For over seventy-five years, the world has debated two dominant frameworks to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: the two-state solution and the one-state solution. Both approaches, while different in structure, share the same foundational assumption—that the existence of a state is necessary for peace, justice, and coexistence. But what if that assumption is flawed? What if the very concept of the state is not the answer, but the root of the problem?
The zero state solution is a radical departure from both models. It does not propose to divide the land between two competing national projects, nor to unify it under a single, centralized state. Instead, it proposes something far more transformative: to liberate the land from the logic of ownership, borders, militarism, and domination entirely. In this model, Israel-Palestine becomes a stateless, demilitarized, sacred commons—a territory governed not by sovereignty but by shared stewardship. This space would belong to no one state, but to all of humanity. It would be held in trust as a sanctuary for Jews, Muslims, Christians, secular peoples, Indigenous voices, and others who view the land as sacred—not as a prize, but as a shared responsibility.
This proposal is not simply about rejecting colonialism or nationalism. It is about rejecting statehood as the only framework through which justice and safety can be achieved. From an anti-colonial, progressive, and anarchist perspective, the state is not a neutral tool. States, even those formed in the name of liberation, hold the potential—and often the inevitability—of enforcing hierarchy, exclusion, displacement, and militarized control. Genocide, apartheid, and structural inequality are not historical accidents. They are systemic outcomes of centralized power, enforced borders, and dominant narratives.
To understand the need for a zero state, we must recognize the failures of both the one-state and two-state paradigms. The two-state solution promises peace through separation, but it entrenches nationalism, militarized borders, and mutual distrust. It treats partition as justice, ignoring centuries of cultural and geographic interdependence between Jews and Palestinians. The one-state solution, while more inclusive in theory, still depends on state logic: borders, passports, elections, and policing. It risks majoritarian domination, bureaucratic violence, and new systems of marginalization under the banner of unity.
By contrast, the zero state solution imagines a post-sovereign, demilitarized territory governed by intercommunal, non-state institutions. It would be overseen by an international, interfaith, and secular council composed of Jewish, Muslim, Christian, Indigenous, and human rights representatives from around the world. This body would not act as a government, but as a neutral facilitator—tasked with maintaining access to holy sites, protecting sacred lands, ensuring nonviolence, and guiding the principles of shared care and dignity. There would be no armies, no border checkpoints, no nationalist flags. Instead, people would live as caretakers, not as subjects or citizens of a state.
This vision is radical—but it is not without precedent. Across the world, there are real-life models that embody aspects of this approach. The Antarctic Treaty System of 1959 designated Antarctica a demilitarized international zone for scientific cooperation, where no nation may claim sovereignty. Similarly, international waters, airspace, outer space, and the Moon are protected under treaties that prohibit national ownership. These areas exist not as anarchic voids, but as legally and ethically defined global commons, shared and protected by collective agreement.
Other historical examples echo the spirit of this proposal. The UN-administered Free City of Danzig (1920–1939) existed as a semi-autonomous zone outside the jurisdiction of surrounding states. The 1947 UN corpus separatum plan envisioned Jerusalem as an international city, open to all faiths and governed by none. Even within modern borders, places like Washington, D.C., Vatican City, and the Åland Islands function with unique legal statuses that challenge traditional ideas of sovereignty. The DMZ between North and South Korea, while not peaceful, still stands as a space where full national control is suspended.
There are also more radical, grassroots models in practice today. The Zapatista territories in Chiapas, Mexico operate through Indigenous, horizontal governance outside state authority. The Rojava region in Northern Syria has pioneered democratic confederalism, ecological stewardship, and feminist governance under extreme pressure. In Christiania, Denmark, an ongoing anarchist commune thrives despite challenges. Elsewhere, intentional communities, Indigenous-led autonomous zones, refugee camps, protest occupations, and transnational solidarity movements provide a living archive of stateless and anti-colonial resilience.
These examples—ongoing and historic, large and small—prove that stateless governance is not only possible but already alive in pockets around the world. The zero state solution draws upon these lessons to address the most contested land on Earth, not by choosing one side or proposing a compromise, but by refusing to let the state continue its legacy of domination. It affirms that Jews, Palestinians, Christians, Muslims, and others can live together not through separation or subjugation, but through co-belonging rooted in mutual care, shared responsibility, and sacred trust.
Under this vision, the land would become a permanent sanctuary—a place for pilgrimage, study, reflection, and community. Long-term residents would continue living and raising families, not as citizens, but as members of local, cooperative councils. Conflict would be resolved through restorative justice, not carceral punishment. Education would be multilingual, anti-colonial, and interfaith, rooted in ethics, memory, ecology, and cultural stewardship. Property would not be owned privately or by states, but held in commons-based stewardship agreements, renewed and evaluated by the communities themselves. Security would be provided by international peacekeepers or rotating mutual aid forces, not by standing armies or surveillance states.
Critics will call this utopian—but so were abolition, decolonization, and democracy itself in their earliest forms. The systems we now take for granted were once dismissed as impossible. The zero state solution is not a fantasy of perfection, but a rejection of the cycles that have already failed. It is a declaration that peace will not grow from militarized soil, and that liberation does not require the inheritance of oppressive systems. It is an invitation to imagine a world beyond the state—and to build it together.
The sacredness of the land is precisely what makes it unfit to be owned. Let it be shared. Let it be protected. Let it be free.