Bruce Maddy-Weitzman, Amazigh Politics in the Wake of the Arab Spring (New Texts Out Now)

Bruce Maddy-Weitzman, Amazigh Politics in the Wake of the Arab Spring (New Texts Out Now)

Bruce Maddy-Weitzman, Amazigh Politics in the Wake of the Arab Spring (New Texts Out Now)

By : Bruce Maddy-Weitzman

Bruce Maddy-Weitzman, Amazigh Politics in the Wake of the Arab Spring (University of Texas Press, 2022).

Jadaliyya (J): What made you write this book?

Bruce Maddy-Weitzman (BMZ): This book is a culmination of a quarter-century of interest, research, and teaching about the indigenous Amazigh populations of North Africa and the diaspora. As a scholar, I have been endlessly fascinated by the ways in which Amazigh groups that were systematically marginalized by national movements and post-colonial regimes in North Africa have striven to refashion their collective identities, fashion a grand narrative that challenges existing hegemonic ones, and insist on official recognition and amelioration of their status. As an individual, I cannot help but empathize with the Amazigh movement and other ethno-linguistic groups that seek to rescue, modernize, and revalorize their languages and cultures, in the face of real threats to their continued existence. 

The extraordinary waves of popular protest that cascaded back and forth across the Arab Middle East and North Africa, beginning in 2011, generated a veritable flood of commentary that touched on fundamental aspects of state-society relations and collective identities across the region. However, the Amazigh communities, and the evolving and dynamic Amazigh identity movement in general, were given short shrift in these analyses. As the decade unfolded, and the Amazigh factor repeatedly manifested itself in the newly contentious political arenas across the Maghrib and Sahel, it became clear to me that this was a story that needed to be told. Hopefully, readers will find it to be properly contextualized within the larger story of state-society dynamics, in which the legitimizing formulas that underpinned the authority of ruling elites for many decades lost much of their validity.

... the Amazigh factor, in all of its varieties, constituted an integral part of North Africa’s increasingly contested politics during the “Arab Spring” decade.

J: What particular topics, issues, and literatures does the book address?

BMZ: One ongoing subject that the book addresses is the nature of regimes’ and elites’ treatments of the Amazigh movement—from partial recognition and cooptation to utter rejection. Another is the strategies adopted by Amazigh movement activists. A third is the degree to which the movement has broadened its base beyond a narrow intellectual stratum. A fourth is the varied responses from other political and societal currents, from Islamists to liberal secularists, from leftist opposition groups to regime supporters.

My central argument is that the Amazigh factor, in all of its varieties, constituted an integral part of North Africa’s increasingly contested politics during the “Arab Spring” decade. The increasingly visible and assertive Amazigh movement shifted its emphasis during the decade from being primarily ethno-cultural to one that was more explicitly political and socio-economic. This overall shift towards explicitly political issues further refined the Amazigh movement’s rejection of the hegemonic post-colonial narratives that had consigned Amazigh communities to subordinate status within independent “Arab” nation-states. 

A number of common themes characterized this shift, even as the specifics varied from country to country. Firstly, in the formal, constitutional sphere, Tamazight was recognized as an official state language in both Morocco and Algeria, and “Amazighiyya” (“Amazigh-ness”) as a component of their respective national identities; in Libya, intensive efforts to achieve similar recognition fell short of the mark, but remained an area of contention; in Tunisia, by contrast, the efforts by activists and sympathetic non-Amazigh liberals did not bear fruit.

Secondly, the territorial dimension of Amazigh activism was increasingly salient: In Algeria, the concept of self-determination, whether within a federal and consociational democratic Algeria, or even complete independence, was now part of the militant Kabyle political lexicon. “Autonomy” and “self-determination” entered into the lexicon of Libyan Amazigh as well, even if their meanings remained vague and organically linked to the Libyan state and nation as a whole. In Morocco, Amazigh intellectuals spoke of the need for genuine regionalization, and the large-scale Riffian Hirak protests clearly had an ethno-political and territorial dimension. And in northern Mali, an independent Touareg-led state, Azawad, was briefly established, but lacked the capacity to survive.

