Michael Tarazi at the Oregon World Affairs Council

there's a trust advisors yasser arafat on the peel on permanent status negotiations he was an advisor for work on the mitchell plan the tenet work plan and is any proposal he was also a klutz on the preparation of negotiations for camp david and papa and play a key role in the church thats op ed article new york times in february two thousand and two is known for his intelligent articulate and thoughtful commentary on issues involving the least ms bird frequently as a spokesperson on npr bbc abc nile on cnn and msnbc really islamist uprising was a european general counsel at your net services inc based in budapest hungary he also worked as a securities attorney in new york city and it's the mall and the law firm white and case and in paris for the firm of paul weiss rifkind and garrison he has his bachelors and jd from harvard

university and is a member of the new york state bar thank you for coming to help give us some of the foundation involving camp david and undo what the future looks like an opportunity to your apartment it's not that thick crude thank you very much for coming to be with me this evening this is the first time i've been to just as intelligent and articulate i hope that eye i live up to that feeling you know a lot of thinking about whether it is in real life as i did because that could make a quick thank you to the world affairs council of oregon and to all the sponsors for freebies even passable i very much appreciate your support and thank you for giving this opportunity to be with you this evening i'm going to discuss three

issues this evening and i'll be happy it generates through some of that is because a lot of ground to cover sodas any questions you have about anything i say it's better to start over is it really true armenia going through three different issues this evening and then i migrated to some parts of it are given time considerations but if you have any questions about anything i say or about any other issue on your mind right now with respect to the middle east i'm not happy to address any of your questions after make my remarks the first thing i want to talk about is camp david top of what exactly happened what are the issues with respect to the negotiations the sticking points the second issue to talk about is why are we in the situation that were in today what is the root of the current conflict that were in and thirteen to talk briefly about now that we know why we're in this situation what we need to move forward and get out of the situation then they start with camp david not be possible white you talk

about kim davis on was two years old well unfortunately it's still very current and thinking about the middle east and i talked to israelis and i discussed him david they very much take the approach that we were offered the palestinians were offered reading at camp david we just simply didn't know what to do with our self and so therefore we turn around and resorting to violence that's simply not the truth i remember are no where were you all were during the discussions at camp david but i was living in europe at the time and i like probably many here in this room and around the world really bought wholesale into the idea of this generous offer and i remember being very frustrated the palestinians even i as a palestinian about palestinian and very much committed to the middle east and considering myself to be very serve educate about what's going on over there even i was extremely frustrated with the palestinians around that time but then i remember calling up an israeli friend of mine and i said well

that sounds really terrific but you know ninety five percent of the occupied territories ms engle east jerusalem and she said well i don't know and as a lot of the five percent exactly what is a little longer the five percent well i don't know well what about the refugees exactly reverse that is you know i don't know what's a good offer whatever it is it was a good opportunity one saying so and it wasn't until i actually got to ramallah and i actually saw a map of what we offer actually was that i realized what a horrible mistake had been made in not publicizing this more vociferously an openly closer to the time the candidate failed now let me take you through the maps appear on the wall but that you should have your own individual not take you very briefly through what the details are and they take you through them because i want you to think that we the palestinians were thinking when we were hearing all of these proposals there were three things that the palestinians are looking for in a final peace

agreement and those three things are viability true independence and schwartz and with respect a choice i'm talking about the refugees and address each one of those issues that effective i believe are we really going to be able to survive as a state now if you take a look at the map the first thing you'll see is that it's divided the west bank which is of course the west bank in gaza only constitute twenty two percent of historic palestine and this was our approaches that we would get the twenty two was really get seventy eight and that's more than generous offer israel's favor only discover that in fact israel said thank you for the seventy eight now let's negotiate over the twenty two and so the first thing you see in that twenty two the divided up the west bank into three separate areas coupled with gaza the palestinian state before separate areas and so what is that mean exactly it means a palestinian moving around and his or her own state would have to go through is really territory it means that not only are we restricting freedom of movement were also

restricted with respect to developing our own economy how do you get the goods and services from one part of palestine to another if it's subject to israeli control so first effective i believe we don't have the building developer own economy to travel independently within our own country secondly with respect to viability it's an issue of water you'll see it there two blocks has been up here in the north of the area of the law and that was at the organ itself and those are two blocks in israel said look there are so many settlers so many israeli jews that we have moved into these territories in the occupied palestinian west bank that was taken and you know we'll do something somewhere else we'll talk about it later but that's just for the compromise was to take these various what they don't tell you is that there's water particularly with respect to the northern gulf and that's exactly why so many

