The Center for
Jewish-Arab Economic Development in cooperation with Konrad Adenauer Stiftung
Wednesday, January
30, 2002
DR. EREKAT:
Concerning the concept of Jihad, I think we have a deep cultural difference
here. I don't find it my job, as a professor of politics, to go into the
meanings of Jihad, small and big. It doesn't serve any purpose.
To you, Jihad means
something bad. To Moslems and Palestinians, the word Jihad means something good
for their children, boys and girls. But it doesn't necessarily mean that in the
cultural gap. I don't think Arafat meant Jihad the way you understood it, and
that's the truth.
MR. BOCIEN: What do
you understand a Palestinian understands when he hears the word Jihad?
DR. EREKAT: The
bigger Jihad is patience, building the society, steadfastness. The smaller
Jihad is fighting. The same thing applies to martyrdom, which holds a very high
place in Islam. And it happens to people who are underdogs or who have been
treated unfairly. That's the concept, the insinuation of the concept.
MR. BOCIEN: It
doesn't mean war against us?
DR. EREKAT: No. Not
when Arafat speaks about it. But I can't convince anybody about that, to be
honest with you.
MR. BIDERMAN:
You're doing a very good job.
DR. EREKAT: With
regard to Rani's question about a solution, why we came so close and did not
sign, we always say that we don't interfere in Israeli internal affairs and the
Israelis say they don't interfere in our internal affairs. They say it for
public consumption. In reality, we are the internal affairs of the others.
That day in October
when I heard that there would be elections for Prime Minister, I asked, Why do
that? We knew that Barak came to Camp David with no government. We knew many
people had left him. Still, even with your laws, we have till May for general
elections. Between October and May, there's time. We can finish. Why hold
elections in February? Honestly, what was needed at the end of the day was
time.
MR. COHEN: Fine.
That was then. But what do we do now?
DR. EREKAT: As far
as Arafat and Sharon are concerned, I witnessed that. One day, Sharon saw me
walking by and grabbed me to come sit down. But one day, I was sitting with
Clinton and Netanyahu and Ehud and so on, and then Sharon entered. Arafat stood
up and extended his hand to him like this (indicating), and Sharon refused to
shake his hand. That was in October 1998, long before the Intifada he's blaming
everything on.
So there is
something with Sharon. What do you want? This wasn't born last year when Sharon
was elected as Prime Minister of Israel. It's not up to me to come and test
where Sharon belongs or why these people say these things. Many times I see him
calling us Taliban and Al Qaeda, and I leave him a message that you can say
whatever you want about politics. You can attack me personally. You can say
that my politics stinks, they're no good, dishonest, whatever.
But after all,
there is something called human decency, and I can't sink to that level as some
Palestinians or Israelis do when describing each other. Arafat and Sharon were
elected. I don't have expectations that Arafat and Sharon will sign a permanent
status agreement. We want to begin the process.
About the future, I
said something about Mitchell and Tenet. I do not overload my expectations. I
do not exaggerate them. But we need a process to begin. Under current
circumstances, ask anyone, nothing will change. There is the absence of a
process, of a mechanism to enable people to communicate in a civilized manner.
It's so easy for
Israelis to think that Palestinians are no good, they're bad, they're
terrorists, kill them; and for Palestinians to think the same way. You don't
need to explain anything when you get to that point. You're using your fingers,
not your brains.
About the Israeli
reactions to the recent suicide bombings -- which we condemn, by the way, in
the strongest possible term. We don't condone the killings of Israelis or
Palestinians under any circumstances -- I don't know. So far, I'm still a
Palestinian, so I don't know why Israelis react one way or another. Sometimes,
the Israelis sound to me like a group of cats outside my window. When they
scream, I don't know whether they're making love or fighting. Many times it
confuses me. Sometimes I expect something logically to happen and it doesn't
happen. So sometimes you stop expecting anymore.