Thirdly, socio-economic marginalization, including discrimination and willful neglect by state authorities against Amazigh populations in peripheral regions, was increasingly central to the Amazigh movement’s discourse, and protests over specific grievances abounded. Insistence on their rights was framed as being commensurate with their status as the indigenous people of their lands, in line with the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Fourthly, formidable obstacles remained extant. One in particular was the difficulty in building durable alliances with other elements in society that would help the Amazigh advance towards their fundamental goals of refashioning the fundamentals of their countries’ national identities.

And lastly, the increasing salience of trans-state ties between Amazigh organizations across North Africa and in the Amazigh diaspora was noticeable. Moreover, diaspora-based organizations and communities played significant roles in bringing the Amazigh agenda to the attention of the international community. Social media was an ever-more important tool for mobilizing on behalf of the Amazigh cause, helping to sharpen the collective consciousness of Amazigh in both the imagined homeland of Tamazgha—“the land of the Amazigh”—and the diaspora. This transnational sharpening was also accompanied by the further articulation and elaboration of more local identities, particularly among Libyan, Riffian, and Kabylian Amazigh.

Notwithstanding these common themes, the variety of specific contexts and experiences led me to organize the book according to developments in five different states—Algeria and Morocco, of course, but also Libya, Mali, and Tunisia, which up until now have barely figured in discussions of the Amazigh movement’s challenge to the existing socio-political order in North Africa.

J: How does this book connect to and/or depart from your previous work?

BMZ: My previous book on the subject, The Berber Identity Movement and the Challenge to North African States (University of Texas Press, 2011) provided a historical overview of Amazigh existence and detailed examination of the rise of the Berber identity movement, focusing on Morocco and Algeria. Amorphous, leaderless, and multi-vectored, with both country-specific and trans-state aspects, it had one clear core demand: the recognition by North African state authorities of the existence of the Amazigh people as a collective, and of the historical and cultural Amazighité of North Africa. This latest book is a natural outgrowth of the previous one.

J: Who do you hope will read this book, and what sort of impact would you like it to have?

BMZ: I hope that my book will be read by multiple audiences: country specialists, scholars who work on ethnicities, nationalism, collective memory, and minority-state relations, policymakers, and broader audiences interested in political, social, and cultural developments in the MENA region. I would be thrilled to see the book translated into French and Arabic (and Tamazight!).

J: What other projects are you working on now?

BMZ: I am currently completing a lengthy chapter analyzing the history of Morocco’s interaction with the larger inter-Arab system, dating back to the rise of Arab nationalism and the Moroccan independence movement, and following the story through the years of radical pan-Arabism dominated by Gamal Abdel Nasser, King Hassan’s active inter-Arab and Arab-Israeli diplomacy, and the current king’s markedly lower profile in Arab affairs. The story is of course linked to Morocco’s ongoing nation-building project. The chapter will appear in a volume that will honor the life and work of my doctoral adviser and historian of modern Syria, Lebanon, and the Arab-Israeli conflict, Professor Itamar Rabinovich. 

On another note, I have just participated in a wonderful conference at the Heidelberg Hoschsule for Jewish Studies, on Indigeneities and Diasporas, comparing the Amazigh, Kurdish, and Jewish cases. My contribution focused on the enduring myths and contemporary affinities between the indigenous Amazigh and (equally indigenous?) Jewish communities in North Africa, and will be expanded for publication.

 

Excerpt from the book (from pp. 63-67)

Coming out of the Closet: Libyan Amazigh Assertion in Fractured Polity

The Uprising

Perhaps the most difficult political choice that individuals and communities confront is whether or not to take up arms and rebel against their government, for the consequences of failure are likely to be severe. The very process of deciding is likely to be highly charged, creating or exacerbating divisions within the community that could threaten its cohesiveness and adversely affect the outcome. And the more fluid and uncertain the setting, the harder it is to be confident in a particular course of action.

