When Americans or Israelis speak of a “two-state solution” to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, they usually mean a Palestinian state alongside the Jewish one. Eric Mandel points out that when Palestinians use this locution, they mean something else entirely:

From my extensive experience speaking with Palestinian leaders and laymen alike, I have come to learn that the Palestinian version of the two-state solution leaves no room for a Jewish state. . . . To almost all Palestinian citizens of Israel I spoke with, from Arab mayors to teachers, a state of the Jewish people is illegitimate; Zionism is a colonizing enterprise of Jews stealing Arab land. Judaism, to them, is exclusively a religion, without a legitimate civilizational or national component. They view the Jewish historical claim to the land as fictional. . . .

Their idea of a fair “two-state solution” is one completely Arab state in the West Bank and one democratic binational state of Israel that allows the right of return for descendants of Palestinian refugees. It is a “two-state solution,” but not the one American Jews would recognize or Israel could survive.

I asked these Palestinian citizens of Israel if, were they to have every economic advantage that Jewish Israelis have without performing any compulsory civil service, they would then consider Israel a legitimate democracy. Almost all said no: not until the Jewish star is removed from the flag, ha-Tikvah is no longer the national anthem, and the right of return for diaspora Jews to Israel is rescinded. . . .

There is little doubt that future American administrations will re-attempt negotiations with the Israelis and Palestinians in hopes of achieving some form of a two-state solution. But it would be wise, before proceeding, to have both parties sign an agreement that, at the end of the negotiations, one of those states must be the state of the Jewish people, with the final resolution including a signed end-of-conflict agreement that unambiguously states that . . . all Palestinian claims [against] that state are settled.

Early Friday morning, Israel attacked military installations near the Iranian cities of Isfahan and nearby Natanz, the latter being one of the hubs of the country’s nuclear program. Jerusalem is not taking credit for the attack, and none of the details are too certain, but it seems that the attack involved multiple drones, likely launched from within Iran, as well as one or more missiles fired from Syrian or Iraqi airspace. Strikes on Syrian radar systems shortly beforehand probably helped make the attack possible, and there were reportedly strikes on Iraq as well.

Iran itself is downplaying the attack, but the S-300 air-defense batteries in Isfahan appear to have been destroyed or damaged. This is a sophisticated Russian-made system positioned to protect the Natanz nuclear installation. In other words, Israel has demonstrated that Iran’s best technology can’t protect the country’s skies from the IDF. As Yossi Kuperwasser puts it, the attack, combined with the response to the assault on April 13,

clarified to the Iranians that whereas we [Israelis] are not as vulnerable as they thought, they are more vulnerable than they thought. They have difficulty hitting us, but we have no difficulty hitting them.

Nobody knows exactly how the operation was carried out. . . . It is good that a question mark hovers over . . . what exactly Israel did. Let’s keep them wondering. It is good for deniability and good for keeping the enemy uncertain.

The fact that we chose targets that were in the vicinity of a major nuclear facility but were linked to the Iranian missile and air forces was a good message. It communicated that we can reach other targets as well but, as we don’t want escalation, we chose targets nearby that were involved in the attack against Israel. I think it sends the message that if we want to, we can send a stronger message. Israel is not seeking escalation at the moment.