On the strategic
plan of the Palestinian Authority, the only strategy we can afford -- because
sometimes I touch my head. Sometimes I think, do we have a sign on our
foreheads saying Stupid? You can say anything you'd like about Arafat, but he's
not stupid.
Take the ship
issue. From day one we heard about it, fine. We contacted the Israelis and
said, Can you come meet with one of us, and please, if you have any
information, let's just get to the bottom of this. No. General Zinni came. How
about a trilateral commission to get to the truth? No.
We have a problem
of accountability with you and with the United States. Anything we say will not
be believed. I asked the Europeans. I asked the Russians. Nobody want to touch
it. Okay. So I'm guilty till proven innocent. I can be hanged, and then after
my hanging I'll be given an unfair trial.
Is Arafat going to
take on Israel with 50 tons of weapons? I saw with my own eyes the Khomeini of
Iran in private with his Koran saying about Arafat and his colleagues, kill
them all, and now we're in a strategic alliance. I don't think these people
want to do anything other than rid us of the Palestinian Authority.
I'm not saying
there aren't some Palestinians -- I asked General Zinni, How many persons were
caught involved in espionage for the Soviet Union? Does that implicate your
entire nation? I'm not saying who did it or who didn't. I need to know the
truth. Sometimes it's free of charge. What is it?
So the only
strategy for us, till today, is to continue our commitment to the peace process
and to the December 16 speech of President Arafat. Do Palestinians see through
Arafat's eyes and hear through his ears and speak with his tongue? No. No.
Honestly.
When people tell me
that Arafat wants this and Arafat wants that, Arafat is my President. He was
elected, and I work for him as my President. My job is to tell Arafat that
these are the options you have, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. We meet, and that's how
decision-making is done. If I don't like something I can give in my
resignation.
Why do you
insinuate that we deal with Arafat in this way? We don't. He listens, and he
better listen to us. And that is the truth. I work for President Arafat just
like Gil worked with Barak. And I have more guts in front of Arafat than he had
in front of Barak.
But this is
stereotyping of Arafat. We may agree with him. We may disagree. He may scream
and shout and get angry at certain of our positions, and we may present our
case and leave the room and go home, and take the phone off the hook for four
days sometimes. We are human. If somebody taught you in the Israeli schools
that Palestinians are perfect, we're not. We're not.
On separation, we
ask the Israelis what they mean by separation, because what do you call what we
have today around each village and the refugee camps in the West Bank? There's
literally no movement. I don't want to tell you about how I got to this meeting
here today. Sometimes I tell myself, you have so little dignity. Just sit in
your house and don't leave.
But what can you
do? What can you do in separation? Separation, to us, means unilateral steps
whereby Israel will suffocate the Palestinians, destroy their economy, destroy
their infrastructure and their livelihood, under the pretext of security.
Okay. Let's have an
agreement on separation. Why can't we discuss this? Why can't we sit down and
see what can be done? What I hear from Landau -- you have some ministers now
that I don't know what to say about Israel anymore. I heard of a minister in
the Israeli Cabinet whose son got in a fight with another boy in school and he
goes and beats that child. God. What can I say? But it's none of my business.
They don't need to
humiliate Palestinians under the pretext of separation. Palestinians will never
accept Israeli occupation. There is this way that we are killing them. Don't
accept occupation, but we will end the occupation through a meaningful peace process,
negotiations, and we will do it. It's doable. This is the line.
There are other
Palestinians now who look at the humiliation, at the suffering and despair and
the desperate situation on the ground, and they say there's another way. And
these angry ideas about war and this and that prevent Palestinians from coming
to us, and it just adds to the complexities.
There is no trust.
That's true. People don't trust Arafat. Okay. Tomorrow morning, I'll begin a
campaign in my home town of Jericho. I'll order the imam in the mosque to start
reciting bad things about him. I'll order the local radio station to start
saying bad things about him. I'll order the school teachers to start lecturing
about him. And then I want him to go to Jericho and see how many people will
trust him.
