I began my business career as a gaming entrepreneur, so no one can lecture me about probabilities. I know a long shot when I see one. For more than two decades, the peace camp in Israel has been treated as a statistical impossibility. The collapse of the Oslo process, followed by the horrors of the Second Intifada, did much to sour both Israelis and Palestinians on the prospects for a two-state solution.
Yet, like my mentor, the late and beloved Shimon Peres, I have never stopped believing that peace was possible. Now, against the odds, we have placed that conviction in writing.
After months of negotiations, our party, B’Yachad Natzliach (Together We Will Succeed), reached a comprehensive framework agreement with the Palestinian Authority. This memorandum is the first of its kind: an Israeli political movement and the recognized Palestinian leadership, sitting as partners, and hammering out a full settlement to the conflict.
Addressing unresolved issues
It addresses every final-status issue that previous governments and envoys left unresolved – refugees, Jerusalem, borders, settlements, security arrangements, economic cooperation. It is a blueprint for two states living side by side in peace and dignity
The skeptics will say: This is just another document, destined for the dust-bin. But the fact that it exists at all is itself a landmark. For decades, peace plans have been drafted by foreign mediators, imposed from the outside. This one was authored here, by Israelis and Palestinians together, in the language of our shared interests. It is not an abstract “roadmap,” but a living pact that can be placed before our voters, our neighbors, and the world.
My vice president, Drar Amreh, played a pivotal role. An Arab citizen of Israel from Tamra in the Galilee, Amreh brings to the table an intimate understanding of both Israeli and Palestinian aspirations. His ability to conduct the negotiations – in Arabic, in Hebrew, and above all, in the voice of mutual recognition – proved indispensable.
That fact is itself a lesson: Arab Israelis are not a marginal constituency to be courted only at election time. They are a vital bridge between two peoples. If we are serious about resolving this conflict, Arab citizens of Israel must be active participants in our politics, not merely spectators.
Showing there is another way
This is why our party’s electoral list is shared equally between Jewish and Arab candidates, and why our platform speaks to the urgent needs of Arab communities – crime prevention, public services, and economic development – while simultaneously addressing the core security concerns of Jewish Israelis. We cannot disentangle the domestic crisis of alienation from the regional crisis of conflict. The one reinforces the other. To heal both, we must act together.
I do not underestimate the obstacles. The Israeli public has been told for years that “there is no partner for peace.” The Palestinian public, likewise, has been told that Israel has no intention of allowing their state to exist. Distrust runs deep.
But the polling we see suggests something else: Israeli Jews yearn for normalization with the Arab world, secure borders, and an American guarantee to anchor any final settlement. Palestinians, for their part, want dignity, freedom of movement, and sovereignty. If we can demonstrate that these goals are achievable – if we can show not just promises but a detailed framework – then the public will come with us.
That is why we have chosen to premise our campaign to this agreement. In the coming election, B’Yachad Natzliach will ask Israelis to vote not just for a party but for a future: a future where East Jerusalem is the capital of Palestine and West Jerusalem the capital of Israel, where refugees are offered real solutions, where security is guaranteed by international partnerships, and where the Jordan Valley, Gaza, and the Galilee are not fault lines of endless conflict but frontiers of shared prosperity.
I am not naïve. The road ahead will be long and fraught. But I am also not cynical. When I entered politics, I vowed not to repeat the failures of the past. I left the Labor Party because it had lost the courage of its convictions. I founded this movement because I knew there must be another way. Now we have shown that another way exists.
B’Yachad Natzliach is a party that belongs equally to Jews and Arabs – or perhaps more accurately, to neither alone. It belongs to the idea that Israel’s destiny is not perpetual war but a shared society and a shared region. Our agreement with the Palestinians is not the end of the struggle but the beginning of its resolution.
In gaming, a long shot does not always pay off. But sometimes, if you take the chance, you can change the game entirely. That is what we are doing now. And I believe that, together, we will win big.
The writer is a gaming entrepreneur and founder of the new B’Yachad Natzliach (Together We Will Succeed) Party.