The New York Declaration on the Two-State Solution: More Empty Promises?

The New York Declaration on the “Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine and the Implementation of the Two-State Solution” is the outcome document of the conference of the same name held from July 28-30, 2025, in New York.ⁱ Signed by 16 countries as well as by the European Union (EU) and the League of Arab States, the Declaration commits to a peace plan that would deliver a permanent end to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict based on the principle of a two-state solution. The seven-page Declaration outlines a time-bound set of steps to achieve the agreed objectives and specifies in four sections how the signatories plan to: 1) end the war in Gaza; 2) empower a sovereign and economically viable Palestinian state to exist alongside Israel in peace and security; 3) combat ‘illegal unilateral measures’ that might jeopardize the two-state solution; and 4) achieve regional integration after ending the conflict. The 17-page Annex to the Declaration summarizes the proposals and recommendations submitted by Conference working groups for future discussion. Despite the Declaration’s ambitious objectives, the framework to which the signatories have committed reflects the same strategy that Arab and Western states and the EU have pursued for decades: pressure the Palestinians to negotiate and end the armed struggle against the occupation in return for international efforts that promise to bring about the so-called two-state solution.

The introductory clauses of the Declaration include a commitment to international law as the framework to achieve the stated goals. Yet the substance of the Declaration suggests either a fundamental misunderstanding — or deliberate avoidance — of international law. The most urgent obligation today under international law is to end the genocide that international legal authorities and experts agree is occurring in Gaza.ⁱⁱ All signatories to the Declaration (except Qatar and Indonesia) are States Parties to the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which imposes specific, positive obligations to take all measures to prevent and punish genocide,ⁱⁱⁱ obligations reinforced  by the International Court of Justice that supersede any other imperatives.

The inaccurate reflection of international law is also clear in the language of the Declaration. For example, there is a repeated demand for Hamas to release Israeli hostages, while calling for an exchange of ‘Palestinian prisoners.’ The nomenclature itself is misleading. Israel is holding more than 10,000 Palestinians without charge or trial, many of whom are denied contact with their families or counsel and are in indefinite detention.^iv These detainees fit the international definition of a hostage, which is a person experiencing ‘an arbitrary deprivation of liberty.’^v UN entities, Human Rights Watch, Physicians for Human Rights, Palestinian human rights organization Addameer, and other prominent human rights organizations have documented Israel’s torture, cruel and inhuman treatment, and murder of Palestinian hostages, such Israel’s killing of Dr. Adnan Al Bursh, head of the orthopedic department of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza who was tortured to death.^vi The Declaration refers to none of these cases as urgently requiring accountability.

Ending the War in Gaza

“The war in Gaza must end now.” — Paragraph 8 of the New York Declaration.^vii

The signatories expressed their support for US, Egyptian, and Qatari efforts to negotiate a ceasefire agreement leading to a permanent end to hostilities, as well as for the release of all hostages; the exchange of Palestinian prisoners; the return of remains; and the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza. Although clearly endorsing an end to both the occupation and Israeli attacks on Palestinians across the Occupied Territories, the Declaration does not distinguish between the Palestinian right to resist and Israel’s use of force in territory that it occupies. The right to resist is enshrined in international law, while the use of force in occupied territory is manifestly illegal, as underscored by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in its Advisory Opinions in 2004^viii and 2024.^ix Focusing on the ‘war in Gaza’ as a conflict between two equivalent parties distorts international law and the legal obligations of state and non-state actors.

Violation of the Genocide Convention imposes erga omnes partes obligations, which refers to obligations that are incumbent on all States Parties, regardless of their connection to the genocidal acts being carried out. The ICJ has reaffirmed the universal obligation to take specific measures to prevent and punish genocide regardless of third parties’ connection to the genocide being carried out. The ICJ has recognized, for example, South Africa’s standing to bring the case for genocide against Israel, Guatemala’s case against Germany for complicity with genocide, and the Gambia’s genocide case against Myanmar––all currently pending before the Court.^x The ICJ has issued three provisional (interim) measures against Israel, in January,^xi March,^xii and May 2024,^xiii ordering Israel to cease its ‘genocidal acts’ in Gaza, to open all crossings to let in full humanitarian aid,  to immediately end military operations in Rafah, and that Hamas must  release all hostages. Of all these orders, the only measure mentioned in the Declaration is that “Hamas must free all hostages.”^xiv

The Declaration does not commit its signatories to take the actions required of them by the ICJ and the Genocide Convention. The Declaration is replete with statements of condemnation such as, “condemn attacks against civilians,” “reject actions leading to territorial or demographic changes,” or “condemn attacks by Israel against civilians in Gaza…resulting in grave violation of international law.” Such positions are important, but so are the signatories’ other obligations under international law that go unmentioned.

