West Bank Claimed as Israeli: The Two-State Solution’s Illusion Exposed
As the world continues to discuss peace for Palestine, Israeli officials are making statements that call Palestine’s very existence into question. In early October 2026, Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said that the entire West Bank — Areas A, B and C — belonged to Israel. He also threatened to push for the expulsion of Palestinians from the occupied territories if he were appointed defence minister in the future.
Ben-Gvir’s claim exposes a fundamental contradiction: the world promises a Palestinian state, while Israel’s expansionist politics continue to erode the territory needed for such a state to exist.
Ben-Gvir’s statement should be a stark warning to the international community, particularly to countries that continue to promote the two-state solution as a way out of the Palestinian conflict. It is more than a political provocation. When territory inhabited by millions of Palestinians is claimed as Israeli, on what basis can the world still believe that a peace process can curb such expansionist ambitions?
The two-state solution requires a real, contiguous Palestinian territory with sovereignty. Without viable territory, independence would be a name without substance: a state unable to exercise effective control over the land, borders and resources needed to govern. Ben-Gvir’s claim is therefore not merely a controversial statement. It lays bare the direct conflict between the ambition to control the whole West Bank and the basic conditions required for a Palestinian state to be established.
More than words: Palestinian territory continues to shrink
Ben-Gvir’s remarks are not detached from developments on the ground. A United Nations report in September 2026 documented settlement expansion, demolitions, land confiscation, forced displacement and restrictions on Palestinian movement. During the reporting period, thousands of settlement units were advanced or approved, including projects in the E1 area near Jerusalem that threaten the territorial continuity of the West Bank.
Senior United Nations officials have again warned that Israeli settlement expansion, including plans for the E1 area, threatens the viability of the two-state solution. Settlement growth obstructs Palestinians’ access to land and makes it increasingly difficult to establish a unified Palestinian territory. But has this warning made Israel reconsider?
For decades, the two-state solution has been promoted as a path to peace. It envisages Israel and Palestine living alongside one another in their own states. But how can a sovereign Palestinian state be established if its land is continually seized, settlements keep expanding, its territory is fragmented and people’s movement is restricted? How can negotiations produce a just peace when claims over Palestinian territory continue to expand, including into areas under the authority of the Palestinian government?
The world promises Palestine a state, yet the land on which that state would be founded is becoming increasingly difficult to hold on to.
This is why the two-state solution increasingly resembles an illusion: as territorial expansion and the oppression of Palestinians continue, without efforts to stop that expansion, the solution risks becoming a diplomatic slogan repeated ever more often but increasingly difficult to realise. A thief cannot share a house with its rightful owner; ultimately, one side will occupy it. The question the world must confront is who has the right to occupy Palestinian territory: the occupier, or the home’s rightful owner?
Ben-Gvir’s claim to the entire West Bank raises an unavoidable fundamental question: is the two-state solution still worth pursuing? Muslims need to recognise that Palestine is not simply a conflict described as a war. It involves occupation, displacement, violations of rights and the failure of the international order to ensure that the law is applied consistently. What is happening in Gaza and the West Bank is occupation, the article argues, and requires a solution that brings it to an end.
The struggle to defend Palestine must be comprehensive, through political education — recognising who the occupier and true adversary are — public advocacy and pressure on those with the power to end the occupation. The international community must move beyond repeating slogans about peace. Muslim-majority countries must go beyond symbolic condemnation. Palestinians have fought relentlessly and need support from their fellow Muslims and from the wider world.
People around the world must continue to demand that Palestinian rights are not sacrificed for the sake of a false stability. The international community must not allow political statements of this kind to pass without consequences. Countries that claim to support peace need to take concrete steps, from refusing to recognise territorial annexation and demanding an end to illegal settlements to ensuring legal accountability for violations. International solidarity must transcend each country’s individual interests and unite around the rights of the Palestinian people.
Palestine needs justice, freedom, protection and the right to determine its own future.