settlers are actually they're not i'm not trying to suggest there's no water anywhere else but water's a very scarce commodity in the middle east as many of you're probably aware so what israel is doing here is not just taking the land but they're also making a claim to the water underneath and with respect to that northern block with aereo is a very terry mcauliffe a high recharge area which is under water flows into that's an easy access area that's the waters easily extract abilities also very pure water so this is really a grab for water more than was a grab for land so effective i believe no economy no water and then of course we don't have control over our own borders if you see in your map this is the jordan valley right here and he's very clever i really have to hand it to the israeli lawyers they're very clever they settled this is technically part of the palestinian state is part of the ninety three ninety five ninety whatever percent that we're going to hand over to you but you're going to lease it back to us so in effect israel

will control it and i resigned haircut one of the negotiators at a press conference and someone asked him how long that israel want to actually control it for how long was actually supposed to last for nine hundred and ninety nine years or so in effect an effort to be fair that was her opening statement that in effect what they're saying is that we're going to control the borders of the palestinian state and so in effect you have to think of this as a prison and it's not a question of percentages because we often talk about when you know if you take into account a prison there's ninety five percent of the prison is for the prisoners' their cells their cafeteria their exercise room their medical facilities their health facilities it's the five percent that the prison guards control that allow them to control the prisoners inside and that's really all israel is doing with respect to the viability issue of our palestinian state we weren't getting out of prison or just getting some very big prison cells this independence first and foremost it's a question

of jerusalem that was our capitalist reason it's really amazing because many israelis seem to forget these years was occupied territory there is no difference legally speaking between east jerusalem any other part of the west bank and the gaza strip but two israelis they have bought into the idea that somehow teachers and somewhat differently to see that reflected in the american press as well with river to the west bank and they referred him to resign as two separate entities getting the impression that legally they are different if you take a look at east jerusalem is a blow up iran on the map this was clinton's very famous what's arab shall be part of palestine with jewish lobby is really it sounds very fair and very logical what it's not saying is that all of the jewish colonies built in east jerusalem will in effect be legitimized and annexed to israel now what is that mean what what are palestinians saying about oslo where the criticisms of oslo back in nineteen ninety three

they were saying look guys israel doesn't want peace israel wants to get rid of us they don't want to be responsible for this christian and muslim population in their midst and they want to be able to control as much of our land and future as possible that's their motivation here this is not a reconciliation between two equal parts this is about the demographic threat so when they do they carve out the arab areas color palestine and i think that we see they did in east jerusalem and that weight is really don't have to give us the right to vote they don't have to give us health insurance you don't have to give us the water infrastructure sewage treatment they're not responsible for us they got rid of us but for all practical purposes they'll be able to annex all of the colonies surrounding east jerusalem in effect giving them control over the entirety of old west and east jerusalem without having to take responsibility for any of the christians and muslims who live there and so our criticisms of oslo back in nineteen ninety three were reflected very clearly in the proposal for jurors from the can david

and later taught one thing you don't see on here with respect to true independents as well is the air your control of the airspace or the palestinian state not to mean you betcha sounds like airplanes coming into now it's actually much more than that that includes the electromagnetic sphere that includes mobile phone service and satellite tv our ability to have those basic services and you know for the kind of technology that would be required would have been subject to israeli control that was the palestinian state so it was either a viable nor it was a true independence the third show to talk about his choice that's the issue that we're looking for a final peace agreement and i talk about choice and talking about the refugees now i think most of you probably aware that seventy five percent of the palestinian population was expelled or fled during the war tonight is forty seven and nineteen forty nine and that number about

seven hundred thousand at the time has now become around three to three and a half million refugees are we going to do with the refugees at camp david they said we're not talking about it not our problem this is what it means to be a jewish state you just have to compromise and we said that's not going to work but understand what it means to be a refugee means that you've been disempowered you lost your home you lost your town in many cases you've lost all sense of your own history in your own country and decisions about your future about your life were made for you not by you and if we don't take into account the legitimate concerns of the refugees all we're going to do is create an alternative plo once an agreement is signed that doesn't take into account their concerns and you know the passing i think themselves wait a minute i mean isn't this kind of fundamentally discriminatory mean isn't this what we're talking about that is they were jews they be allowed to return but they can diverge in judaism they be allowed to return

but because they're not the right religion they're not allowed to return at the bit like milosevic and he won in kosovo said why can't let these albanians return to kosovo that would disrupt the serbian character of the serbian hartman and the rest of the world so that that's not gonna work nearby but yet with respect the palestinians we are expected to buy so we're being told find creative solutions to fundamentally discriminatory position of israel and we said ok we have some we believe only way forward with this to take into account is real demographic concerns as well as the palestinian right of return it's to give them choices allow the refugees to decide for themselves their own fate and so we say well choice one maybe you're on lebanon your refugee lebanon and you don't have full voting rights are so full status as a citizen of lebanon but you'd like to stay in lebanon we could talk to the lebanese government say look how many of these refugees can you take