These dynamics were very much in evidence among Libyan Amazigh in early 2011. The reverberations of the Tunisian and Egyptian mass protests were being felt throughout Libya, and Amazigh youth were no exception. While they pushed for action, particularly after the authorities started to arrest potential agitators, community elders tried to hold them back. As a vulnerable minority community, the uncertainty about how to react and the possible consequences was especially poignant. In early February, three veteran Amazigh activists, representing three different mountain towns, agreed that in the event of an uprising in the east, their community should wait to see how neighboring Arab communities reacted before making a decision. The possibility that Qaddafi would use neighboring Arab communities against them was ever present in their mind. 

On February 15, the rebellion was ignited by large scale protests in Benghazi, which were fired upon by security forces. Unexpectedly, the Nafusa Imazighen’s Zintan Arab neighbors, who had a strong presence in the Libyan military, decided to join the rebellion. Their move came after heated internal debate, overtures from the regime and countervailing pressure from their youth. The decision tipped the balance for the Nafusa Amazigh communities, who now joined as well. So did other neighboring Arab towns. Local military councils supported by deserting officers were established. Pickup trucks carrying Amazigh fighters often bore Tamazight inscriptions, written in Tifinagh characters, such as Igrawliyen n Adrarn Infusen (“Revolutionaries of Adrar n Infusen”), along with Arabic equivalents. A number of civilian functionaries did agree to meet with Qaddafi in early March, but they had lost whatever influence they once had. The National Transition Council, established by the anti-Qaddafi forces in Benghazi on February 27, was quickly endorsed by the Amazigh leadership, which sent representatives from different towns, including Yefren, Nalut, Jadu, Ghadames, and Zuwara, to participate. The swift establishment of the NTC and the Amazigh endorsement was partly the outcome of years of periodic discussions, going back to 2005, among a number of Libyan opposition groups and representatives of the World Amazigh Congress on how to build a post-Qaddafi, democratic Libya.

The immediate priority, of course, was the battle: recognizing the NTC enabled Amazigh groups to negotiate external military support for their portion of the insurgency, while keeping their distance from the Council. In this, they were not essentially different than other units in the rebellion. While the NTC had formally established a National Liberation Army, this military institution was in practice a loose coalition of independent brigades and not a unified command structure.

Qaddafi’s air force had already begun bombing Yefren on February 20th, prompting women and children to take shelter in caves. A more sustained military offensive was launched in early March, and at the beginning of April, Yefren found itself besieged, and would remain so for two months. The UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimated that nearly 55,000 civilians from Yefren, Nalut and other towns streamed across the Tunisian border seeking safety. A large refugee camp was established in Tataouine, whose own Amazigh population mobilized to support the refugees, and the area became a hub for humanitarian supplies to the mountains, supplied by Qatar, the UAE and Oman, each one directing its aid to specific clients…… 

During the first months of the rebellion, the hodgepodge of anti-regime forces in the western region, Amazigh and Arab, volunteer irregulars and defectors from the army, were on the defensive, and often left to their own devices. However, from the beginning of June, the tide shifted, with increasing support from NATO forces. An August offensive seized the strategic western coastal area, including the predominantly Amazigh town of Zuwara and the crucial Zawiyah oil refinery 50 km. from Tripoli. The city was taken by rebel forces on August 21, and its many Amazigh residents joined the throngs of celebrants, waving Amazigh flags along with the old, pre-Qaddafi Libyan flag that had been adopted by the NTC. 

Overall, Amazigh fighters had contributed substantially to the rebellion’s ultimate success by helping to create an important second front. As Frederick Wehrey observed, “whoever controls the Nafusa commands the western approaches to the capital.” Hence, their efforts complemented the main thrust coming from the east. It was a formative collective experience, and provided them with a measure of legitimacy for their future actions and demands. Their efforts were also recognized in real time by the Libyan Arab rapper Ibn Thabit, whose songs praised the Nafusa fighter and recognized their deep roots in the country, offering up the possibility that the post-Qaddafi Libyan nation could be inclusive in nature.

Coming out of the Closet

Emboldened by their struggle and the vacuum left by the withdrawal of regime officials and security forces from the region, Libyan Amazigh communities swiftly asserted their “Amazighité” in public for the first time. The Tamazight-language song "Agrawli Itri Enegh” ("The Rebel is Our Star"), sung by Dania Ben Sassi and written by her activist father, became one of the anthems of the revolution. The song honors his sister’s son, who was killed in the fighting. Ben Sassi performed the song in central Tripoli’s renamed Martyr’s Square shortly after the eviction of Qaddafi’s forces, before large celebratory crowds, Amazigh and Arab alike. It was a moment that seemed pregnant with possibilities for a new Libya, one in which its Amazigh elements might play an integral part.

