FIRlnGLlne WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY, JR.

Transcription

1 The copyright laws of the United States (Title 17, U.S. Code) governs the making of photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. If a user makes a request for, or later uses a photocopy or reproduction (including handwritten copies) for purposes in excess of fair use, that user may be liable for copyright infringement. Users are advised to obtain permission from the copyright owner before any re-use of this material. Use of this material is for private, non-commercial, and educational purposes; additional reprints and further distribution is prohibited. Copies are not for resale. All other rights reserved. For further information, contact Director, Hoover Institution Library and Archives, Stanford University, Stanford, CA Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Jr. University. FIRlnGLlne WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY, JR. HOST: GUESTS: SUBJECT: SIDNEY ZION MARK ROSENBLUM 0 "SHOULD AMERICA GET INVOLVED WITH NETANYAHU?'' FIRING LINE is produced and directed by WARREN STEIBEL. This is a transcript of FIRING LINE program #2722/1151, taped at HBO Studios in New York City on January 13, 1998, and telecast later on public television stations. Copyright 1998 FIRING LINE Transcripts and videocassettes are available through Producen; Incorporated for Television, 2700 Cypress Street, Columbia, SC 2920s so3n

2 MR. BUCKLEY: It is a very troubled period in the Mideast, with the trip by Prime Minister Netanyahu to America and the conflicting demands of Arafat, added to it all the resignation of David Levy from the cabinet of Mr. Netanyahu. And so we resume, as alas we may need to do for years ahead, our periodic worried look at the scene in Israel. To help us be profound and illuminating, we have two guests. Mark Rosenblum is a historian at Queens College in New York and director of the Middle East Project of the Michael Harrington Center. I pause to recall that the late Michael Harrington was our very first guest on Firing Line in April of Professor Rosenblum, a graduate of the University of Wisconsin, took an advanced degree at NYU, where he is completing work on his doctorate. He is the primary patron of the organization Peace Now, described as the largest grassroots movement in Israel's history supporting measures to expedite peace and, most recently, the Oslo accords. Sidney Zion, known to our faithful viewers, is a little of everything or, more accurately, a lot of everything. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania and the Yale Law School, served as a trial attorney, then as a freelance journalist whose column is published by The New York Daily News. He is the author of several books, including The Autobiography of Roy Cohn. On the Israeli question he is a hard-liner. Let me begin by asking Mr. Rosen bl um whether he encourages a terminal freeze between the United States and the government of Netanyahu. MR. ROSENBLUM: A terminal freeze-- MR. BUCKLEY: Yes. MR. ROSENBLUM: --between the two governments? MR. BUCKLEY: Yes. We know, do we not, that the failure of the president to greet Netanyahu last time he was in America was greeted by the Israeli press as a freeze. Question: Have we reached the point where White House strategists are saying that Mr. Netanyahu is so mishandling the affairs of Israel that the whole world would be better off if he were replaced? That's my question. MR. ROSENBLUM: I think they are less than thrilled with the performance of Netanyahu and they feel as if commitments they have 1

3 previously gotten out of him haven't been honored; and they're afraid that he has shown more of his ideological predispositions and not enough of the pragmatic face they hoped was there. But I think that a freeze is not in the works. As you know, he is on his way to Washington. He will meet; he'll be followed by President Arafat. So Washington has not given up hope. I think what it's now come to a full realization of is there is no substitute for ongoing positive intervention. So Washington, I think, is about to become more intrusive, I hope in a positive intervening way. MR. BUCKLEY: Well, there was a column published in The New York Times by an analyst, Tom Friedman, who said one possibility is that things would get so stuck that the White House might, say, turn to Israel and say, Okay, you people figure it out; I'm apparently contributing nothing. Is that prospect, in your judgment, conceivable? MR. ROSENBLUM: I think it's been weighed heavily and pursued for a short period after the January Hebron understanding. Because under Netanyahu, to be fair, there was a breakthrough of sorts that occurred a year ago, and he agreed to re-deploy from 80 percent of the city of Hebron, which is near and dear in Jewish tradition, and he also agreed to a road map that Dennis Ross, the chief negotiator, prepared of mutual obligations on both the Israeli and the Palestinian side. Then Netanyahu proceeded to send the bulldozers in to a southeastern hill called Har Homa and the entire peace process went into a six-month collapse. And Washington basically said, I think, Stew in your own juices; neither of you is playing this game in an honorable, compromising way. I think that that came to an end this past summer when the secretary of state, in her August 6 address, made it very clear this is not a sandbox [where you] can allow the boys to behave like boys. It's too important to Washington for basic strategic reasons. So I think they are not about to sit on their hands. I think that they are in for the long haul, not just for reasons of appreciating the people in the region, but strategic American interests are at stake. MR. BUCKLEY: Well, let me ask MR. ZION: Have you been critical of any concession that Netanyahu has made in the last year or so, or are you sort of swinging with him? MR. ZION: My view on the whole thing is this: that Netanyahu has lived up to everything he had to live up to in Oslo. This baloney about Har Homa destroying the peace process means that if it's true, the peace process was never there. Nothing in Oslo, nothing in Hebron, 2