First, the prohibition against genocide is a peremptory, or jus cogens, norm, meaning there is no excuse or right to derogate from it, such as a claim of self-defense or excesses of wartime. The duty to punish genocide requires that all States Parties exercise jurisdiction against perpetrators of international crimes—that is, investigating and prosecuting any individuals in their territory suspected of inciting, committing, or being complicit in genocide.^xv All States Parties to the Rome Statute, the founding statute of the ICC, must therefore comply with the ICC arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former minister of defense Yoav Gallant, including arresting them when they enter or fly over their territories. Signatories are further obliged to place sanctions on Israel and Israeli settlers, to end all weapons transfers to Israel, and the like. Non-parties to the ICC should also implement arrest warrants, as they have obligations independent of the Rome Statute to arrest and prosecute perpetrators of war crimes and crimes against humanity on par with what the ICC has charged as the basis of its warrants. All UN member states are parties to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 that create these obligations; their domestic laws must conform to such commitments to punish war crimes and crimes against humanity under the 1949 Geneva Conventions. Yet there is no commitment in the Declaration to do any of these things. Although proposals in the Annex do discuss genocide and ICJ and ICC obligations, they do not represent commitments from the Declaratory states. The Declaration’s focus is on what the conference participants agree to do once a ceasefire is achieved, not on how that ceasefire can be achieved.

Empowering a Sovereign Palestinian State Alongside Israel

“We reaffirmed our support for the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination…recognition and realization of the State of Palestine are an essential and indispensable component of the achievement of a two-State solution…Full admission of the State of Palestine to the United Nations is an indispensable element of the political solution.” — Paragraph 25 of the New York Declaration.^xvi

Commitments to achieve an independent Palestinian state, to support Palestinian self-determination, and to ensure the economic viability of Palestine are all positive points in the Declaration. In tandem with aiming to bring about an end to occupation, siege, territory acquisition or forced displacement, and ensure the territorial integrity of all the Occupied Palestinian Territories, these affirmations are welcome, albeit long overdue. The irony is that participating countries such as Canada, France, Italy, Japan, and the United Kingdom have not recognized Palestine as a state. Canada, France, and the UK have made future recognition conditional on steps taken by Israel or Palestine, qualifiers that undermine their putative commitment to Palestinian self-determination.^xvii Statehood is a recognition that a territory meets the international criteria to join the community of nations; membership in the United Nations indicates that it fulfills the requirements of the UN Charter. Recognition is neither a carrot nor a stick for other states to use as leverage to achieve their political goals.

The Declaration’s commitments to ‘securing the day after for Palestinians and Israelis’ include supporting the Arab-Organization of Islamic Cooperation reconstruction plan for Gaza, encouraging participation in a planned Gaza Recovery and Reconstruction conference in Cairo, and urging donors to provide assistance through an International Trust Fund for reconstruction. Signatories further committed to supporting and funding the ongoing work of for United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). This support is particularly crucial to UNRWA after the Trump administration ended US funding in 2024, which had previously comprised over half of all state contributions to UNRWA, and after Israel terminated its agreement with UNRWA, closed its offices, and expelled its employees from the Jerusalem headquarters.^xviii The Declaration offers no indication of what states will do to counteract the criminalization of UNRWA and to protect its employees, many of whom Israel has killed and others who face daily attacks and famine in Gaza.

A related provision of the Declaration supports the deployment of a temporary international stabilization mission in Gaza under UN auspices. Multiple UN bodies, experts, and public figures have been calling for UN intervention forces in Gaza since 2023; this demand is necessary, overdue, and extremely urgent.^xix However, the Declaration states that such a mission is to be mandated by the UN Security Council, a non-starter due to the anticipated US veto of any measure against Israel’s interests. The only feasible way to bring about a ceasefire, an end to Israeli occupation of Gaza, and a permanent peace would be to seek UN General Assembly authorization, under the Uniting for Peace Resolution, for a mission organized and carried out by member states’ troops.^xx Surprisingly, the Declaration contains no mention of the precedent set by the 1956 Suez UN Emergency Force (UNEF) that supervised the withdrawal of Israeli and other forces from Egypt and remained as a peacekeeping force in Gaza for 10 years.^xxi Even the Annex proposals, which discuss the possibility of international missions, refer to other UN missions and lessons from them, but fail to mention UNEF.

Combatting “Illegal Unilateral Measures” and Preserving the Two-State Solution

“We reaffirmed our unwavering support, in accordance with international law and the relevant UN resolutions, to the implementation of the two-State solution, where two democratic and sovereign States, Palestine and Israel, live side by side in peace and security within their secure and recognized borders on the basis of the 1967 lines, including with regard to Jerusalem.”^xxii – Paragraph 19 of the Declaration.

