The Tzabar Plan

A new framework for ending the Israel–Palestine conflict based on physical separation, a Palestinian state established without negotiation, and a highly original deterrence mechanism designed to minimize post-state violence.

What is the Tzabar Plan?

• The Tzabar Plan is a new proposal for resolving the Israel–Palestinian conflict in a post-Oct 7 and post-Gaza world.
• At heart, it is a re-conceptualized two-state solution — likely the last remaining formulation of a two-state solution that Israelis might accept. At the same time, it is perhaps the only realistic remaining pathway to Palestinian statehood.
• The framework is pragmatic and centrist, drawing on both left-wing and right-wing thinking. In terms of Israeli politics, it would probably land in the center or center-left, but would likely appeal to a wide swath of the Israeli public.
• It is highly innovative, chiefly through the introduction of the land-loss-for-violence deterrence concept, which forms the heart of this proposal and which has no precedent.
• Whereas most existing proposals focus on guiding principles and contain little by way of concrete details, the Tzabar Plan is highly specific, laying out precise borders, security provisions, phased timelines, and detailed implementation steps.
• It is a hard-nosed plan that is unapologetically realistic, dispensing completely with any expectations of a warm peace or good will between both sides. Instead, it is squarely aimed at breaking the status quo of near-endless war and creating the structural conditions that would allow for enduring stability in the region.

How The Plan Works, In Its Shortest Form

Physical Separation

In this plan, Israel acts unilaterally to physically separate the two populations and recognizes a Palestinian State. It does this by first annexing the major settlement blocs in the West Bank (around 410,000 people) and relocating the remaining 110,000 “deep” settlers into Israel Proper (roughly 22% of the settler population).

At the same time, Israel transfers two portions of near-empty territory from Israel Proper to Palestinian control — one portion in the Negev tripling the size of Gaza, and one portion extending the southern West Bank — which allows the new Palestinian state to start off with approximately 110% of the current territory of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Two security barriers are installed along the border: a permanent, heavy-duty security barrier on the Israeli side, and a movable barrier on the Palestinian side, with roughly 100 meters of no-mans-land in between.

Through this physical separation, Israel fixes its borders permanently and drops all territorial ambition beyond those new borders, unequivocally. All of this occurs with no drawn-out negotiation between Israeli and Palestinian counterparts, and with no preconditions. Israel essentially takes what it wants out of the West Bank (the major settlement blocs), then withdraws to defensible boundaries and locks in its borders.

Minimizing Post-State Violence

Almost all two-state frameworks have failed to address what happens after Palestinian independence, when rockets and terror attacks will undoubtedly be launched at Israel from the new Palestinian state, most likely from militant groups like Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad that the new Palestinian government either cannot or will not control.

In every other plan, the default answer is Israeli military retaliation, escalation, and another war, which is exactly what happened after the unilateral disengagement from Gaza in 2005. The main contribution of this plan is a mechanism designed to dramatically minimize the risk that the post Palestinian State period will devolve into war: the “land-loss deterrence mechanism”.

In the land-loss deterrence mechanism, unprovoked Palestinian attacks are met not with Israeli airstrikes or incursions, but instead with a pre-published, automatic penalty in land: the buffer zone separating the two states extends deeper into Palestinian territory, by a fixed amount determined by a formula of 5km² per Israeli fatality. Importantly, Israel does not annex or settle this land. Instead, the land — now part of no-man’s land — is effectively returned to nature. No one gets the land.

Think of this dynamic as a bathtub filled to the brim. The Palestinian state is born at its maximum size: nothing it ever does can add to its territory. Likewise, nothing Israel ever does can add to its territory. The only question is to what extent Palestinian militants drain the bathtub of the Palestinian State through unprovoked attacks on Israel.

This plan is bold and does not claim to be painless nor to have serious downsides. Its claim is that every other remaining path — continuing the status quo of military occupation, re-entering into another trust-based peace process, or Israeli annexation of the West Bank without the creation of a Palestinian state — is more unstable, more violent, and makes both the Israeli and Palestinian people worse off.

The map

Proposed borders: annexed blocs, the buffer zone, New Gaza, and SoWeBa. Interactive: zoom and tap any feature.

Start here

The Brief — the full argument in fifteen minutes. If you read one page, read this. (Also available as a PDF.)

The full plan — every provision, the complete schedule, the maps, the objections, and the annexes.

If you follow this conflict closely, start with the Brief; it gets to the mechanism in ninety seconds. If you want the argument from first principles, start with Why Every Other Path Fails. If you want to see how this plays out on the ground, read Jenin, 2030.

The plan

✉️ Stay in touch. Occasional dispatches when the plan or the situation changes — no spam, no schedule. (Embed the Tally or Buttondown signup form here.) To join the working group, challenge the plan, or put it in front of someone who should see it: contact@tzabarplan.org

The Tzabar Plan · Last updated July 2026 · The Why Now page is revised as events develop; the plan itself is versioned.