Year XXXVIII, Number 3, November 2025

Emanuel Shahaf

Israeli activist and former intelligence official. Co-chair of the Federation Movement.

For three decades, the Israeli–Palestinian peace process has rested on a single foundational premise: that separation is the only viable path to peace. The initial Oslo plan gestated into a vision of two states living side by side with minimal contact, clearly demarcated borders and political autonomy based on territorial partition. This logic shaped diplomacy, military strategy and the worldview of the international community. It became the unquestioned default approach to resolve the conflict.

The assumption of separation collapsed on October 7, when Hamas’s attack exposed the profound interdependence of Israelis and Palestinians. Walls, fences and surveillance systems proved incapable of keeping the two societies apart. Israel’s subsequent military campaign in Gaza, the massive displacement of Palestinians and the deep trauma within Israeli society have underscored that the conflict is too geographically entangled, economically interwoven and emotionally charged to be managed by physical or political disengagement.

October 7 did not only expose this interdependence; it revealed the mutual vulnerability that accompanies it. Israelis discovered that even the most fortified borders cannot insulate them from instability in Gaza. Palestinians learned once again how total is their subjection to Israeli political and military decisions. Interdependence is structural, but vulnerability is systemic and neither side can escape it.

At the same time, Israel’s political reality has shifted dramatically. The electorate has moved sharply to the right, driven by fear, insecurity and disillusionment with negotiations. Many Israelis now reject the two-state paradigm not out of ideological extremism but because it no longer appears feasible. The impact of October 7 has accelerated this trend. The attack struck at the deepest layers of Israeli collective psychology, reinforcing a belief that territorial concession is dangerous and withdrawal invites catastrophe. This mindset now permeates not only traditional right-wing constituencies but much of the political center as well. Any proposal that fails to offer credible security arrangements and long-term stability will be dismissed out of hand.

On the Palestinian side, the Palestinian Authority has lost legitimacy and coherence, while Gaza has suffered catastrophic destruction. The credibility of separation has faded for Palestinians as well: statehood feels beyond reach, the status quo unbearable and the political horizon nonexistent. Yet despite this bleak landscape, Israelis and Palestinians continue to live in what is increasingly a single geopolitical space: one economy, one electrical grid, one water system and one overarching security domain. The question is no longer whether they share the land; they clearly do. The real question is how the political system that governs this shared space should be structured.

Recognizing the collapse of the separation paradigm does not mean embracing a singular alternative. Instead, it opens space for multiple models that accept the territorial and demographic interdependence of both peoples. These include confederation proposals, rights-based one-state models and cantonization schemes. What unites them is the acknowledgment that a rigid partition is no longer feasible.

Among these emerging pathways, federation stands out because it directly addresses the core contradictions of the current reality. The federation does not seek to erase national identities or impose artificial coexistence. Rather, it offers a framework where two national communities maintain self-government within a shared constitutional structure. Each community manages its internal affairs while joint federal institutions handle issues that are inherently cross-border: security, economy, infrastructure, environment, natural resources, mobility and last not least, Jerusalem.

This logic mirrors what already exists on the ground. The region functions today as a de facto single system: one labor market, one customs regime and highly integrated supply chains. Palestinian workers remain essential to Israel’s construction and agricultural sectors; Israeli control shapes every aspect of Palestinian economic life. These are not conditions that can be undone by diplomatic declarations; they are structural realities. Yet these ties exist without shared governance, producing permanent vulnerability: Palestinians remain exposed to Israeli power without representation and Israelis remain exposed to the consequences of Palestinian despair and political fragmentation. This unstable asymmetry is one reason why the conflict repeatedly erupts into crisis.

The current Israeli government shows little interest in partition. But they also cannot permanently maintain unequal control over millions of Palestinians without inviting international isolation or internal moral crisis. Palestinians, meanwhile, cannot achieve statehood under present conditions. Both sides are locked in a system neither controls nor can escape, unless a new paradigm is introduced. Federation offers one such paradigm: shared governance tailored to deep interdependence and shared vulnerability.

Comparative experiences from Europe offer valuable lessons. The Swiss, Belgian and German federal models show that political structures can evolve to accommodate profound diversity. The European Union demonstrates that sovereignty is not a zero-sum asset; it can be shared and distributed in ways that reduce conflict. Crucially, these federations emerged from conditions of low trust and high fear. Switzerland’s federal compromise developed among groups that once fought open wars; Belgium’s federalization addressed deep linguistic divides; Germany’s design protects minority regions. These examples show that federations succeed when they provide mutual guarantees, institutional checks and flexible autonomy. For Israelis and Palestinians, such guarantees may offer the only realistic alternative to perpetual crisis.

A federation in Israel–Palestine would likely begin with asymmetric arrangements, allowing both sides to exercise significant regional autonomy while gradually building shared federal mechanisms. This is not a one-step leap but a phased process, much like European integration. First come practical cooperative institutions, economic coordination and shared mobility protocols. Only later do robust federal bodies emerge. My own proposal, rooted in existing Israeli regional councils and Palestinian nafot (administrative districts), envisions a bottom-up federation built on local identities. Regions remain culturally distinct while participating in federal decision- making on matters no longer manageable within divided frameworks. The aim is to institutionalize shared living that already exists in practice.

In the aftermath of October 7, the urgency of such thinking has only increased. The attack shattered Israeli confidence in separation as a security doctrine. The war’s devastation deepened Palestinian despair and eroded faith in old diplomatic formulas. A wounded Israeli society leans further right, demanding absolute security; Palestinians face unprecedented hardship. In this environment, traditional two-state proposals seem detached from reality. A new architecture is required, one that acknowledges fear without capitulating to it and offers dignity without demanding uniformity.

If October 7 taught anything, it is that unmanaged interdependence generates unmanaged vulnerability. Israel cannot secure itself while Gaza collapses, just as Palestinians cannot achieve dignity while living under indefinite Israeli control. Any future political architecture must address not only rights and identities, but also the shared vulnerabilities that bind the two societies together. Presenting a federation does not require dismissing other alternatives. Confederation models, rights- based one-state models and revised two-state proposals all deserve examination. What federation contributes is institutional clarity. It recognizes that Israelis and Palestinians are two national communities embedded within a single territorial system. It provides tools, regional autonomy, federal guarantees and power-sharing, that translate coexistence from a volatile fact into a consensual political arrangement. It reframes sovereignty not as exclusive control but as shared responsibility. The question is not whether separation can be revived; it cannot. The political right in Israel has ensured that territorial fragmentation is irreversible; the center has largely adapted; the left lacks the strength to challenge it. Palestinians remain physically fragmented but territorially inseparable from Israel. The fiction of a clean partition has expired.

The real question is: How do we transform an involuntary one-state reality into a voluntary, stable and just political framework? How do we design institutions capable of protecting both national identities and individual rights? Federation does not promise harmony; it promises structure: a system designed for conflict management and mutual constraints. It offers a pathway away from absolutist narratives and into institutional imagination, the kind that built postwar Europe and allowed historical enemies to live together under shared rules.

In the end, moving “from separation to federation” is about realism - the realism of recognizing that Israelis and Palestinians aren’t going anywhere. They already share one land, one economy and one fate. The challenge is to create a political system that reflects this reality rather than denies it. Federation is one such system, worthy of serious consideration at a moment when the old paradigm has collapsed.