Autonomy as State Prevention: The Palestinian Question after Camp David, 1979–1982

The context of Israel’s post-1967 rule over the Palestinian territories, which began well after the end of empire, the mandates, and the major waves of decolonization, sheds new light on the relationship between late-twentieth-century occupation and the persistence of prolonged statelessness. This essay examines how a particular practice within the political and diplomatic repertoire of transformative occupation—the promotion of local autonomy—was successfully deployed in the Israeli-Palestinian arena. It charts the emergence of autonomy from the time of the 1978 Camp David Accords and delineates its broader impact as a tool of state prevention curtailing Palestinian sovereignty until today.