Palestinians may bolster support for a bi-national state with Israel should US-backed negotiations, restarted last year, fail, a group of prominent Palestinians said in a report yesterday.
The 52-page report by the Palestine Strategy Study Group said a shift to a binational outcome "reopens a challenge to the existence of the state of Israel in its present form". It added: "Although many Palestinians may still prefer a genuine negotiated two-state solution, a failure of the present Annapolis initiative will greatly strengthen those who argue against this."
Hani al-Masri, a Palestinian writer and member of the group, said the report's aim was to "show that if there are no serious negotiations, we must prepare for other alternatives".
He said the report offered a "last call" for a two-state solution, which he said was being hampered by Israel's settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank.
The group is made up of 27 Palestinian intellectuals, academics, human rights activists, entrepreneurs, former government ministers and members of parties including Fatah and Hamas from the West Bank, Gaza Strip and the diaspora. It has been meeting since January in Ramallah, Nablus, Amman and Istanbul to work on the document.
Israel has long renounced the idea of a bi-national state with the Palestinians, an option in which it would lose its Jewish majority.
Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority president, has said he still supports a two-state solution despite faltering negotiations with Israel. But some Palestinian officials have raised other options.
Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior aide to Mr Abbas, has floated the idea of a Palestinian unilateral declaration of independence.
Talks between the two sides have shown few tangible results since restarting last November at the USbrokered Annapolis summit.
Israeli and Palestinian officials have expressed scepticism of reaching Washington's goal of a framework peace agreement by the time President George W. Bush leaves office in January.
Mark Regev, a spokesman for Israel's prime minister, Ehud Olmert, said Israel rejects the option of a bi- national state and that a two-state solution is supported by the United Nat-ions, European Union, the Arab League and Israeli and Palestinian leaders. He added: "The Palestinians made a historic mistake in 1947 when they rejected a two-state proposal by the UN. I am sure they won't make the same mistake again."
The report raised an alternative strategy should Israel refuse to negotiate "seriously" for a two-state outcome. In addition to a binational state, they included ceasing negotiations and reorganising the Palestinian Authority.