4 ever said or suggested that the Israelis could not build in Jerusalem. By the way, 10,000 more building's going on, most of it illegal, by the Arabs in Jerusalem, only you don't read about it. MR. BUCKLEY: Why? MR. ZION: Because the media doesn't want you to know about it-- MR. BUCKLEY: Why? MR. ZION: --and Americans for Peace Now doesn't want you to know about it. MR. BUCKLEY: Why? MR. ZION: Why? Because they want to put the onus all on Israel. MR. BUCKLEY: Why? MR. ZION: Why? Because they want to push Israel into creating a Palestinian state, that's why. MR. BUCKLEY: Why? Why? MR. ZION: Why do they want to do it? That's a great question. [laughter] I don't know why they want it. I'll tell you this. The president of the United States shamelessly supported Peres in the election. Not even a question about it. They just went all-out. And now they are all-out to overthrow Bibi. I don't think they are going to get away with it, but they're going to try. Maybe they will. MR. BUCKLEY: That's what I wanted you to-- MR. ZION: Why do they want to do that? Because they don't want questions asked about reciprocity, which-- Hebron, by the way, a year ago, Mr. Arafat once again promised the same that he had promised in Oslo, didn't do it again. There is not one thing in the Hebron or Oslo accords promised by Arafat that he's done. MR. BUCKLEY: Is that correct? MR. ZION: And not only that, they claim they're never going to do it. They haven't changed the [unintelligible], they haven't turned over 3

5 prisoners, they haven't gone after, most importantly, the infrastructure of Hamas, they haven't stopped the anti-israeli rhetoric. And they promised it, and they never do it-- MR. BUCKLEY: And they-- MR. ZION: And Israel is always told, we're always told that Israel hasn't done what they-- MR. BUCKLEY: They haven't repealed their anti-israel covenant. MR. ZION: No, they have not. They haven't done anything at all that they said in 1993 they were going to do, and once again last year. So why does Mark say it's because they have put in a bulldozer at Har Homa-- MR. BUCKLEY: Well, let's-- MR. ZION: --that the whole thing is-- MR. BUCKLEY: --find out why. MR. ZION: Yes, let's do that. MR. ROSENBLUM: Let me try and bring us to what I think is the grayish reality here, the grayish reality on the two issues. One that I mentioned, of Har Homa, that Sidney says is nonsense, because there is nothing in the Oslo peace accords that would prohibit the Israelis in letter and spirit from doing what they did in Har Homa; and secondly, the claim that it's only Arafat and the Palestinian authority that have egregiously violated all of the Oslo accords. I think the reality is much more complicated. Let me make two brief comments. MR. BUCKLEY: Sure. MR. ROSENBLUM: The reality of Har Homa is, it's true that there is nothing in the letter of Oslo that prohibits Israeli building. What was supposed to be observed by both sides in terms of the spirit. and this is literally a clause in the Oslo agreement, that says neither party should take unilateral acts that will abridge or undermine issues that are left for final status negotiations, including Jerusalem. So the building in Har Homa was itself not individually the triggering event that led everything to collapse. It's got a context, and the context was 4

6 that since 1967, 40,000 units have been built through Israeli government public sector finance, on one third of all the land in East Jerusalem that was annexed by the Israeli government. And of the 40,000 units that were built, Sidney, with Israeli government funds, not one was for Palestinians. So the Palestinians took the signal of building this new huge settlement--we're talking about public funds, Sidney-- MR. BUCKLEY: As a-- MR. ROSENBLUM: --as opposed to private. They took this as a statement that Har Homa was not going to be discussed and there was a continual violation of any possibility of discussing Jerusalem at the end of this game and Netanyahu has said over and over again, On Jerusalem, there is nothing to talk about--when in fact, Israelis and Palestinians of almost all political persuasions have identified conflictresolving ideas that would allow for the Israelis to exercise their sovereignty over Jerusalem with some accommodation to Palestinian political national goals there. MR. BUCKLEY: Like what? MR. ROSENBLUM: For example, one of the things that could be done in Har Homa at this second, as we sit, is: 98 percent of the Palestinian land that was expropriated by the government of Israel to build 6500 Jewish units in this place called Har Homa could be rescinded--the expropriation, 98 percent--could be rescinded to the Palestinians, and they could build Palestinian units on those two expropriated parcels, and the Jewish units, the 6500 units, could go ahead and be built by the Israeli government. Rescind the expropriation-- MR. BUCKLEY: Have you got any problem with that? MR. ZION: What expropriation? They owned-- This was all Jewish property. Almost all of it-- MR. ROSENBLUM: Sidney-- MR. ZION: --was owned by Jews. MR. ROSENBLUM: Sidney-- MR. ZION: This is a lie about expropriation. 5

