The Israelis and Palestinians currently find themselves at a crucial moment in the peace process. With the window for a two-state solution closing quickly, the two sides have once again found themselves in a stalemate with each side unwilling to compromise on basic issues. One of the main reasons for the standoff is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's demand that the Palestinian leadership recognize Israel as a "Jewish State." The administration of President Barack Obama will likely decide not to oversee negotiations again if a system for beginning peace talks is not reached by their deadline this coming April. If a framework agreement is not reached by that time, the Palestinians will likely turn to anti-Israel groups such as the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions campaign to further isolate Israel from the rest of the world.

It is imperative that the two sides put aside their respective demands until the negotiations actually begin. Unfortunately, Netanyahu's demand that the Palestinian Authority recognize Israel as a Jewish state will inevitably lead to a failure to begin peace talks. 

Netanyahu's demand may seem reasonable, but such recognition would be controversial to Palestinians currently living in Israel, who make up 20 percent of the country's population. The Knesset-the Israeli Parliament-has attempted, and failed, to define the term "Jewish State" after the issue came to a vote multiple times over the past few years. Perhaps if the Knesset passed a resolution defining the "Jewish State" as a democratic, nondiscriminatory nation it would not be as controversial if Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas were to make the concession. If they do not do so, many Palestinians will consider calling Israel a Jewish state an implicit show of support for certain Israeli policies which discriminate against non-Jews, such as the allocation of public land almost exclusively to Jews. 

If Netanyahu has really made the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state paramount to all other concessions he desires from the Palestinians, then he should work with the Knesset to create a definition of the term which he thinks the Palestinians could accept. 

Another issue associated with the Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state is the "right of return" for Palestinian refugees living outside of Israel and the occupied territories. The Palestinian Authority believes that descendants of Palestinian refugees from Israel's War of Independence in 1948 deserve to be able to move back to their ancestors' homes, many of which are located in Israel proper. This mass migration of non-Jews into Israel would undermine Israel's status as a Jewish state by possibly creating an Arab majority in Israel. The Israelis will not accept a flood of Palestinians coming into Israel, but Netanyahu must realize that the issue needs to be settled during talks, not before.
Drawing lines in the sand on issues that can only be resolved through negotiations is unnecessary and may lead the Palestinians to question if Israel genuinely desires to sit down with them.

If Netanyahu truly desires to meet with the Palestinians, he must remember where he went wrong during the previous negotiations in 2010. The last round of peace talks broke down due to Netanyahu's refusal to extend a 10-month moratorium on Israeli settlement in the occupied territories unless Abbas recognized Israel as a Jewish state. 

Abbas promptly refused, claiming that the religious identification of Israel had nothing to do with peace talks. There is no reason why Abbas would change his opinion on the issue, so Netanyahu must have known the Palestinians would reject the most recent iteration of the demand. His request shows the type of stubborn refusal to negotiate, which has plagued the leadership of both sides for decades and caused the conflict to continue for as long as it has. The Palestinian Liberation Organization recognized the state of Israel in 1993 and has continued to recognize Israel since that time. The fact that they have not used the term "Jewish state" in their acknowledgement should not be an issue. It was never considered an issue until Netanyahu manufactured this crisis when he became Prime Minister for the second time in 2009. 

If Netanyahu truly cared about ensuring that his country is called a Jewish state, he would work hard to give the Palestinians their own state, thereby preventing the inevitable loss of the Jewish majority due to the growth of the Arab population in Israel. If the Arab population were to grow larger than the Jewish population in the Jewish state of Israel, Israel would become an apartheid state, and the policies that favor Jews would become even more problematic than they are now. The Israeli government's policy of allocating land almost exclusively to Jews, for example, would absolutely be an apartheid policy if there were an Arab majority in a Jewish state. Netanyahu's main goal should be to ensure that this situation never becomes a reality so that Israel can maintain its status as a democratic state. 

Netanyahu is adding unnecessary roadblocks to the conflict when he should be working toward mitigating tensions and getting back to the negotiating table. By showing no willingness to work with the Palestinians at such a crucial point in the peace talks, Netanyahu is jeopardizing Israel's ability to be both Jewish and democratic in the long run.