and normalize the status or maybe you're in jordan or maybe you're a millionaire refugee in paris and you have no intention of coming wednesday exactly where you are but you're just in compensation ok we can address that thats option one option to you can return what becomes the palestinian state yes we know that you're not from this part of palestine you know you're from high fur you're from the north or you're from the south of tel aviv but maybe you'd be happier and their palestinian state maybe that'll be your dominant culture the dominant language of fujitsu dominant religion maybe that's where you would feel more comfortable two three go to a third country now canada last year talked about its willingness to take in refugees as part of doing its share to help resolve the crisis from the middle east and so it's really funny because we talk to people who were among the winners are casually i say yeah you know the

refugees may have the option of going to canada no you make those refugees come to ramallah so it is a real option and option for his return to your home in what is now israel with the understanding that their village probably doesn't exist any more israel destroyed four hundred thousand villages after the war in nineteen forty eight if your home does exist as bobby inhabited by jews right now nothing creative problem and youre not going back in time you're only going back in geography so what exactly are you expecting to get by returning to israel and in addition you have to keep in mind that there are many palestinian citizens of israel about peaking at twenty percent a population that are not so happy with their status inside israel right now and do suffer some systematic discrimination scientists are so maybe that's not what you really want and we present this to israelis this a lot you know what guarantee do we have to not only take option for

and we say let's explore some opportunities such as a formula they are ex number love jews returning making ali arctic is really giving year a certain percentage of that number can be a lot of the palestinians exercising the right of return so that's the only way that we can reconcile israel's democratic concerns with the palestinian right of return but if we go into this and they sorry there's no right of return to baghdad that's a nonstarter with palestinians are realistic enough to know that we can go to israelis and say ok sorry please move over three million people are moving in tomorrow that's a nonstarter so we come up with options and you know the second part of my discussion tonight which is why are we in the situation over in today what's what's the conflict all about if we know now that it's not a question i've been given this one are wonderful

offer and simply you know pressing a button the star violence and what is the current origins and if you're going to look at the current origins you have to start with a very different experiences that israelis and palestinians had since the signing of oslo in nineteen ninety three now i'm not israeli i don't report to speak for israelis but size of a lot of other talking for that this is a concern and it's a nervous and i'm only halfway through i don't support a state for israelis but it seemed to be that there were two things israelis were primarily concerned about after oslo one was security and that's a legitimate concern i don't mean to minimize that concert and two was a growing acceptance and normalization of their status of the country and on both of those fronts progress was made with respect to security israel had its most secure year in nineteen ninety eight since the occupation began in nineteen sixty seven that such as the palestinians that's martin

indyk now the former united states ambassador to israel publicly thanking president arafat for security cooperation we even had netanyahu was by no means a fan of president arafat in the peace process calling president arafat and publicly thanking him for his security cooperation so i don't mean this is to suggest that everything was perfect under severe suicide bombings after oslo as well in nineteen ninety five the property and power but by nineteen ninety eight it was fairly clear to most israelis that progress is being made it was moving in the right direction with respect to security secondly with respect to a normalization of their status in jordan peace agreement would live in fossil that oslo thirty two countries establish relations with israel after all warming of relations in the arab world from morocco to oman that establish trading offices inside israel that would've apostle that also so again it was moving in the right direction what was going on first thing the checkpoints

we were put in the equivalent of reservations and surrounded by israeli checkpoints to get from one part one reservation to another reservation we had to go through israeli checkpoints are striking for human movement began and not only that but again our ability to develop our own economy with respect to goods and services traveling between the palestinian areas we are now in control of only about seventeen percent of the west bank and that seventy percent is divided into thirteen separate reservations so how much produce from gaza was actually stopped at the checkpoint because israelis claimed a security problem but in reality didn't want the produce and train the west bank because that would compete with israeli products that they were dumping into very captive market in the west bank and that's with checkpoints did us that controlled every aspect of our existence not only movement also our economy second even religion is yours was blocked off before we could travel to east jerusalem

but after oslo we needed permission so whether you're christian palestinian or muslim palestinian you can go crazy or holy sites in jerusalem without israeli permission and more often than not that was not granted i have christian relatives in gaza who have not been able to get to pray in jerusalem for the last six years and that was definitely a backward step that oslo induced so freedom of movement economy freedom of religion but there's one point above all others that totally undermined palestinian confidence in israeli intentions an entire peace process and that is of course the ongoing colony construction from nineteen ninety three from nasa was signed to your two thousand israel doubled doubled the number of israeli jews living in the occupied palestinian territories from two hundred thousand to four hundred thousand and seven years that has a rate of growth unprecedented in the entire twenty seventy five years of occupation