Ben Sassi’s father was from Zuwara, her mother from Belgrade, Serbia, where she grew up. She would appear on numerous occasions before adoring audiences in the years after the revolution. In January 2013, she was joined on stage by the well known Moroccan Amazigh singer Khalid Izri at a large concert celebrating the Amazigh New Year (Yennayer). Later that same year, in a festive concert in Paris celebrating Amazigh culture, she sang the unofficial Amazigh anthem, “A Vava Inouva”, together with its originator, the iconic Idir. Izri also performed with both of them at the concert, making it a truly pan-Amazigh cultural moment. Ben Sassi’s presence was an indication of how far her own star had risen as the voice of the Libyan Amazigh, how hungry they were for such a star, and how the Libyan Amazigh community was now on the pan-Amazigh cultural and mental map. For her, it must have been an especially poignant moment, for she had grown up listening to his music, thanks to her father. It had been a primary mode through which she began to identify with the Amazigh cause.

From the moment of the uprising, Amazigh flags had become ubiquitous, as did symbols in the Tifinagh script. A modicum of self-rule was established in Amazigh communities, and Tamazight was quickly introduced into local schools, public spaces and radio and television broadcasts. The improvised, amateurishness nature of the initial efforts mattered less than the fact that they were taking place at all. Teachers were given crash courses of instruction on teaching Tamazight, using the Tifinagh script. They were assisted by hurriedly obtained textbooks and educators from Morocco and Algeria; a delegation from the World Amazigh Conference made a five-day visit to the region in August, further deepening the pan-Amazigh connections. The first “national” television broadcast in Tamazight, already took place on May 2, in the midst of the war, on “Libya Free People TV”, broadcasting from Doha, Qatar. The broadcast and subsequent ones suggested that the incipient new Libya could, and perhaps would include its Amazigh and other communities within the fabric of the nation.

Anecdotal evidence attested to the transformative effects of the uprising on the Amazigh community, on both the communal and national levels. Signs of an emerging modern ethnie identity were provided by a resident of Yefren, who noted that previous local divisions had been superseded by a common bond forged in struggle: “The revolution has brought us all together. We all had our tribal allegiances before, and it would be rare for anyone to eat from the same gasa’a (“shared plate”) as someone from another Amazigh town. Now Nalut, Kabaw, Jadu, Zintan, Yefren, al-Qalaa – we all eat in [from] the same plate.” Historical figures from the Nafusa region who had been downplayed or ignored by official accounts of the struggle against Italian colonialism were now publicly iconized. The most important of these was Sulayman al-Baruni (1870-1940), whose father was venerated throughout the Ibadi communities in North Africa, as well as by non-Ibadis in Tripolitania…. Another revived historical figure was Khalifa ben-Askar, who was executed in 1920 by the Italians and especially revered in his native Nalut. By contrast, images of Omar al-Mukhtar, the lionized leader of the anti-Italian resistance in eastern Libya, were absent.

New Texts Out Now: Mandy Turner and Cherine Hussein, guest eds. "Israel-Palestine after Oslo: Mapping Transformations in a Time of Deepening Crisis." Special Issue of Conflict, Security & Development

Conflict, Security and Development, Volume 15, No. 5 (December 2015) Special issue: "Israel-Palestine after Oslo: Mapping Transformations in a Time of Deepening Crisis," Guest Editors: Mandy Turner and Cherine Hussein.

Jadaliyya (J): What made you compile this volume?

Mandy Turner (MT): Both the peace process and the two-state solution are dead. Despite more than twenty years of negotiations, Israel’s occupation, colonization and repression continue–and the political and geographical fragmentation of the Palestinian people is proceeding apace.

