A Win-Win Peace Treaty Between Palestine and Israel

Anytime anybody says “I want to create peace between Palestine and Israel,” they say “please don’t waste your time”. The Palestinians and Israelis have been fighting since the birth of Israel. So many peace treaties between the two groups were made, and all of them failed. Why? Because there was not a balanced peace accord that was win-win for both sides. In this case, it was always an advantage to Israel. Every time a peace accord does not address and fulfill both party's expectations in a balanced approach[1] , it is as if we are planting the seeds for the next fight.

It also does not help the prospects for Peace that neither the Palestinians nor the neighboring Arab States accepted or recognized UN Resolution 181 in 1947, known as the Partition Resolution, which divided the Palestinian mandate into Jewish and Arab States. War with 5 Arab nations and the Palestinians against the Jewish State broke out immediately after in 1948, and an unresolved and escalating conflict that has gotten progressively more complicated every year to the present date was born.

Peace remains elusive to this day some 77 years later, and together with the multiple intermittent wars that have occurred and are presently raging, regional stability has been severely impacted with ripples felt around the world. While a balanced peace accord is desperately needed, it is not enough. There also have to be fearless and committed leaders on both sides to drive the process forward. Alas, those leaders are nowhere to be found.

Today, Israel has the worst government since its birth; this government is extremely fanatic, anti-Palestinian, and most of all their leader Netanyahu, the longest living prime minister of Israel is extremely unreliable. So any peace treaty with this government and with this prime minister has no meaning and no value at all.

The Palestinians in Gaza are governed by Hamas, also known as the Islamic Resistance Movement. They are an extremist Fundamentalist organization that is openly and expressly committed to the destruction of the State of Israel. They have been designated as a terrorist group by the US, the UK and the EU. There is absolutely zero potential for peace when a regime like this represents the Palestinians.

The Palestinians in the West Bank are governed by the Palestinian Authority, who have in fact recognized the State of Israel, and are in turn recognized by Israel. Finally, the PLO is recognized by the UN and the International community as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.

It would appear that peace is all but impossible after 77 years of continuous conflict, and with the aforementioned antagonistic Governments currently in place, and with the resentments of the surrounding Arab neighbors, and the lack of courageous, respected champion to drive a peace process, etc. But it is not impossible, and it's not the first time in history that impossible conflicts have developed either.

I would like to give few examples of success that occurred during 20th century to prove to the skeptic that there is hope for peace between Israel and Palestine:

Case n.1 Race.

Let’s look at the peace agreement made in South Africa, between the white minority government with the majority of black people. Nobody believed that such a treaty could be made and succeed, but the white suddenly found a black man with the courage, charisma and vision: Nelson Mandela. The peace treaty was made with great success and now it’s history.

Case n.2 – Religion

Ireland used to be a colony under Britain for many years and Irish tried so hard to win independence as a country from the UK. Both countries have a common border, which is about 100 km long. When independence came, the small island of Ireland was divided into two parts, the southern part mostly catholic, who wanted independence, and the northern part, mostly protestant, wanted to be still part of the UK. A bloody revolution exploded between the two sides, killing, bombing, bloodshed for many years, until a man – Tony Blair – became prime minister of the UK and he had the vision, the courage and charisma to finally bring peace to the Northern part of Ireland and succeeded. Finally, peace came back to the Belfast area of Ireland.

Case n.3 – cultural traditions

This is the case of France and Germany. These two countries have a common border, which is made up of hundreds of kilometers. For over a hundred years, the two countries fought several wars with incredible amount of killing and destruction, and above all, hatred which finally ended up with WW1 and the Allies won and Germany lost. But this time, the French who hated the Germans, made a peace treaty called the Versailles Treaty, which was a very poor treaty because it called for vengeance and made the Germans hate the French even more, and this was the seed for the next war. Suddenly, a man appeared and vitalized the Germans for vengeance against France, which culminated into WW2, which was the biggest and most destructive war, where more people than ever before in history got killed and with the Nazi building the strongest army the world had ever seen.

WW2 was nothing less than a horror story in history. The Allies won once more, against the Nazi. Germany, together with Italy, got defeated and destroyed. But this time, the three leaders (Churchill, Roosevelt, and De Gaulle) learned the lesson of the Versailles Treaty and decided not to repeat the same mistake. Instead of vengeance, they created the Marshall plan to help Germany and Italy revive and build their country and economy. This succeeded so well.