prior to oslo what's the message that thousands are getting from that israel's not believing in fact it's coming now it is impossible for us in the house leadership to convince the palestinians that israel is really serious about the peace process and they continue confiscating more and more land taking more more water building more more bypass road says all part of the colony construction enterprise i don't how to do that and every time i say you know there are a lot of people inside israel that really support peace and into the occupation this is so why did they let this happen and i don't know what to say about a good deal of germany has seen recently on television he says you know it's like you and i are negotiating over a piece of pizza that how much are you going to get how much of like an idiot and during the negotiations you keep eating it and that

creates a real sense of nothing's going to be left over and it creates a lot of frustration a lot of suspicion a real lack of trust about the other side so given that sense of frustration and given that tension it doesn't take very much to ignite and of course that spark it ignited the situation came not only with sharon's visit to the hellish at the temple mount in september but as the mitchell report itself points out it also came because of the legal use of force by israel against unarmed thousand demonstrators the following week and i'm always shocked to see in the press to sell it the palestinian started this there were approximately forty palestinians killed for the first israeli was killed so thats why were in the situation that we're in so what we need to go forward with are two things to point this out to you because people would

say will this work will that work of plywood about this there to test you apply to any initiative and you'll know yourself whether not it's gonna work first does that link israeli security measures with palestinian concerns about the occupation their freedom and second is there going to be a neutral third party who has the ability to comment on the ground and play a judge we talk about the late first of all the major port but we were happy with the next report is the team came on the ground and they understood what was going on and they made that link between the israeli lack of security and the palestinian lack of freedom and that's why specifically said that security cooperation of the nature that is real desires will not be sustainable or affective absent meaningful political negotiations and political measures and an end to provocative steps such as settlement building great they hit me on the head so what happened was he you're going for snowden committed anything with respect to the mitchell report because we immediately move to a

procedure where we do you write those two and we talked about israel's security first first is rugged security and then we'll talk later about perhaps ending the occupation if we feel like and that doesn't slightly more with the palestinians so this was first with sharon's idea of seven days of complete quiet which of course doesn't exist anywhere in the world let alone in the context of political occupation and repression and that was from the mitchell report this was a sharon being creative and creating more obstacles and it seems that the americans bought into the security first idea and of course every time we have a lull in the violence and by the way let alone the violence apparently means in the american press that no israelis are getting killed constantly getting killed that's ok but there was really getting killed there's a lull in the violence and we had that from december sixty to about january twelfth and of course what happened at the time he was assassinated by the israelis in the whole cycle starts again and i wanted to do it in the washington post right after that and said look this is all very predictable because sharon

cannot afford a lull in the violence he was elected at a time of crisis has only sustainable a time of crisis and he's going to do all that he can to sustain the crisis mentality inside israel and if it means as though he's gotta go and assassinate people or start the cycle over again he would do it so we bought into the whole security first arrangement and of course that hasn't worked so that's what we need to do more than forwards understand security and politics are mixed secondly we'd have a neutral judge how has this played out in the past well you ever netanyahu claiming the palestinians had too many weapons in violation the oslo accords the wrong type of weapons and so therefore israel's not going to abide by its obligations under the oslo agreement and the passengers who get wait a minute maybe you're right we don't know maybe there's some were smuggled and where the judge is going to come in here and say yes palestinians are no palestinians are doing the right thing or the wrong thing is what you need to do to get back on track we were given that opportunity

why because netanyahu wasn't really concerned about alleged violations he was too busy trying to use that as a means to avoid implementing israel's obligations under the oslo process so that's why we need a third party on the ground in this and the same thing with respect to security of the course the last year why aren't you writing down on terror as we are but who's going to be able to see a what we can actually do given the fact that our infrastructure is entirely destroyed over the last month including a security infrastructure the very people who are supposed to cracking down and the who's been able to come in and say yes the thousands of done all that they can given the limitations what sharon who gets to play that role and i certainly hope is no one here believes that sharon will ever come out and say yes the thousands of done all they can do because he's not interested in going to the next step and that's exactly why he hasn't allow third parties to come on the ground to actually see with the palestinians are doing we are like the israelis really don't have anything to hide when we talk

about independent investigations we really want them to come on the ground because we know that there's no other way to balance out the fundamental imbalance of power between israelis and palestinians and again this is something you see in the press all the time as if somehow both sides are equals as an independent people palestine with an army a military is in a chemical israel and there's simply fighting it out there's no context that this is a fight between an occupied an oppressed people with the law on their side against the occupier and the press and so that's the two things we need to move forward so when you hear about things such as unilateral separation or a peace conference or any of the current initiatives are being floated around out there just ask yourself to have those two components and you will know whether or not it's going to work analyst talking about either of those two components right now and during the all the initiatives that we hear about are not going to work unless

