There are many reasons to feel hopeless when it comes to the prospect of Israeli-Palestinian peace.
The sheer scale of death and devastation, first wrought by Hamas’ massacre and then by Israel’s intensive military assault on the Gaza Strip, has hardened opinions on both sides, fomenting grief, anger and desire for vengeance with no clear end point.
Still, senior figures closely involved with past attempts to resolve this most intractable of impasses have told NBC News that, in this moment of tragedy, there may be opportunity — and even hope.
“It’s a big crisis — and crises create opportunities,” said Yossi Beilin, a veteran Israeli politician and peace negotiator whose backchannel discussions led to the Oslo Accords. This was a series of landmark agreements between the Palestinians and Israelis in the 1990s that mapped out a route to peace but ultimately failed on their promise.
While Beilin doesn’t kid himself about the scale of the challenge for those who seek a negotiated peace between the Palestinians and Israelis, he and others say one crucial thing has changed. To an extent not seen in decades, the eyes of the world are focused on Israel and the Palestinian territories — a patch of land barely larger than Massachusetts. And, whatever their political inclinations, few believe that the previously tolerated status quo can be allowed to continue.
“The world had given up on us,” Beilin said. “But Oct. 7 changed everything.”
Before that day, the issue of Israel and the Palestinians was languishing in a stalemate: Israelis felt unsafe from attacks by rockets and lone-wolf Palestinian militants. Gazans were trapped by a 16-year Israeli land, air and sea blockade that crippled the economy and crushed their hopes for the future. And Palestinians in the occupied West Bank were left to fend off Israeli settlers encroaching on their land, in tense altercations that regularly flared up into violent clashes.
But with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin…
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