Israel–Palestine’s Struggle for Peace
History’s Trap: Solzhenitsyn’s Two Hundred Years Together
"The amount of dehumanization, hatred, bitterness, will take generations to navigate through." – Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, UN General Assembly, July 2025.
When Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote Two Hundred Years Together two decades ago, he sought to reconcile Russians and Jews after centuries of mistrust, pogroms, and revolution. His work was both praised and condemned for trying to balance moral accountability with empathy for both sides. But the central dilemma he faced—how to tell a shared history of trauma without becoming trapped by it—remains urgently relevant today.
This week, Safadi’s passionate speech at the UN evoked that same moral dilemma in the context of Israel–Palestine. Representing 57 Arab and Muslim states, Safadi declared that the Arab world would guarantee Israel’s security if it withdrew to its pre-1967 borders and recognized a Palestinian state. He sharply rebuked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for rejecting a two-state solution: “If he does not want the two-state solution, can you ask Israeli officials what is their end-game—other than just wars and wars and wars?”
His frustration echoes Solzhenitsyn’s warning: when historical trauma is weaponized rather than reconciled, it becomes a prison. Israelis and Palestinians—like Russians and Jews in Solzhenitsyn’s book—remain trapped in cycles of mutual fear, grievance, and selective memory.
Solzhenitsyn’s Lesson: History as Both Bridge and Weapon
What Two Hundred Years Together Tried to Do
Solzhenitsyn’s two-volume history of Jews in Russia (1795–1995) was not just a historical chronicle; it was an attempt at moral reckoning. He asked Russians to acknowledge their pogroms and legal discrimination while urging Jews to confront uncomfortable truths, such as their disproportionate role in early Bolshevik leadership. His ultimate goal was reconciliation: an honest conversation about shared suffering.
Yet the book became deeply controversial for three reasons:
Historical Methodology Problems – Solzhenitsyn relied on outdated sources and anecdotal evidence, downplaying systemic state antisemitism.
Moral Equivalence – By emphasizing that Russians suffered under serfdom and famine too, he blurred crucial differences between general oppression and targeted ethnic persecution.
Narrative Risks – His focus on Jewish radicals gave ammunition to nationalist groups pushing antisemitic tropes, despite his explicit rejection of collective Jewish guilt.
The core problem was this: how do you seek mutual empathy without minimizing asymmetrical injustice? That question is the same one confronting Israel, Palestine, and the wider Middle East.
The Israeli–Palestinian Parallel: Two Peoples, Two Traumas
A Tale of Competing Traumas
Just as Solzhenitsyn described Russians and Jews as two traumatized peoples misreading each other, Israelis and Palestinians exist within competing narratives of historical pain:
The Israeli Narrative is shaped by centuries of Jewish persecution, the Holocaust, wars of survival (1948, 1967, 1973), and present-day threats from Hezbollah, Hamas, and Iran. Netanyahu’s UN speech leaned heavily on this narrative, warning that Israel is “surrounded by those who want to destroy it.”
The Palestinian Narrative centers on the Nakba (the 1948 mass displacement), decades of military occupation, settlement expansion, and a sense of political invisibility. Safadi’s anger reflects this frustration: “Thirty years of efforts to convince people that peace is possible… this Israeli government killed it.”
Both narratives are real. Both are rooted in genuine suffering. But as Solzhenitsyn’s critics pointed out, shared suffering does not mean equal responsibility or power.
The Problem of Moral Equivalence
Solzhenitsyn’s greatest flaw was his tendency to weigh Russian and Jewish suffering as morally comparable. Historians rightly objected: serfdom and poverty were tragic, but Jews faced targeted pogroms, legal restrictions, and systematic exclusion.
The same false equivalence emerges when leaders insist that Israel’s security fears and Palestinian statelessness are simply “two sides of the same tragedy.” Power asymmetry matters:
Israel is a nuclear-armed state with U.S. backing, while Palestinians remain stateless and divided.
Israel controls borders, airspace, and economic resources; Palestinians live under military occupation.
Safadi’s statement directly challenges Netanyahu’s framing: Israel’s security cannot justify perpetual occupation. In other words, trauma does not absolve present responsibility—a principle Solzhenitsyn struggled to uphold consistently.