This is not news, nor is it surprising to any keen observer of the situation. But what is surprising–and thus requires explanation – is the resilience of the Oslo framework and paradigm: both objectively and subjectively. It operates objectively as a straitjacket by trapping Palestinians in economic and security arrangements that are designed to ensure stabilization and will not to lead to sovereignty or a just and sustainable solution. And it operates subjectively as a straitjacket by shutting out discussion of alternative ways of understanding the situation and ways out of the impasse. The persistence of this framework that is focused on conflict management and stabilization, is good for Israel but bad for Palestinians.

The Oslo peace paradigm–of a track-one, elite-level, negotiated two-state solution–is therefore in crisis. And yet it is entirely possible that the current situation could continue for a while longer–particularly given the endorsement and support it enjoys from the major Western donors and the “international community,” as well as the fact that there has been no attempt to develop an alternative. The immediate short-term future is therefore bleak.

Guided by these observations, this special issue sought to undertake two tasks. The first task was to analyze the perceptions underpinning the Oslo framework and paradigm as well as some of the transformations instituted by its implementation: why is it so resilient, what has it created? The second task, which follows on from the first, was then to ask: how can we reframe our understanding of what is happening, what are some potential alternatives, and who is arguing and mobilizing for them?

These questions and themes grew out of a number of conversations with early-career scholars – some based at the Kenyon Institute in East Jerusalem, and some based in the occupied Palestinian territory and elsewhere. These conversations led to two interlinked panels at the International Studies Association annual convention in Toronto, Canada, in March 2014. To have two panels accepted on “conflict transformation and resistance in Palestine” at such a conventional international relations conference with (at the time unknown) early-career scholars is no mean feat. The large and engaged audience we received at these panels – with some very established names coming along (one of whom contributed to this special issue) – convinced us that this new stream of scholars and scholarship should have an outlet.  

J: What particular topics, issues, and literatures do the articles address?

MT: The first half of the special issue analyzes how certain problematic assumptions shaped the Oslo framework, and how the Oslo framework in turn shaped the political, economic and territorial landscape.

Virginia Tilley’s article focuses on the paradigm of conflict resolution upon which the Oslo Accords were based, and calls for a re-evaluation of what she argues are the two interlinked central principles underpinning its worldview: internationally accepted notions of Israeli sovereignty; and the internationally accepted idea that the “conflict” is essentially one between two peoples–the “Palestinian people” and the “Jewish people”. Through her critical interrogation of these two “common sense” principles, Tilley proposes that the “conflict” be reinterpreted as an example of settler colonialism, and, as a result of this, recommends an alternative conflict resolution model based on a paradigm shift away from an ethno-nationalist division of the polity towards a civic model of the nation.

Tariq Dana unpacks another central plank of the Oslo paradigm–that of promoting economic relations between Israel and the OPT. He analyses this through the prism of “economic peace” (particularly the recent revival of theories of “capitalist peace”), whose underlying assumptions are predicated on the perceived superiority of economic approaches over political approaches to resolving conflict. Dana argues that there is a symbiosis between Israeli strategies of “economic peace” and recent Palestinian “statebuilding strategies” (referred to as Fayyadism), and that both operate as a form of pacification and control because economic cooperation leaves the colonial relationship unchallenged.

The political landscape in the OPT has been transformed by the Oslo paradigm, particularly by the creation of the Palestinian Authority (PA). Alaa Tartir therefore analyses the basis, agenda and trajectory of the PA, particularly its post-2007 state building strategy. By focusing on the issue of local legitimacy and accountability, and based on fieldwork in two sites in the occupied West Bank (Balata and Jenin refugee camps), Tartir concludes that the main impact of the creation of the PA on ordinary people’s lives has been the strengthening of authoritarian control and the hijacking of any meaningful visions of Palestinian liberation.

The origin of the administrative division between the West Bank and Gaza Strip is the focus of Tareq Baconi’s article. He charts how Hamas’s initial opposition to the Oslo Accords and the PA was transformed over time, leading to its participation (and success) in the 2006 legislative elections. Baconi argues that it was the perceived demise of the peace process following the collapse of the Camp David discussions that facilitated this change. But this set Hamas on a collision course with Israel and the international community, which ultimately led to the conflict between Hamas and Fateh, and the administrative division, which continues to exist.

The special issue thereafter focuses, in the second section, on alternatives and resistance to Oslo’s transformations.