The three leaders of WW2 were examples of success, in rebuilding Europe and forgetting the hatred of hundreds of years of the past. The relation between France and Germany and Italy became so close, strong and biding, that they created the European community which is by itself a success story.

Case n. 4 – Colonialism

Algeria was a colony of France for over a hundred years and Algerians eventually revolted and gained independence in 1962. French were very hard and aggressive against the people who were fighting for independence from France. The fight took many years and thousands of dead and the destructions of Algieri (the capital city). It took a charismatic man with courage and vision who finally decided it was time for peace. Algeria became an independent country and France, under Charles De Gaulle, gave its blessing.

However, there were also failures throughout the century.

Case n.1. – India

An Indian man, Gandhi, had migrated to South Africa and become a lawyer with a degree from the UK, with great charisma and vision. When he returned to South Africa the country expelled him and he returned to India and galvanized the whole country against Britain for independence and succeeded very well. His job was not over, as the big majority of Hindi and the minority community of Muslims, started fighting among themselves and had a history of fighting. Gandhi had plans to make peace between these two communities. There was a big open festival where Gandhi was celebrating the peace agreement from England and creating a peace core and suddenly, out of nowhere, a young Hindu fanatic came from the crowd and shot and killed Gandhi. With that, he also killed the possible agreement between Muslims and Hindus. After about 80 years, India and Pakistan are still paying the price of failure and unfortunately, in these two countries, no great charismatic leader has ever come again to power with the vision to bring a lasting peace between the two countries and communities.

Case n.2 – Palestine and Israel

After many years and many wars, an Israeli prime minister – Rabin - , who had courage, charisma and vision, tried to make a peace accord with Arafat, the Palestinian charismatic leader, in Oslo. Rabin was celebrating his agreement of peace with Palestine, in Tel Aviv, when suddenly a young fanatic Israeli from the crowd, with a gun, shot and killed him. With this, he also killed the peace agreement between the two people.

The permanent peace agreement

The preliminary agreement

In order to succeed, peace agreements require leaders who have courage, charisma and - above all - vision. Today, on neither side, such a man is there. The current long-lasting Israeli leader Netanyahu is the wrong man for peace. He’s strongly fanatic, and – after 16 years as prime minister – the only thing he has in his record is antagonizing more and more the Palestinians, continuing the hatred and bloodshed towards the Palestinians, and forming the most conservative government in the history of Israel.

Note, Netanyahu, who swore that he would never negotiate with a terrorist organization like Hamas, seems to have forgotten that Israel itself was born thanks to several organizations that the UK had labeled as terrorist, including Haganah. Members of Haganah include Shamir and Begin as well as half a dozen of prime ministers of Israel. In addition, the first President of Israel was considered a terrorist by the British Government itself in Palestine.

With reference to the Palestinians, their land is divided into two sections: the Gaza strip and the West Bank. While the Palestinian Authority with municipal control in the West Bank is a recognized partner, the same cannot be said of Hamas in Gaza. Israel will rightfully never accept nor tolerate the continued participation of the terrorist regime Hamas in the Gaza government. If Gaza and the Palestinians want peace, Hamas will have to go. Additionally, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank must be a unified government, perhaps under the Palestinian Authority, and with Hamas banished from any Governmental or Leadership role this is perhaps now possible. Finally, the PLO, is recognized as the representative of the Palestinian people at the United Nations.

The PLO has to be dismantled because the present system in Palestine, with over control by Israel, encourages corruption and decay, without doing anything. Nowadays, Palestine is divided into two sections: the West Bank and Gaza.

In 2007, the elections in Gaza were won by Hamas, legitimately. The PLO remained in control of the West Bank. Hamas was born not as a terrorist group, but as an idea of helping to develop Gaza with a government that was more efficient than the PLO of the West bank and the feeling that unless they fought back and organized themselves, peace would never come to Palestine. Hamas was labeled as a terrorist organization, just like it had happened during the birth of Israel, with Hagana, which was also labeled as a terrorist organization by the British colonialists. Most of the leaders fighting for freedom were called terrorists too by the British colonial power.

Israel is determined to destroy Hamas, kill all their fighters, organizations and leaders. They could be successful, but the spirit of Hamas cannot be killed. Israel has to learn from the greatest American president, Abraham Lincoln, who at the end of American civil war agreed that the Confederacy’s army, governments, leaders, military people could go back free to their homes, under the condition they would not join any political or military party or government in the South, and just be free citizens. He did not look for revenge, one pound of flesh.