they address those tuitions imposing i just i just want to say that yeah we have we have our artisan in online ads kind of difficult sometimes is nothing in the american experience that teaches you to work in your office while tanks are rolling around outside his tear gas lamps in every once awhile ago and her colleagues' opposition has a common upon her room and says you don't under estimates the power of a few commit citizens to make a difference in fact it's the only thing that really ever done so i decide to keep that in mind to know that you know we in palestine really rely on people concerned citizen such as you here in oregon to really make your voices heard here with respect to the press and elected officials to the extent that you believe that there can be different policy here please get involved in and please do believe that your involvement however slight really does make a difference thank you very much the peak

full of another question so i don't know you just raise your hand precise as a green cap to what extent was just like the rest of the arab world too well you know we get that question a lot it's a good question to what extent did we expect the arab world to get involved use whatever power they have withered be a diplomatic or other and you know again there isn't a whole lot they can do i mean these are not you know among the stronger nations but nevertheless they have done quite a bit vertically with respect the diplomatic initiative that was adopted the arab league not too long go that was very remarkable even historic that you have the entire arab world coming together saying look as we were talking about a full peace agreement

normalization of relations between israel and the arab world not just the palestinians in exchange for you doing what the law requires you to do and i think that's quite a remarkable achievement i think that i personally grateful to the to the arab league that adopted such a bold diplomatic initiative of course it went nowhere in the next day ramallah was invaded unknown talk about it ever again but nevertheless i thought that was a very creative way in a very bold way for the arab world to get involved in a very positive roll with respect to economic i don't know to what extent it will be for example the oil weapon and others in a very clear that oil's not a weapon i don't know if the situation continues down the path that its going i don't know that will be a policy the changes i think a lot of pressure internally in the arab society to them to be a bit more proactive with respect to economic leverage while in the next step of buying

businesses which is well i can assure our senator richard talking about i don't know i mean you've got the west bank and gaza it was you got jordan on the other side so jordan itself a lot of the time what's the trans jordan yet if it does address that really quickly the synching pointing answer the sharon you have things that you know jordan is palestine sometimes edit that somehow this was causing territory you know history is history and there were different nations that were carved up and jordan became one of them and jordan's for the jordanians the thousands who live there are not from there so reddit but what we're focusing on right now is the west bank and gaza strip in accordance with international law and thirty point out that is very tiny but that's all that we've got to be pretty happy about which is if you raise a very good very good point about the idea of a

state to define yourself in terms of one religion or one ethnicity i think that we should be very carefully with respect to israel that most jews in israel don't see themselves just as a religious group but also as a certain ethnicity in assertiveness easily cut someone bought a lot of those lines i am i do personally have a problem with any state that defines itself in terms of one ethnicity or one religion but that's that's the reality what we're dealing with right here and i think that's the prom that israel didn't have to confront and i think they don't have to confront that within each other with respect to secular versus religious jews once this palestinian issue should go away it forever able to get a palestinian state i think you can see a lot of tension inside israel to what it means to be a jewish state for the time being it's been pretty much the unanimous world consensus that israel has a right to exist as a jewish state whatever that means i really don't know what that means you talk to very basics israelis it will get seven different ideas as to what it means to be a jewish state so well we don't try to grapple with those issues

with respect our negotiations were focused right now on just getting our freedom and our independence and then now how states define themselves as something up to those states yes but i didn't say anything about and a lot longer than focusing on negotiations unless i'm playing very heavily but i'm certainly happy make a common i'm happy to reiterate the condemnation of suicide bombers that was issued by the housing authority recently i don't believe that there's any justification for it and it needs to be condemned but fought the real question becomes is how do we stop suicide bomb is it simply a military solution or is it a political problem we have to address the politics underlying it and it has been our position all along that we have to underage and that connection between israel's security in terrorist acts and pass the lack of freedom this isn't happening in a political vacuum not not to say that it's justified or excusable but unless we try to understand how and why it's happening will be able to successfully addressed and it's not going to be through

what's been going on over the last month i mean you certainly don't give israel's israelis us security and peace and freedom by denying security and peace and freedom to the palestinians i think we've seen that the question is when are israel is going to understand this is not a question of military force but rather one of political solutions <unk> scientists but if i can ever get is your first point i i as stuart levy we don't have much faith that the americans can play it neutral role are hoping that will eventually change are trying to do as much as we can to help change that but you know every palestinian on the street can tell you that they know that if it wasn't for american support financial support military support the f sixteens apache