They don't know
him. Public opinion is not something inborn. It's something we create. It's
fashionable in Israeli society today that those good Israeli candidates who can
get the most votes are those who can inflict more suffering on the
Palestinians, who can harm the Palestinians and show how strong and tough they
can get.
By the way, don't
think that, when I stand in Jericho or Nablus or Gaza, I am popular for what
I'm saying to you. Believe me, I'm not popular. My ideas are not popular. Many
Palestinians feel sorry for me. I was a professor to some of them. People come
and say to me, You don't even own a private car. Go back to the university.
This is the truth.
So there is a
systematic campaign against Arafat, begun by Mr. Barak, who wanted to prove to
the Israelis that it wasn't his mistake. The only time Barak agreed to meet
Arafat was when Saeb Erekat ran after him in Camp David one day when he was
walking by. I said to him, Ehud, you're from the Middle East. He's 71 years old.
Go have a cup of tea with him. And I brought him to have a cup of tea.
I made the tea, and
they talked about the weather in the morning and in the afternoon, sunshine and
then windy, and that was the discussion between the two brave leaders who
wanted to conclude an agreement in Camp David.
Then Barak comes
and says we made an offer. I wish to God I could see this offer. I wish to God
Barak would reduce it to writing. He never did.
I know the world is
changing around us. People are sick and tired of Israelis and Palestinians.
They want to help us, but nobody will help us unless we help ourselves. The
Americans will be the happiest people on earth if tonight they hear that the
Israelis and Palestinians are meeting and producing a road map for the next step
tomorrow.
And the Europeans
the same, because we know we are now the obstacle to many things that are
changing around the world. Look at what's happening in Cyprus. It's happening
all over. North and South Sudan.
You can do anything
unilaterally, but in negotiations you need a partner. That's the truth. That's
the truth about the future. The future lies in our ability to communicate, to
sit down and use all the damage control mechanisms and crisis management
abilities that we have.
That's how we
begin. We have to begin somewhere. But in spite of all the things we've done,
now we're just back to the point where we don't trust them and they don't trust
us. They want to destroy us. It's bringing us to the point of catastrophe.
That's the popular
Palestinian sentiment on the streets now, that after we have recognized them,
after they told us they stand next to us for peace, they fooled us. And now
they won't negotiate with anybody and they will break our necks.
I don't like going
through these old points because the Palestinians blame me. If they don't blame
me with their words, they blame me with their eyes or with the statements they
tell me. And the soldiers blame me. They tell me, We don't want to do this. You
failed.
I think we should
do more with the Israeli population. You should do more with the Palestinian
population. That's where we make the difference. If this peace process goes
down, if Arafat goes down, if the Palestinian Authority goes down, if the
Palestinian voices of courage, wisdom and farsightedness are silenced, what's
happening out there now will be just the tip of the iceberg of what's yet to
come.
Once I was having a
discussion with Itzik Mordechai in Martin Indyk's home. I said to him, You know
what? I am a professor of political science. I did major research for many many
years, and I found out that the majority of Jews will not convert to
Christianity or Islam, and the majority of Christians and Moslems will not
convert to Judaism. What do you do with them? You're supposed to protect your
people, not tomorrow, not at the next elections.
Honest to God,
ladies and gentlemen -- and with this I will end -- I respected Rabin so much.
He was a Prime Minister who was thinking of Israel's interests 200 years from
today. Later Israeli Prime Ministers only care about the eight o'clock or the
nine o'clock news.
We need to make it
happen. We need every voice. If our Israeli colleagues are willing to meet, we
are unconditionally sanctioned and mandated by Arafat immediately, tonight,
anytime, to begin a process of communication, damage control, any mechanisms
possible to start breaking this cycle. Thank you very much.
MR. BIDERMAN: Thank
you very much.