Cherine Hussein’s article charts the re-emergence of the single-state idea in opposition to the processes of separation unleashed ideologically and practically that were codified in the Oslo Accords. Analysing it as both a movement of resistance and as a political alternative to Oslo, while recognizing that it is currently largely a movement of intellectuals (particularly of diaspora Palestinians and Israelis), Hussein takes seriously its claim to be a more just and liberating alternative to the two-state solution.

My article highlights the work of a small but dedicated group of anti-Zionist Jewish-Israeli activists involved in two groups: Zochrot and Boycott from Within. Both groups emerged in the post-Second Intifada period, which was marked by deep disillusionment with the Oslo paradigm. This article unpacks the alternative – albeit marginalized – analysis, solution and route to peace proposed by these groups through the application of three concepts: hegemony, counter-hegemony and praxis. The solution, argue the activists, lies in Israel-Palestine going through a process of de-Zionization and decolonization, and the process of achieving this lies in actions in solidarity with Palestinians.

This type of solidarity action is the focus of the final article by Suzanne Morrison, who analyses the “We Divest” campaign, which is the largest divestment campaign in the US and forms part of the wider Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. Through attention to their activities and language, Morrison shows how “We Divest”, with its networked, decentralized, grassroots and horizontal structure, represents a new way of challenging Israel’s occupation and the suppression of Palestinian rights.

The two parts of the special issue are symbiotic: the critique and alternative perspectives analyzed in part two are responses to the issues and problems identified in part one.

J: How does this volume connect to and/or depart from your previous work?

MT: My work focuses on the political economy of donor intervention (which falls under the rubric of “peacebuilding”) in the OPT, particularly a critique of the Oslo peace paradigm and framework. This is a product of my broader conceptual and historical interest in the sociology of intervention as a method of capitalist expansion and imperial control (as explored in “The Politics of International Intervention: the Tyranny of Peace”, co-edited with Florian Kuhn, Routledge, 2016), and how post-conflict peacebuilding and development agendas are part of this (as explored in “Whose Peace: Critical Perspectives on the Political Economy of Peacebuilding”, co-edited with Michael Pugh and Neil Cooper (PalgraveMacmillan, 2008).  

My first book on Palestine (co-edited with Omar Shweiki), Decolonizing Palestinian Political Economy: De-development and Beyond (PalgraveMacmillan, 2014), was a collection of essays by experts in their field, of the political-economic experience of different sections of the Palestinian community. The book, however, aimed to reunite these individual experiences into one historical political-economy narrative of a people experiencing a common theme of dispossession, disenfranchisement and disarticulation. It was guided by the desire to critically assess the utility of the concept of de-development to different sectors and issues–and had a foreword by Sara Roy, the scholar who coined the term, and who was involved in the workshop from which the book emerged.

This co-edited special issue (with Cherine Hussein, who, at the time of the issue construction, was the deputy director of the Kenyon Institute) was therefore the next logical step in my research on Palestine, although my article on Jewish-Israeli anti-Zionists did constitute a slight departure from my usual focus.

J: Who do you hope will read this volume, and what sort of impact would you like it to have?

MT: I would imagine the main audience will be those whose research and political interests lie in Palestine Studies. It is difficult, given the structure of academic publishing – which has become ever more corporate and money grabbing – for research outputs such as this to be accessed by the general public. Only those with access to academic libraries are sure to be able to read it – and this is a travesty, in my opinion. To counteract this commodification of knowledge, we should all provide free access to our outputs through online open source websites such as academia.edu, etc. If academic research is going to have an impact beyond merely providing more material for teaching and background reading for yet more research (which is inaccessible to the general public) then this is essential. Websites such as Jadaliyya are therefore incredibly important.

Having said all that, I am under no illusions about the potential for ANY research on Israel-Palestine to contribute to changing the dynamics of the situation. However, as a collection of excellent analyses conducted by mostly early-career scholars in the field of Palestine studies, I am hopeful that their interesting and new perspectives will be read and digested. 

J: What other projects are you working on now?

