Shared spaces — separate spaces: the Israel-Palestine peace process

The Israel-Palestine peace process has been implemented in a series of stages, beginning with limited Palestinian autonomy in part of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, followed by the territorial expansion of the self government region to include all major Palestinian population centers. The current peace process is no more than a transition stage on the way to Palestinian statehood. Final round negotiations will have to deal with difficult issues of boundary demarcation. This will necessitate transforming the geographically discontinuos map of the Oslo II agreement into separate and compact political territories. While shared Israeli-Palestinian spaces would indicate a real move towards peace, continued mistrust and suspicion of each partner for the other is dictating the creation of separate spaces — for both peoples and territories. This is yet another example of the continued significance of territorial boundaries as part of the conflict resolution process in areas of ethno-territorial disputes.