liberal pretence of a jewish state127 narrative along with the ramifications of Zionist military actions are both also disregarded in Yakobson and Rubinstein’s analysis. The Principle of ‘Two States for Two Peoples’ In their vindication of the Jewish state, Yakobson and Rubinstein point to the principle of ‘two states for two peoples’ and argue that criticisms of the former challenge the viability of the latter: The voices heard in recent years which disparage the concept of the ‘Jewish state’ claiming that it contradicts the principle of equality, are in fact denying the principle of two states for two peoples …. No Jewish state means no state for one of the two peoples (Yakobson and Rubinstein 2009, 14). They contend that, [i]n reality, it is perfectly clear that a country with an Arab-Muslim majority (as such a bi-national state is bound to be, sooner rather than later) located in the heart of the Arab-Muslim world, cannot be anything but an ArabMuslim state in all respects, regardless of any formal definitions. …. So, the true alternative to a Jewish nation-state in part of the country (alongside a Palestinian nation-state) is an Arab nation-state in all of it – one state for one people (Yakobson and Rubinstein 2009, 10,11). Yet at the same time, [t]he fact that the state [of Israel] is the expression of the right of the Jewish people to national independence does not mean that it is not also the state of its citizens that belong to the Arab national minority – that is, a democratic state or, in other words, a state of all its citizens (Yakobson and Rubinstein 2009, 14). Two points of consideration arise from this line of argumentation. The first, and rather obvious, question is why the authors believe that Israel as a Jewish state is capable of functioning in a socially, politically and legally non-discriminatory manner whereas a bi-national Arab and Jewish state (or even an Arab state for that matter) simply does not maintain the same potential. Of course, the irony is that Israel has, since its inception, been thoroughly unable to balance its self-defined Jewish and democratic character in a manner that does not severely infringe on the social, cultural, economic, educational and political rights of its Arab citizen and non-citizen population. This is evident in the aforementioned political and legal mechanisms of discrimination embedded in the Israeli incorporation regime. Despite the historical record, however, Yakobson and