Forgiveness creates good will, and helping rebuild Gaza can bring the only meaningful long-term peace to the area. The Palestinians must dissolve the PLO, delete as much as possible the corruption and start a new page in history.

If we look back at history, the majority of countries who gained independence from the colonial power, were actually able to achieve that thanks to organizations which were labeled as terrorist, and some of them became great leaders (including Nelson Mandela and Gandhi).

The US-EU-UN delegation to Israel have to find a way to put Netanyahu and his government aside, revive the government with a lot of pressure, especially from the US, in hope of an Israeli man who could suddenly appear, who really believes in peace, charismatic enough to have the Israeli behind him and with a great vision.

The peace agreement should start immediately, to minimize the bloodshed, the killing and the hatred on both sides. It will have several steps, in order to be accepted by both countries.

The agreement I propose can easily be accepted by both sides and on top of it, it would make both sides happy with their goals and give them a feeling of win-win. I will put the steps required to reach this agreement.

1) Immediate cease fire, to be respected by both sides, and immediate release of all emergency water, food, medicine, electricity, etc.

2) Two different delegations, one going to Israel (composed of USA, the EU, United Nations), proposing the peace plan. The second delegation (made of Egypt, Qatar, EU and UN) going to Egypt or Qatar and meet top Palestinians and Hamas.

3) The immediate release of all the hostages held since Oct 7, 2023, by Hamas of Palestine and the immediate release by Israel of all prisoners taken and arrested from Gaza and the West Bank taken from Oct 7, 2023.

The peace agreement should be made in such a way that we satisfy both parties, and both parties feel they won. Israel has always wanted the end of Hamas, from the very beginning. With this agreement, the end of Hamas can actually come true, since no person active in Hamas (such as a fighter, government worker, political activist etc.) will be allowed to participate in the new Palestine. Every breach of the agreement will be severely punished.

The Palestinians, on the other hand, have always wanted their own independent country and two-state solution will be acceptable to the Palestinians, recognized by the United Nations with full rights.

The only unsolved question would be the state of Jerusalem, which will be discussed later on.

The final agreement

The win-win agreement will completely delete Hamas, from any role in the new Palestine. The Palestinians will have their own new country, in a two-state solution, recognized by the UN.

A United Nations’ administrator will be chosen for Gaza, who will supervise all the development, construction and planning of the Gaza strip. Also, a UN peace core will be sent to Gaza, mainly from European or Arab friendly countries, for a period that is going to last as long as required.

A new Constitution will be made with the assistance of the United Nations. Elections will be planned.

If such preliminary agreement is acceptable to both sides, Israel will immediately release all Palestinians prisoners in Israel and Israeli military force will have to leave the West Bank and Gaza, as soon as the peace core arrives in Palestine.

An agreement should be reached concerning the settlements and the colons of the West Bank in Palestine. Israeli settlements in Palestine will be resolved in three steps:

a) all settlements established before 2000 will have the right to stay in Palestine;

b) settlements built or created between 2000 and 2015 will have to be resolved as follows.

n The land of the house, the garden and the farm will have to return back to their original owner;

n If this land has been purchased from the colons from Israeli, they will receive a refund for what they payed for the land;

n The construction of their homes will be reimbursed by the Palestinians government based on the square meters of constructions, to be agreed upon by a committee of Palestinians and Israelis.

n If the colone destroys or damages the construction, the Palestinians will have the right not to reimburse the colone the cost of the constructions.

c) As far as settlements built since 2015, the colons will not be able to collect compensation from the land, which will go to the original owner. However, the Palestinians government will compensate for the construction cost of their homes. They will have to leave the West Bank in maximum two-year period from the day of this agreement.

d) A fund to pay the construction cost of the buildings will be collected from the friendly Arab states to be payed for this purpose only.

The Palestinians will have a huge job to start a new life in Gaza and the West Bank. International assistants in city-planning, construction, building technology will be supervised.

The win-win proposal is as follows:

- Israel has settlements in Palestine. The settlements created before 2010 can remain in Palestine, while the ones created after 2015 should be dismantled and go back to Israel.

- A commission made of both Israeli and Palestinians shall be called for, to resolve all the problems created by the independence of the West Bank.

