A study by the European Council on Foreign Relations has revealed a broad shift in Israeli political attitudes toward the Palestinian question, indicating declining support for the establishment of a Palestinian state across most Jewish political currents, alongside rising acceptance of the idea of prolonged Israeli control over Palestinians.
Researcher Beth Oppenheim said in the study, titled "The Ideas of Israel," that the political center of gravity inside Israel has moved significantly to the right on issues related to the West Bank, settlement, security and the future of the Palestinian state.
The study argues that the national and religious right has become more capable of imposing its visions regarding the future of Palestinian territories, while forces that once linked Israel's future to a political settlement based on separation from the Palestinians or a two-state solution have declined.
The study indicates that the Israeli national current supports various forms of expanding Israeli sovereignty, including, among some of its components, annexing parts of Area C in the West Bank, while keeping Palestinians under limited arrangements of self-rule and Israeli security control.
As for religious nationalists, the study says their vision goes further, linking Jewish nationalism with religious doctrine and viewing the West Bank as part of the historical and religious "Land of Israel."
According to the study, this current pushes toward expanding settlements and imposing Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank, while some of its components put forward expansionist visions that go beyond the West Bank's borders.
Oppenheim notes that the dispute over the Palestinians is no longer confined to the traditional right-left divide, as parts of the center and the liberal Zionist current have adopted harsher security positions, particularly after the October 7, 2023 attack.
The study says that Hamas's attack that day and the war that followed reinforced among many Israelis the belief that the state's security depends primarily on military superiority and the use of force.
In parallel, the study notes that even the liberal Zionist current, which rejects annexation of the West Bank and criticizes settler violence, no longer clearly proposes the two-state project as a main political axis, with some of its leaders now focusing on "separation" from the Palestinians while preserving a Jewish majority inside Israel.
The study argues that these shifts place the Palestinian cause before a long-term dilemma, as a system could persist in which Israel controls millions of Palestinians security-wise and politically without the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, and at the same time without integrating them into a single political system with equal rights.
Oppenheim notes that religious nationalists have become among the most prominent forces seeking to turn control over the land into a permanent project, while the idea of "Greater Israel" has become more present in political circles that were previously less accepting of such visions.
The study considers that these shifts will not disappear once Netanyahu's era ends, because their causes are linked to broader social, religious, demographic and political changes within Israeli society.
It concludes that the future of the Palestinians has become closely linked to Israel's internal struggle over the definition of the state, its borders and its identity, and that the current dominant political direction has moved a great deal away from the model based on a political settlement ending in the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.