MT: I am currently working on an edited volume provisionally entitled From the River to the Sea: Disintegration, Reintegration and Domination in Israel and Palestine. This book is the culmination of a two-year research project funded by the British Academy, which analyzed the impacts of the past twenty years of the Oslo peace framework and paradigm as processes of disintegration, reintegration and domination – and how they have created a new socio-economic and political landscape, which requires new agendas and frameworks. I am also working on a new research project with Tariq Dana at Birzeit University on capital and class in the occupied West Bank.

Excerpt from the Editor’s Note 

[Note: This issue was published in Dec. 2015]

Initially perceived to have inaugurated a new era of hope in the search for peace and justice in Palestine-Israel, the Oslo peace paradigm of a track one, elite-level, negotiated two-state solution is in crisis today, if not completely at an end.

While the major Western donors and the ‘international community’ continue to publicly endorse the Oslo peace paradigm, Israeli and Palestinian political elites have both stepped away from it. The Israeli government has adopted what appears to be an outright rejection of the internationally-accepted end-goal of negotiations, i.e. the emergence of a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. In March 2015, in the final days of his re-election campaign, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, visited the Jewish settlement of Har Homa in Palestinian East Jerusalem, which is regarded as illegal under international law. Reminding its inhabitants that it was him and his Likud government that had established the settlement in 1997 as part of the Israeli state’s vision of a unified indivisible Jerusalem, he promised to expand the construction of settlements in East Jerusalem if re-elected. And in an interview with Israeli news site, NRG, Netanyahu vowed that the prospects of a Palestinian state were non-existent as long as he remained in office. Holding on to the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt), he argued, was necessary to ensure Israel’s security in the context of regional instability and Islamic extremism. It is widely acknowledged that Netanyahu’s emphasis on Israel’s security—against both external and internal enemies—gave him a surprise win in an election he was widely expected to lose.

Despite attempts to backtrack under recognition that the US and European states are critical of this turn in official Israeli state policy, Netanyahu’s promise to bury the two-state solution in favour of a policy of further annexation has become the Israeli government’s official intent, and has been enthusiastically endorsed by leading ministers and key advisers.

[…]

The Palestinian Authority (PA) based in the West Bank also appears to have rejected a key principle of the Oslo peace paradigm—that of bilateral negotiations under the supervision of the US. Despite a herculean effort by US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to bring the two parties to the negotiating table, in response to the lack of movement towards final status issues and continued settlement expansion (amongst other issues), the Palestinian political elite have withdrawn from negotiations and resumed attempts to ‘internationalise the struggle’ by seeking membership of international organisations such as the United Nations (UN), and signing international treaties such as the Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the International Criminal Court. This change of direction is part of a rethink in the PA and PLO’s strategy rooted in wider discussions and debates. The publication of a document by the Palestine Strategy Study Group (PSSG) in August 2008, the production of which involved many members of the Palestinian political elite (and whose recommendations were studiously discussed at the highest levels of the PA and PLO), showed widespread discontent with the bilateral negotiations framework and suggested ways in which Palestinians could ‘regain the initiative’.

[…]

And yet despite these changes in official Palestinian and Israeli political strategies that signal a deepening of the crisis, donors and the ‘international community’ are reluctant to accept the failure of the Oslo peace paradigm. This political myopia has meant the persistence of a framework that is increasingly divorced from the possibility of a just and sustainable peace. It is also acting as an ideological straitjacket by shutting out alternative interpretations. This special issue seeks a way out of this political and intellectual dead end. In pursuit of this, our various contributions undertake what we regard to be two key tasks: first, to critically analyse the perceptions underpinning the Oslo paradigm and the transformations instituted by its implementation; and second, to assess some alternative ways of understanding the situation rooted in new strategies of resistance that have emerged in the context of these transformations in the post-Oslo landscape.

[…]

Taken as a whole, the articles in this special issue aim to ignite conversations on the conflict that are not based within abstracted debates that centre upon the peace process itself—but that begin from within the realities and geographies of both the continually transforming land of Palestine-Israel and the voices, struggles, worldviews and imaginings of the future of the people who presently inhabit it. For it is by highlighting these transformations, and from within these points of beginning, that we believe more hopeful pathways for alternative ways forward can be collectively imagined, articulated, debated and built.