- Any home or building created after 2015 will be given to the Palestinians and a special type of budget will be created to pay the Israeli, who built that house or building. Anything confiscated or taken by force, by the Arabs, or just moved in, will have to leave the place without destroying anything. The empty homes will be sold to the Palestinians, who will move in and start a new life and create a type of good relationship with the Israelis.

- This commission will also moderate the relationships between the two countries and will issue very strict regulations about mutual respect and any offence by either nationality will be equally punished in both countries. These regulations will start applying from school, police force, government employees education, etc.

- All Arabs and Jews living in Palestine will have a Palestinian ID and will be under the jurisdiction, laws and order of Palestine.

- The Palestinian state will have a police force to control, for internal security of the country and its borders. The Isareli settlements in the West Bank will be protected by a joint Palestinian-Israeli police force, for a period of time, to be agreed upon. West Bank and Gaza are separated and a highway should be built between these two areas, with a train running through the two countries.

- The Palestinians cannot have an army of theirs for 15 years and Israel will respect the Palestinian territory at any cost. The Palestinians will have complete freedom of traveling and Israelis and Palestinians will be able to cross the borders with their ID document in peace.

- The Palestinians living in Israel should be treated exactly like Jews, with full advantages, the right to vote, to attend proper schools, with respect, similarly to the ones living in Israel.

- A crime committed by a person from one community to a person and vice versa will be tried where the crime was committed under its jurisdiction.

- The United States should put pressure on Israel to access a win-win agreement with the Palestinians, in order to resolve the problem, which is detrimental to the American reputation worldwide.

The rebuilding of Palestine

A reconstruction program should be made in Gaza, similar to the Marshall plan after WW2 in Europe, to win the Palestinian good will and forget the bombing, the bloodshed, and the killing. The ruins and the trash must be assembled and used to build a walking area in the sea, areas for recreation and sports, piers, a small seaport etc. building constructions using new technology that ensures faster construction.

The Jerusalem question

Jerusalem remains the most difficult, stumbling, complex issue for both Palestinians and Israelis. I believe the most acceptable solution will be to designate the city of Jerusalem as a Holy City or an international city – similar to the Vatican. Jerusalem could be considered like a holy city for both communities, in such a way that each community will feel that Jerusalem is theirs. Most importantly, in Jerusalem people have to respect each other and they can easily move from one area to another, without any documentation needed.

The separation will be marked only by the natural division and the streets that mark the division will have two stripes of white paint, one on the left and one on the right. These two white stripes will designate the two parts of Jerusalem.

Jerusalem is historically and culturally divided in two parts:

- The older part (the holy part for Christianity) shall be controlled by a Palestinians mayor, with the ultimate power to control the territory, elected by Palestinians;

- The western part, mostly Jewish, controlled by a Jewish mayor, with the ultimate power to control the territory, chosen by the local people

The two mayors will be responsible to the two presidents of the two communities, rather than to the prime minister, so that their position does not get political. A small police force will be appointed by both communities and the striped roads which separate the two communities will be controlled by the police force by pair (one Israeli, one Palestinian), to ensure security in both communities. In case, mayors will have complete control over the city. Trouble-makers will be exiled from the city and not allowed in ever again. Police force is to know trouble-makers on both sides.

It is important that both communities feel like Jerusalem is their city, and it is responsibility of the mayor to ensure such behavior.

It is also very important that two sides of the city will keep the original look and style.

A ring road garden all around Jerusalem, with one km minimum of diameter, is to become a garden recreation area with benches for the people of Jerusalem, for planting trees.

Both sides of Jerusalem should maintain the traditional looks and character. A committee will be selected by both parties, to settle all issues that might occur. Each one will be fully responsible for his territory, which includes new housing, constructions, cleaning, security etc. Both sections will always have special policemen acting as safeguard security of the city.

All inhabitants will have a Jerusalem ID, which is going to be similar to their original country’s ID, but with different colors, in order to allow easy identification of each community. Both Arabs and Jews will have freedom of movement throughout the city, with their ID card.

Conclusion

As all agreements, compromises are difficult to reach by both parties. It takes tremendous amount of courage and vision and pressure to conclude.

It is worth working hard and finalize an agreement for life. I wish both Israelis and Palestinians good luck and in good faith.

Authored by Eng. Giovanni Vincenti

© COPYRIGHT 2025 Giovanni Vincenti

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