Negotiations that enable Israel’s land-grabs

Israeli settlers gather at a water spring in the Israeli-occupied West Bank village of Ras Ein al-Auja on April 22, 2026, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank village of Ras Ein al-Auja [Faiz Abu Rmeleh/Getty Images]

Back in the early 2000s, I was part of the Palestinian team supposedly negotiating an end to Israel’s military occupation and colonisation of Palestinian land. The idea was as perverse then as it is now: that those living under military rule have to “negotiate” for their freedom and that the owners of the land have to “negotiate” for Israel to return their land to them.

At the time, we Palestinians were told by many heads of state – including those from the US and Europe – there was no other way and that negotiations were the only path to achieving our freedom. Of course, that is simply not true, for virtually no state has gained its freedom and independence by negotiating with its oppressors.

As the negotiations took place, Israel used the opportunity to build and expand its illegal settlements, doubling the number of Israeli settlers within seven years of the Oslo negotiations. In other words, under the guise of “negotiating”, Israel stole more land. These same world leaders who pushed negotiations, and those who succeeded them, kept feeding us the line (lie) that all of Israel’s land theft would be undone with successful negotiations.

Of course, they did not lay out a Plan B, despite the illegality of land theft being the cornerstone of international law. For its part, Israel kept speaking of wanting “peace” and the desire for “negotiations”, all while eating up more Palestinian land.

Fast forward twenty-six years, and we still see the same tactics, for this is how Israel was created in the first place. Israel has long had, as its goal, the expansion of the territory it controls since the beginning of the Zionist project. This is why one can see that, with the Partition Plan of 1947, despite claims that they “accepted” the Partition (though it was not for anyone to give away), Zionist attacks were not confined to the areas that were illegally “allocated” to the “Jewish state” but that their attacks aimed outwards. This is also why Israel made a “pre-emptive” (i.e., illegal) attack against Syria, Egypt and Jordan in 1967 and continues to illegally occupy and colonise the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and the Golan Heights in violation of international law and of international decisions. But, unlike the flowery language of wanting “peace” that Israeli leaders used to express back in the 1990s and 2000s, today, Israeli leaders have become honest: they have made it no secret that they intend to annex the occupied West Bank; recolonise the Gaza Strip and further take land from Lebanon and Syria. And, under the guise of perpetual war, this is precisely what Israel has done. Israel has gone deep into Lebanon and Gaza, including during “ceasefires.”

Over the past few years, not only has Israel normalised bombing of hospitals, schools, first responders, journalists and children, but it has also normalised assassinations and – even more alarmingly – genocide. And rather than confront Israel, these same world leaders have aided in sheltering Israel and in maintaining impunity for the worst of international crimes. It is therefore not surprising that Israel continues to steal more land.

Yet the foundation of the international legal system as we know it is that states cannot steal land – they cannot invade the territory of another. This foundational rule exists for a reason: for if states can steal land, it simply fuels more wars. With Israel pushing into several countries and denying freedom, the question that remains is whether Israel operates above the system of law and order that was put into place after the Second World War or whether the rules, as we have been led to believe, are simply not applicable. Lebanon has already fallen into the same trap that Palestinians fell into in the 1990s, believing that negotiations are the path to removing Israel from its land. At the end of these negotiations – if there ever is an end – Lebanon and Syria will end up with less land than before, as this pattern of “negotiating” the return of land is simply a recipe for Israel to perpetually remain. The question that remains is whether we will see a system that finally confronts Israel, which has made a mockery of the international legal system, or whether this becomes the new status quo.

Diana Buttu is a Palestinian lawyer and analyst who served as a legal advisor to the Palestinian negotiating team from 2000 to 2005.