more thoughts inspired by Debt: The First 5000 Years.
“… one popular theory of the origins of the state, which goes back to at least to the fourteenth century North African historian Ibn Khaldun, runs precisely along these lines: nomadic raiders eventually systematize their relations with sedentary villagers; pillage turns into tribute, rape turns into the “right of the first night” or the carrying off of likely candidates as recruits for the royal harem. Conquest, untrammeled force, becomes systematized, and thus framed not as a predatory relation but as a moral one, with the lords providing protection, and the villagers, their sustenance.
… The geneaology of the modern redistributive state – with its notorious tendency to foster identity politics – can be traced back not to any sort of “primitive communism” but ultimately to violence and war.”
Reading this sent me back to thinking about Israel. Maybe the conversation should be neigther about a one-state solution nor a two-state solution. Given what we know about states in general, maybe a better way forward is to something which is beyond state? What if the moral framework of states is inherently incapable of supporting the breadth and depth of what wants is unfolding in Israel (and many other places)?