Memory as a Political Weapon
Solzhenitsyn warned against turning history into a tool of resentment, yet his own book was co-opted by nationalists. This same dynamic plays out in the Middle East:
Israel invokes Jewish historical trauma as a justification for hardline security policies. Netanyahu’s narrative of existential siege keeps the public wary of bold peace concessions.
Palestinian and Arab leaders invoke the Nakba as proof that Israel has never been a partner for peace, sometimes downplaying Israeli security concerns as propaganda.
Iran uses its own historical grievances—Western imperialism, the 1953 coup, sanctions—to justify regional proxy wars, feeding Israeli fears and hardening Netanyahu’s stance.
When history becomes political currency, compromise dies. Safadi’s UN appeal was a plea to break this cycle: “We are here… willing to guarantee Israel’s security… The danger is being created because [Netanyahu] simply does not want the two-state solution.”
Can History Be a Bridge Instead of a Trap?
Solzhenitsyn’s goal was noble, even if imperfect: he believed that truth-telling could heal interethnic wounds. The Middle East desperately needs a similar reckoning. But for that to happen, all sides must abandon selective memory:
Israelis must recognize that occupation cannot be a permanent answer to security fears. A state built on the legacy of exile and persecution should not normalize statelessness for another people.
Palestinians and Arab states must acknowledge Jewish trauma as real and existential, not as an invented pretext. The Holocaust, pogroms, and multiple wars of annihilation are not ancient history—they shape Israeli psychology today.
Iran and regional powers must stop treating the Palestinian cause as a proxy battleground. Safadi’s vision of 57 Arab and Muslim states guaranteeing Israel’s security depends on ending such manipulations.
The Breaking News Context: A Turning Point?
Safadi’s UN statement may mark a rare diplomatic opening. His words were unequivocal: “All of us are willing to guarantee the security of Israel in the context of Israel ending the occupation and allowing for the emergence of a Palestinian state.”
If taken seriously, this offer undercuts Netanyahu’s constant invocation of existential threat. For decades, Israeli leaders have argued there is “no partner for peace” in the Arab world. Safadi flipped that narrative: “We have no partner for peace in Israel; there is a partner for peace in the Arab world.”
This is historically significant. Since the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, no Arab leader has made such a sweeping public commitment. For the first time, Israel’s long-term security might depend less on military dominance and more on diplomatic courage.
But will Israel seize this moment? Or will history’s trap—the same trap Solzhenitsyn warned about—tighten further?
What Solzhenitsyn Would Likely Say
If Solzhenitsyn were alive to comment, he might sympathize with both Israeli and Palestinian traumas, as he did with Russians and Jews. But his critics would warn him—and us—against the same mistakes:
Truth must be specific: Naming injustices clearly matters more than vague calls for mutual empathy.
Power must be acknowledged: Those who hold power bear greater moral responsibility to change the dynamic.
History must not excuse present choices: Trauma explains fear, but it cannot justify permanent denial of another people’s rights.
Safadi’s words—like Solzhenitsyn’s original vision—suggest that reconciliation is possible, but only if both sides stop seeing history as a weapon and start treating it as a warning.
A Choice Between Past and Future
The greatest lesson from Two Hundred Years Together is not about who was right or wrong, but about what happens when nations refuse to escape history’s gravity. Russians and Jews spent two centuries trapped in mistrust, their memories hardened into identities. Solzhenitsyn’s call for dialogue came too late to change much.
The Israel–Palestine conflict is at a similar crossroads. Safadi’s offer of security guarantees represents an extraordinary chance to rewrite the future. But if Netanyahu—and by extension, Israeli society—continues to view all Arab overtures as existential traps, the cycle of “wars and wars and wars” will continue.
As Safadi said, it may take “generations to navigate through” the hatred already created. But generations of delay mean more lives lost, more bitterness entrenched.
History can trap us, or it can teach us. The choice is still open.
Key Takeaway
Solzhenitsyn’s flawed attempt to heal Russian–Jewish wounds warns us of the danger of half-truths and selective empathy. The Israel–Palestine conflict will only move toward peace when leaders on all sides dare to confront historical trauma honestly, acknowledge real power imbalances, and choose reconciliation over fear.