of Israeli leadership and Netanyahu himself, as reported by The Times of Israel:

Most of the time, Israeli policy was to treat the Palestinian Authority as a burden and Hamas as an asset. Far-right MK Bezalel Smotrich, now the finance minister in the hardline government and leader of the Religious Zionism party, said so himself in 2015. According to various reports, Netanyahu made a similar point at a Likud faction meeting in early 2019, when he was quoted as saying that those who oppose a Palestinian state should support the transfer of funds to Gaza, because maintaining the separation between the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza would prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Third, Maher would argue, as he did before the pseudo ceasefire was signed, that Hamas needlessly delayed in returning the hostages. This, too, is a lie according to the families of the hostages. I have yet to see condemnation of Netanyahu for thwarting hostage release, as attested to by the families of the hostages themselves. They place the failure to release hostages squarely on Netanyahu’s shoulders, who rejected an offer by Hamas to release all hostages immediately after 10/7, in exchange to stop an invasion of Gaza.

If hostages really were the top priority, then Netanyahu would have availed that opportunity. He chose not to. Repeating “but what about Hamas” without first understanding why it was created, how it continues to be funded, and why the hostages weren’t released, is to ask a question without being willing to apply the proven answer. That gets us no closer to peace, and only perpetuates more war. But that is exactly the path Netanyahu has taken throughout his tenure in Israeli politics, and the path propagandists like Maher continue to espouse.

Netanyahu Openly Rejects A Palestinian State

Indeed, Netanyahu has made no secret of his intent to prevent a Palestinian state at all costs. Again The Times of Israel reports:

Netanyahu boasts of thwarting the establishment of a Palestinian state ‘for decades.’ PM says his opposition to Palestinian statehood has only intensified since Oct. 7, vows Israel to ‘maintain full security control over all territory west of the Jordan River.’

With each passing day Israeli leadership seems only more emboldened in working to permanently prevent a Palestinian state. But this is nothing new. In December of 1988 when Yasir Arafat publicly declared that the PLO recognizes the right of Israel to exist, the New York Times reported, “His statement, which he presented as a milestone, was immediately dismissed in Israel and greeted coldly by the United States.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem in 2023 (Ronen Zvulun, AP)

Nearly four decades later Palestine continues to recognize the right of Israel to exist, yet suffers continued harm and destruction. The peaceful Great March of Return was met with a violent response. The BDS movement has been criminalized in more than 37 states in America. The US Government has cut UNRWA funding despite zero evidence of Palestinian wrongdoing. The US Government has likewise banned the PLO from taking its case to the ICC despite ample evidence of Israeli wrongdoing. Meanwhile, Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem reports that thousands of Palestinians, including hundreds of children, remain indefinitely in Israeli prison without charge or conviction. Are they not hostages, too?

Palestinians cannot peacefully march, cannot peacefully boycott, cannot peacefully appeal to the ICC, cannot peacefully get UNRWA aid during a famine, cannot peacefully demand the return of their children in Israeli prisons, cannot get accountability for mass graves, and cannot get accountability for being bombed in a safe zone. And meanwhile, Palestinians are expected to negotiate with an occupying force, Israel, which is proudly on record that it will never recognize the right of Palestine to exist, and continues to build illegal settlements in the West Bank.

The Israeli government has decimated Gaza, making it uninhabitable, and killing more than 100,000 Palestinians—including more than 21,000 children. The IDF has killed at least 427 more Palestinians in the West Bank (where there is no Hamas), and Israeli settler attacks against Palestinians continue to increase. Palestinian Civil defense forces have discovered three mass graves in Gaza of more than 700 bodies, including hospital patients, people who were bound when executed, with some bodies indicating signs of torture and being buried alive. Horrifyingly, the Israeli government has dismissed these atrocities as “fake news.” World Central Kitchen, the New York Times, and NBC News all attest to Israel deliberately bombing and killing Palestinian civilians in areas it specifically ordered them to go to as safe zones—hundreds of times. As you might expect, deliberately bombing civilians is a war crime.

Conclusion: The Question They Will Never Ask

Let us return to where we started.

While pundits like Bill Maher continue to espouse violent and racist disinformation, it is incumbent upon us—people who care about facts and human rights—to speak truth that much more courageously. Corporate media demands politicians answer whether Israel has a right to exist. They will never ask whether Palestine does. Because the answer—from the Israeli government itself—is no.

Not as a fringe position. As the stated, documented, on-the-record policy of the Prime Minister of Israel, who has openly boasted of thwarting Palestinian statehood “for decades.” For 38 years, Palestinian leadership has recognized Israel’s right to exist. That recognition has been met not with reciprocity—but with more illegal settlements, more occupation, more criminalization of peaceful protest, more funding of Hamas to prevent the Palestinian state that peace would require, more mass graves, and a genocide that has killed more than 100,000 Palestinians—including more than 21,000 children.

Palestinians have tried every avenue. They marched peacefully—and were shot by snipers. They boycotted—and were criminalized in 37 states. They appealed to the ICC—and were blocked by the United States. They asked for the return of their children in Israeli prisons—and watched Netanyahu reject a hostage deal that would have freed them all, because peace threatened his political survival more than war.

What peaceful path remains that has not been blocked, criminalized, or bombed?

So here is the only question that matters: given that Israel’s government has openly declared its intention to prevent Palestinian statehood forever—what will the global community do before the next 100,000 Palestinians are killed and the dream of a Palestinian state is permanently extinguished?

The Palestinian people have been asking that question since 1948.

The world owes them an answer that matches the scale of what has been done to them.

And we—all of us who refuse to accept the corporate media’s framing—are part of how that answer gets delivered.

Gathering of Palestinians at a refugee camp during the first Arab-Israeli war (1948–49). Universal History Archive—Universal Images Group/Getty Images

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Qasim Rashid is a human rights attorney, author, and host of Let’s Address This—a platform dedicated to the human rights and accountability that corporate media refuses to provide. Subscribe, share, and let’s remain relentless in our mission for a more perfect Union.

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