Under the bright Washington sky on September 13, 1993, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestine Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat shook hands in front of U.S. President Bill Clinton, marking what many hoped was the beginning of a lasting peace. In the Declaration of Principles they signed, Israel recognized the PLO and the Palestinians renounced terrorism. A new Palestinian Authority (PA) was to take charge in Gaza and parts of the West Bank over five years, after which final-status issues (borders, refugees, Jerusalem) would be negotiated. Instead, the process stalled. As one retrospective observed, “the peace process… has been stillborn, with Israel continuing its illegal occupation… and the Palestinian people no closer to – and some would argue further away from – an independent state.”
The Oslo Accords divided the West Bank into three uneven zones. Area A (about 18% of the West Bank) was placed under complete Palestinian civil and security control. Area B (roughly 22%) was to remain under Palestinian civil administration. Still, Israeli. The remaining 60% (Area C) was to stay under exclusive Israeli control. Area C includes all Jewish settlements and major highways, leaving Palestinians in non-contiguous enclaves. Under the interim Oslo agreement, Israel was to withdraw most of its forces from Areas B and C within five years. In reality, that did not happen: Israel continues to maintain complete control over Area C, from security forces to land planning.
By design, Area C holds most of the land. Still, only a small fraction of the population, roughly 180,000–300,000 Palestinians in scattered villages, versus over half a million settlers. Under Israeli administration, Palestinians in Area C face draconian restrictions. Human rights groups describe a rigid, apartheid-like land regime: Israel effectively runs “two planning systems…with flagrantly unlawful and discriminatory outcomes.” In practice over 70% of Area C is declared off-limits to Palestinian development, with only about 1% zoned for Palestinian use. For example, between 2000 and 2019 Israel approved just 245 Palestinian building permits (less than 4% of applications) in Area C. Those who build without permits risk demolition: between 2009 and 2020 the Israeli military tore down 5,817 Palestinian-owned structures (homes, farms, water cisterns, etc.) for lacking permits. By contrast, Israeli authorities facilitated settlement expansion: in that period they began construction on over 23,600 new settlement housing units. The squeeze has been devastating, a World Bank estimate put the annual cost of Area C restrictions to the Palestinian economy around $3.4 billion.
Such scenes are routine in the territory. By contrast, Israeli settlements boom. Peace Now reports that between 2009 and 2020 Israel began construction on more than 23,600 new settlement housing units in the West Bank. Israel’s Civil Administration actively promotes this growth: for example, one recent approval advanced plans for 5,295 homes in dozens of settlements and even legalized three unauthorized outposts as new neighborhoods. Military planners often reassign Palestinian lands to regional councils or declare them state land, further squeezing Palestinians. Bedouin grazing areas and herding grounds have been confiscated, and even entire communities (like Khan al-Ahmar) face forced displacement, measures humanitarian agencies say amount to collective punishment.
The imbalance extends into daily life. Settler violence against Palestinians is commonplace and largely unpunished. UN monitors recorded around 1,860 attacks by settlers on Palestinians in the West Bank from late 2023 through 2024, roughly four incidents per day, ranging from shootings and stone-throwing to arson and assaults. In many cases Israeli soldiers stand by: for example, in March 2024 a settler shot a Palestinian teenager in the back while nearby troops held fire. Human Rights Watch notes that the same Israeli government now “has primary control across both” Israeli and Palestinian areas, granting “Jewish Israelis privileges denied to Palestinians.” In practice this means that Israeli courts shield settlers, while Palestinians live under military rule with curfews, checkpoints and travel bans. If a settler invades a Palestinian home, Israeli police seldom intervene, but if a Palestinian enters a recognized settlement, he is immediately prosecuted. This system of impunity for settlers versus punishment for Palestinians flows directly from Oslo’s one-sided framework.
It should be acknowledged that not all the fault lies with Israel. Militant groups on the Palestinian side, above all Hamas, rejected Oslo outright and resorted to violence. Hamas violently opposed the Oslo Accords and launched a series of terror attacks on Israeli civilians, killing scores between 1993 and 1997. These bombings and later rocket attacks hardened Israeli society and led to harsh crackdowns and closures. This cycle of violence certainly helped derail the peace process. Yet even if Hamas’s armed campaign played a part, it unfolded in a context of overwhelming Israeli power. Palestinian militants lose life or liberty for their attacks under strict occupation laws, whereas armed settlers often walk free. Ultimately, Oslo’s failure was not simply the result of extremists on both sides, but of the fact that the one with far more power, Israel, faced virtually no penalties for breaking the rules it helped create.
In the three decades since Oslo, the divisions it set in motion have only hardened. Israel’s settlement enterprise never paused; it has accelerated. In mid-2024 the government approved plans for nearly 5,300 new homes in the West Bank at once. Peace Now notes that that same year Israel legalized outposts and advanced thousands more units in settlements. The United Nations reported that Israeli authorities have also moved ahead with planning over 6,300 units in Area C, even as Palestinians in those areas report fleeing their lands under settler pressure. An advisory opinion issued by the International Court of Justice in 2024 confirmed that Israel’s ongoing settlement and annexation measures violate international law. Still, on the ground Israel’s control looks more permanent. Hardline Israeli leaders openly say their goal is to make a Palestinian state “impossible.” Meanwhile, the PA remains a weak, partly autonomous authority confined to slim territories of Area A and B, heavily dependent on Israeli security permission. In effect, the Oslo interim stage has calcified into a status quo: one of de facto annexation and profound Palestinian disenfranchisement.
Decades after Oslo, Palestinians live in a patchwork of enclaves under occupation, not a sovereign state. Israel governs Jewish settlers under its civilian law in the West Bank, while Palestinians fall under a separate military regime. Checkpoints, walls, and permit systems isolate Palestinian towns; settlers use Israeli-funded highways and infrastructure that Palestinians cannot. Home demolitions, land confiscations, and settler attacks happen routinely on one side of the Green Line, while the other side’s violations go unchecked. Additionally, the Israeli government, under the Oslo Accords, has the authority to collect taxes on behalf of the Palestinian Authority (PA) but withholds $100–$185 million annually. Effectively Israel has extracted an additionaly tax on Palestinians in the West Bank, something not authorized by the Oslo Accords but certianly enabled by it. In sum, the structures that Oslo established have entrenched inequality: one people live under military occupation with far fewer rights, the other under civilian rule with privileges. Oslo contained no mechanism to enforce its provisions. Its enduring legacy, therefore, is not peace but a highly skewed reality in which Palestinian self-determination has been delayed indefinitely. The hope kindled in 1993 has been overshadowed by the unequal facts on the ground, a sobering lesson in how power imbalances can turn a peace framework into a cage for one side.
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