helicopter gunships the diplomatic support the un that we very likely would have our freedom in independence by now and so there is a lot of resentment of the united states role interesting the item if you heard this but after the geneva atrocities when they were humanitarian aid workers that when in some of the tents were provided by us at it and they put up a tent it said you know made in the united states or some immediately clear and the people rioted against this and they were so angry that america first synthetic season batch of copper gunships and somehow they're supposed to be grateful for ted's afterwards and if that is not lost on the palestinian population and necklaces not doing what it could be doing i might disagree with you with respect to the chicken and the egg idea i think it's not that israel doing what it's doing because fundamentally merkel wanted to do it that way i think i've from my perspective it seems almost america has lost its own independence and is falling what israel's doing creepy but what we may disagree on that but what a writer well what i what i point in particular and and this is

this is i think now as an american i'm really kind of sad and by such a weakened american president when he says i expect israel to withdraw from you know a thousand cities and do it you know what was that are not immediately but without delay and you know three weeks later not only hurting out with drummer they're invading other towns are basically about that i met you know exactly well i don't know i mean if that's not what we're hearing that from our diplomatic sources i maybe right now being naive but from my perspective it's really the other way around in that you know sharon has a plan he knows exactly what he wants to do he's working his way there and boy show doesn't know a whole lot about the middle east for my perspective and done anything if you don't if you don't have an idea about what to do with those say for domestic bliss of that support israel some yes but there is there's two two

targets in particular that you really have to aim for one is a woman's caution you don't focus your efforts on preaching to the converted you know that's not going to help you know we've we finally do that even in the middle east palestinians don't talk to each other israelis don't talk to each other and a lot of people actually to listen to make decisions so that my first point is you really need to focus on the media and our perspective is always been an ongoing of the united states the media simply by a synergistic into anything about it it's not altogether true i don't mean yes individual cases there certainly is a bison and you know there's nothing we can really do about that but lo and behold i discovered that many of the cases that we come across is not a question of buys the question is simply information they don't hear from the palestinian side are those who support a more neutral balanced approach in the middle east so i actually taught me an example it i wear my pet peeves is when we talk about the law as a jewish neighborhood you know the fighting between the jewish neighborhood of kilos and that jirga as

it's being attacked because it's a jewish neighborhood and not because of any legal israeli colony built on palestinian land and i talked to that the reporters and i decided and i give my little fact she didn't think anyone have one here and i said look here's riggio is here's a map and they said you're absolutely right michael we know exactly what you're talking about but we'll make that decision as a reporter that comes from our editor back on and our editor back home has lobbied hard by all sorts of prose really special interest groups and they go there and they harass in the senate emails and it got to the point where i was so bad that the philadelphia inquirer now are first ramallah as a palestinian settlement well it's no wonder americans don't get it but this is the kind of terminology that the press is using so you really need to lobby hard with editors with the foreign desk editors are with the editorial board you're going there be meetings sent emails call them harassed and you know it works he works the second point of course that was years ago target is the elected officials

and and there is not a question information because you'd be surprised how many people i meet on capitol hill and they'll say yes we know perfectly well what's going on but you don't deliver votes and that is the question of boats that some information you somehow have to make it very clear that this may or may not pass are moments that involves another question says to be fair who resent the gentleman in the white shirt for you yeah i mean well i mean your future is difficult and as long as sharon is around i firmly believe that he will remain don't put in as many obstacles possible and until america time to get serious with developing its own independent policy in the middle east and not simply one that does support sharon i think the short term is rather rather bleak with authorities looking at a long term yes i really do believe that peace is possible that will come about because i spent enough

time in israel have been enough time in the past and you need to know that by and large the vast majority of people really desired it's not a question now a piece of the question a palestinian state it's a question of the details how big is it going to be and what we want to do and i really do believe that it will turn around eventually meeting on the short term eventually it will happen it's not it's by no means a lost cause what was interesting if i can just add to that is if it continues going down this path if the colony construction continues unabated i we're hearing more and more talk of rumblings i should say in the past and community saying forget it we can't get a state you can't unscramble an egg any state we get is going to be simply a reservation and it's time to move from a struggle for equal independence and nationhood to one of equal citizenship vines beak as the us

is bernie you could you could even focus the boycott on settlement products and particular you know you can even more focus in citizen about israel but also about us occupation the sounds that come from there's and also the different ways of organizing a boycott and it's funny i was talking to a journalist and she said you know i didn't understand the situation and i got it and that now the second summarizes this the palestinians inside israel or the equivalent of black string civil rights movement here in america and the palestinians in the west bank are like blacks in apartheid south africa and then once you make it you understand what the different struggles are and i do think the boycott would be a terrific way to refute way of fighting is this i think you can i think it's just because there's a lot of lot of prison leaving

