I asked a professor if Israel is a democracy. His answer is surprising.

[pppolitics]

If Palestine should be independent eventually, then it is a democracy, because it is under no obligations to let Palestinians vote.

If Palestine should never be independent, then it isn't a democracy, because the Palestinians should be given the same rights as ordinary Israelis.

So it depends on whether you think there should eventually be a Palestinian state. If you do think so, then Israel is a democracy. If you don't, then it isn't.

I don't understand, are you suggesting that if Palestinas are allowed to vote, it would necessarily not be a democracy?

No. What I'm saying is that if Palestine is a foreign country occupied by Israel, then the Palestinians' inability to vote in Israeli elections does not reflect negatively on Israel's democracy (much as the Iraqis' or West Germans' inability to vote in American elections did not reflect negatively on American democracy). If Palestine is not a foreign country, then of course it does reflect negatively.

(The subtext is that two common criticisms of the Israeli state -- that the occupation is unjust and that Israel is an 'apartheid state' -- are actually mutually exclusive; both cannot possibly be true. My position, which I've reiterated many times, is that the occupation is just and that Israel is not an apartheid state.*)

*Except possibly with regard to the Jewish settlers in Gaza, whose deportations kind of do echo 1950s South Africa -- but, of course, people arguing that Israel is an apartheid state are virtually always arguing for orders of magnitude more settler deportations!

The two-state solution is dead.

Israel killed it.

It's time to figure out how the Palestinians fit into Israel's society.

I would be fine with this, but the actual Palestinian political organizations that exist right now do not seem to agree with you; their goal remains the establishment of a State of Palestine.

Maybe you should support Israel's current war to destroy Hamas? Then there would be one less such organization.

Israel would be the official government of Gaza, not Hamas, and Israel isn't going to drop unguided 2000 lb bombs on its own cities.

https://twitter.com/HotSpotHotSpot/status/1748058002467274979

Finally, Bibi would get something that he said he wanted.

Wait until he sends the bill for rebuilding Gaza to every Israeli household.