Signatories of the Declaration have committed unequivocally to the two-state solution, yet do not address the conditions under which Israel might withdraw from the OPT when more than half a million Israeli settlers today live in the West Bank, Gaza is besieged and occupied, and territorial dispossession continues on a daily basis, The Declaration refers several times to relevant UN resolutions as well as to the July 19, 2024, ICJ Advisory Opinion as references for ensuring the two-state solution. But that ICJ Advisory Opinion declared unequivocally that the occupation was a manifestly illegal annexation with regard to “the entirety of the Palestinian territory occupied by Israel in 1967.” The Court ordered Israel to bring an immediate end to its presence in the OPT, cease all settlements, restitute Palestinian property, and evacuate all settlers. Israel’s steadfast refusal to withdraw and to dismantle settlements makes a two-state solution impossible.

The Declaration overlooks that the 2024 ICJ Advisory Opinion also requires Israel to repeal all laws that discriminate against Palestinians. While signatories emphasize democratic institutions and governance for the Palestinians, there is no demand that Israel revoke its own discriminatory laws that have been widely documented as violating the Apartheid Convention^xxiii. Israel’s Law of Return,^xxiv its nationality/citizenship law,^xxv its property expropriation laws^xxvi, and its most recent Israel Nation-State Law,^xxvii all entrench an apartheid system that is deeply discriminatory and anti-democratic. This system must be dismantled for there to be hope of a durable peace.

The ICJ’s 2024 Advisory Opinion also placed obligations on third party states. In particular, the ICJ ruled that UN member states must not recognize as legal Israel’s unlawful presence in the OPT or provide Israel with aid or assistance that maintains that illegal presence. Once again, these obligations are not taken up in the Declaration, particularly with regard to implementation of an enforcement/peacekeeping mission in Gaza, or peacekeeping troops to monitor Israel’s presence within the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

The Declaration places an inordinate focus on ensuring the viability of a Palestinian state through committing ‘solely’ to the Palestinian Authority and ending Hamas rule in Gaza. It repeats that there must be ‘one state, one government, one law, and one gun’ on the Palestinian side as the way to ensure security across the Palestinian territory. There is no such commitment to ensure one government, one law, and one gun on the Israeli side, even though armed settlers continue to rampage across the West Bank, kill and injure Palestinians, destroy their fields and property, and dispossess them of their homes. Moreover, in determining that the PA must govern Gaza, the signatories are undermining the commitment to self-determination of the Palestinian people. On the one hand, the Declaration calls for democratic and transparent elections for the Palestinians; on the other it denies the right of Palestinians to vote for whomever they want, including Hamas, which has committed to abiding by any electoral decisions made by the Palestinian people.

Achieving Regional Integration by Ending the Conflict

“We agreed to take tangible steps in promoting mutual recognition, peaceful coexistence, and cooperation among all States in the region, linked to irreversible implementation of the two-State solution.”^xxviii — Paragraph 35 of the Declaration

The Declaration contains considerable discussion of supporting Palestinian financial independence, building connections to the international monetary system, and developing trade, energy and infrastructure to ensure Palestinian integration into regional and global markets. These goals are important, but reminiscent of the failed Road Map introduced during the George W. Bush administration,^xxix the Abraham Accords,^xxx and the Arab Peace Initiative, all of which emphasized, to one degree or another, economic development over an end to Israeli occupation and oppression. Economics, trade, and a regional security architecture involving the Arab Middle East are granted more space in the Declaration than guaranteeing the rights of the Palestinian people and sovereignty over their own resources and territory. Yet even this longer discussion pays only lip service to international law. The text mentions “relevant UN resolutions,” referring to General Assembly Resolution 194 on refugees.^xxxi The Declaration also claims that signatories decided to explore frameworks offering “appropriate support to resolving the refugee question, while reiterating the right of return.”^xxxii Resolution 194 enshrines Palestinian refugee right of return, property restitution, and compensation. These rights are fundamental to Palestinian demands for justice; furthermore, they are individual rights that cannot be compromised to satisfy a two-state solution imposed by international intervention. Reiterating rights is a far cry from implementing them, which is what is legally required.

Nothing in the signatories’ commitments indicates a real plan for stopping Israel’s ethnic cleansing and genocide of the Palestinian people. Without that plan, no amount of commitment to achieve a lasting solution—two-state or otherwise—has any chance of success.

The views expressed in this publication are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the position of Arab Center Washington DC, its staff, or its Board of Directors.