iraq as american idol means that has bianca is in fact i have many of my own criticisms that i share with him and others around him but with respect to the substantive issues absolutely present african deliver and he made that very clear in his op ed piece of theater interviews and look you know we're all being distracted by what's going on today with respect to violence and cycle of violence themselves and look i'm going to the end game here this is our position sixty seven borders resolution of the refugee issue and taking account of demographic considered so managing a question oh yes i do know that it has been presented to him as the president did that the answer is probably not yoga would be better than it had been presented

right at the beginning yes he's requested more about the united states' evans that doesn't matter because he said you know i mean i when we talked about the op ed piece of a director was actually drafted last august and as you can get a listen to the viewers because of the condor eleventh and all of the other bad timing since then so when we talk about this isn't working we talk to israelis and they don't believe you know i go there i tell them here's deficient thousand positions and they say lester for coming from you that happen we'll hear from prisoner ferguson look you know once i went back and we talked to the president said look you need an op ed piece to be very clear about what our positions are in fact a former lawyer with him he made some comments and criticisms and we sent it off and it requires that ok so for now what you know did that make a huge difference and i said it didn't really believe me now and he points out is is it a look a look at the way i treated it first told condemned tears as i could and chairs now it's in arabic i condemn it in arabic want to have to read it because i read it won't know you have to say on television up as it on television

and then they say well i don't believe anything to why my jumping to all these hoops if you're bleeding with a credibility factor has become now about me as a human being in these individual is nothing i can do about that and then of course it comes to you know your question about a series that use individual perhaps you should consider yourself in the picture but that's not a question i can answer you'd have to talk to him and his asthmatic <unk> the blue you know i'm very simple reason is that the settlements are their violation of international law on the refugees the right return under international law so why would he be giving up our rights but i can tell you well you raise a good point and i think what what is very important what you say is that you hid the existentialist threats of both sides and with respect and that it is very important to be able to address that in a meaningful

way if we hope to have this process continue or that in a meaningful way i've been tossing around it and thinking about that perhaps and you know when we hear the word injury palestinians really several arising to sing on elders and got us into this mess but if there's a way for him to retrieve it to actually work it would be intruder that actually addresses the issue of refugees and so vince up front and not later enter one option for examples be for israel not only to freeze settlements which we all know in the past has made all sorts of loopholes for natural growth and everything else but to actually put in an incentive plan for settlers to move back into israel way they have an incentive plan to move out of his ruling to the occupied palestinian territories because a lot of these sellers are not these religious zealots that they are because it hurts israel and god gave it to us live and whether it's cheap and did you make a cheap elsewhere they might very well go i actually met one settler this is a phenomenon i'm sure he's not in a typical but he was in the jordan valley and all these isolated settlements in most provocative one isn't doing their new theory such an idiot he goes well eventually we have to move out

he thought he was buying a lottery so i get i don't get a sense of their lottery like that but i mean some people are there for very bizarre reasons and i think a lot of them would move out of the hat other opportunities in sentence on the palestinian side and thinkers all that would address our concern because it hits the existential threat of colonies and on the palestinian side if we had the existential threat of refugees by saying look here a few incentives for refugees to take other options then by the time we get to a final status negotiation hopefully the discussion refugees to be greatly minimize because there aren't as many and discussion on settlements and colonies would be greatly reduced because there aren't as many in it a lot easier to bridge the final gaps and the beauty of the plan is that nobody is forced to do anything it's only those settlers a one a move can move in those refugees who want to date other options are the other options and why not we will await those essentials threats you know in order to help get to a final peace does the

market is going up in those buildings yet about the same tactic that i find out more about that at the internet to me is just amazing you can find out so much more than you never suspected you know and you can find out quite a bit but the bottom line is it's all a question of numbers as a question of money it's a question of mobilization and it doesn't really take a lot to him i mean i've been amazed by how little you can do given the vacuum in information on the other side how often you can make a huge impact very quickly and if you call that the media and you haven't got an open organisations you have here but you train them to call you when they want a year in a local common to balance out the other side then peretti to utilize in the press and you know what the wait for them to call you call them i'd like to give you my opinion as a representative of the you know fairness in the middle east policy club or whatever it is that you are present you know and so you have to be aggressive you know and just don't

complain because i typed some are sitting at americans we can do anything and are so weak or so an organized it doesn't take a lot to really make a difference which is it doesn't and you know it's it's difficult for us and in the animal look as we say to ourselves like my god it gets worse and worse that when we look at an op ed piece that we wrote when we look at something we've been able to do so that's one thing that we did that would have happened if you were here and adds up and with respect to how you compete with them through the question of votes more than his money because you know that the money's there or to get votes so if you can really mobilize and tried to you know produce votes for our side then you know elected officials will have to take an account it's b this is this is the problem and that a palestinian state us why you're continuing to negotiate look what's happened our situation got worse after nineteen ninety three not better why do you think that negotiations as the way forward and we you know we always say it's not just a question negotiation with

those negotiations within the context on international law and that's been our biggest problem is that what's the framework for the negotiation and i can think of three different framework someone as principles of equity and fairness but if that's the case and to get fifty percent historic palestine not twenty two the second framework is international law un resolutions and that's what we've operated under nafta we agreed to it which is the decisions are clear there's nothing to negotiate is not a quick and you know whether or not the occupation and seclude how quickly they can get out the third framework which is of course the one that israel is uses a superpower we're happy to get out even to do about it and we operate under that framework a pow or that of course will never get anything because were far too weak and that's the problem that we have negotiators trying to nail down the framework of what the negotiations are all about and what's the basis of the negotiations and that's the poem that we have a tiny get third parties to try to enforce that framework i would make the ideal linkage there it's not with respect to piece it's needed to press

to our own personal freedom as a palestinian state i don't think that you could hold it against us to say we're not a free democracy and to that we had to occupy you know that's not one of the many israelis to take that approach will soon as you go look and think and act like us then you know you get your freedom but nevertheless you raise a very good point and a point it's becoming much more in the forefront else in society that we need to do a much better job with implementing democratic reforms in our own society and giving voices to lots of different segments of our society and to implement checks and balances within that society independent judiciary a parliament actually has the ability to affect change in meat it's a big pie in the sky right now because we talk about that because it'll you know the lives that have canceled an elected that they can meet you know how they'll get together they can lead their villages in the account and as a very practical obstacle to our ability to implement a lot of democratic reforms right now in this condition i don't mean the sides of the question the course we had seven years we could have done i think a lot more than what we actually did and we have to get back to

that is by if you can take a look i think i'm far the materials he got a tub the map as well and if i can just recap of because they did make a lot of progress and candid catawba i don't buy i perhaps was irresponsible and giving the impression that this was the last stage because he did make some progress and that's reflected in the problem that the two issues in particular this by fatah but that remain outstanding was of course east jerusalem and these settlement blocks in the north of the area along the water there's talking about english at sealing the cell and got significantly reduced we didn't we were partitioned continues to have control over our borders but the question then became what why is this the only answer why is it that these really say what we have to have these colonies images of the way it goes in we're going to just annexed territory and we said well okay look you know will play that game where we get in return a

minivan take easter sunday was west jerusalem we the users lingers the negev desert the very fair trade and we never heard what the israelis had in mind expect a land swap so people like to say that we have agreed to all of this but we didn't agree we agree to discuss it based on what would actually be swamped with respect to iran other settlements and eleven others aligned with regard to discuss anything we look at it from there's a lot a lot of this this border right here if you want to deviate from that a lot of friends that have a pretty good reason and simply saying well that's where all these people that moved in illegally are is a good enough reason and we've proved we give them other options and we're never given these options but maybe thought about actors and subtle let's make an palestinian citizens if they so desperately want to live in a thousand characters the age of those searches for you know and we don't have a problem with your citizens of palestine the other option is what we haven't sent the plan over five years for

them to move out or white we have a program where these israeli citizens to be permanent residents of the palestinian state and they have voting rights in israel but they can actually reside on our side and sovereignty there other options other than simply we get this image as the awakening going to have to compromise and that's a very good point i thank you for the question we were aware of that were aware of this or the pr function and potentially raise the question are there is a point about these documents which i as a lawyer took a look at and kind of laughed because in a court of law is don't have any argument at all doesn't prove anything but it's not in a court of law is in the court of public opinion as you said and they're israel has learned that you don't have to have any real facts or real evidence has to act like you have real facts and evidence in the press of course isn't reading those documents either that all the muppets ok here's the accusation has been used so that's a real uphill battle for us but we try our reckoning are aware of the need to sort of speak much more clearly and much more with a vision to not only the american people but is

really people as well to the palestinian people very clear about what position isn't in prison arafat's injury can it realistically expecting the world to change when he wrote an op ed piece thinking like ok they're given i give it all up it's all out there now and doesn't there's no you got a costly keep reinforcing that message and one of our biggest problems though not only through word gossip directions trying to force that is that we don't get the credit for what we do because there's no third party they are watching what were doing and that's an uphill battle because as long as nobody there actually seeing what we do and what we can't do you still get your run up there saying anything he wants and fannie's had documents to prove it without anyone to balance it and that's the biggest problem right now is not a question of an unwillingness to do it or an unwillingness to be public about what we're doing that is simply that we don't get the credit for what we do given the power balance right the pay to play the part