7 MR. ROSENBLUM: One third of the land-- MR. ZION: Jerusalem happens to be--and Rabin said so and Peres used to say so--and they sold it to the Israelis, Oslo, on the grounds that we will never, ever-- MR. ROSENBLUM: Sidney-- MR. ZION: --do anything to disunite Jerusalem. It is ours. MR. ROSENBLUM: We could disagree a lot, Sidney. MR. ZION: Now you're telling me, Well, wait a minute, let's talk about it. They didn't sell this to the Jewish people on Let's talk about it. MR. ROSENBLUM: Facts-- MR. ZION: They said, We will never give up Jerusalem. MR. ROSENBLUM: Sidney, you can't wiggle out of certain fundamental facts here. MR. ZION: What can't I wiggle out of? What are you talking-- MR. ROSENBLUM: The fact that all the land-- MR. ZION: Everything was paid for, bought, way before. MR. ROSENBLUM: No, the facts are, in Har Homa---and we don't have to spend our time talking about Har Homa-- MR. ZION: Well, let's not. MR. ROSENBLUM: --but it is an issue that's symbolic of a) the more complicated story, and b) there is a way of moving ahead if Netanyahu and Arafat were both willing to be pragmatic. MR. ZION: By the way, I haven't heard you answer. What-- MR. ROSENBLUM: I am going to get to Oslo. MR. ZION: What about that? 6

8 MR. ROSENBLUM: I'm going to get to Oslo. MR. ZION: How come they haven't done anything they promised to do? Or are you telling me they did? MR. ROSENBLUM: Let me explain now the grayish area on the violation of the Oslo accords. It's true that there is a long list of serious violations on the Palestinian authority and Arafat side. I think the most serious ones--if I were the Israeli prime minister, I would be screaming from the rooftops on, is I would be focusing on the lack of a seven-day-a-week, 24-hour continuous commitment to cooperate with the Israelis in the battle against terrorism, and to have a feasible plan for maximizing that effort. Curiously, the CIA and the station chief of the CIA, began to meet with the highest ranking Israeli major general, authorized by the prime minister a month ago to come to come up with a new detailed security memorandum. MR. BUCKLEY: And he agreed on it, didn't he? MR. ROSENBLUM: Netanyahu rejected the agreement of his own major general-- MR. BUCKLEY: I'm saying the generals agreed on it. MR. ROSENBLUM: The generals agreed upon it, both the Palestinian and the Israeli. So something else is going on here. MR. BUCKLEY: Tell me what else is going on. I want to ask you, and then I want to ask you. What is going on that persuades, by your rendering, Netanyahu to be binding himself into a position which simply guarantees eternal hostility and conceivably war? Is it shortsightedness? MR. ROSENBLUM: No, I think that, without trying to be overly cute about it, because Netanyahu is a clever politician, and he didn't get where he's at as a young elected prime minister with a presumably long career in front of him by being stupid. I think that he is in an awkward position with a government that's increasingly right-wing since the defection of Levy. He's afraid that there might be some, particularly in the National Religious Party, with its nine members of the Knesset, that will break from him if he agrees on any serious compromise in this next stage. 7

9 MR. BUCKLEY: Do you think he's correct? MR. ROSENBLUM: No, I think-- There's no way of x-raying into these nine MK's that are members of a very messianic nationalist religious movement, but my sense is, this is the best prime minister they have a chance of ever electing. And if they choose to vote noconfidence against him and bring the possibility that Ehud Barak, the former head of the Israeli defense force who now is the head of the Labor Party, and he becomes elected, this certainly is not going to play out in their perception of what they would like to see happen. So I think they are a captive audience and there is a bluff. Therefore, my argument would be Netanyahu has a captive right-wing flank that doesn't want to see the Labor Party in power. MR. BUCKLEY: [sneezes] Excuse me. MR. ROSENBLUM: Bless you. MR. BUCKLEY: Well, now you've got no problem with that analysis so far as it goes, do you? MR. ZION: So far as it goes. MR. BUCKLEY: Netanyahu does feel to a certain extent that his movements-- MR. ZION: Well-- MR. BUCKLEY: --are limited-- MR. ZION: Well, sure, I mean politically-- MR. BUCKLEY: --by the political situation. MR. ZION: I mean, politically, he is limited for sure. No doubt. MR. BUCKLEY: Yes. MR. ZION: I believe this, that the first question that you posed, about what we should do--america should do--my preference is that America stays out, because I know if they're in what they're going to do. The White House is going to only push Israel and play down all of the violations of all the accords. And what really this is about--and what I 8

10 think Mark really wants, or at least the Americans for Peace Now and a lot of them in Israel want, is really an unconditional withdrawal. They gave us a whole long list of things, Peres and Rabin, that they had to do to sell it to the Israeli people. And they didn't really, I don't believe, mean it. Maybe Rabin did, but Shimon Peres really did not mean it. And they gave them an army--practically an army. There are so many arms now. The Israelis armed the Palestinians in order supposedly to go after Hamas. That's what the reason was. But they don't go after Hamas. The only thing they've ever done with those arms is to shoot Jews over a fake thing about a tunnel about a yearand-a-half ago. Now they have pretty much of an army-- MR. BUCKLEY: Well now, did this agreement that Mr. Rosenblum talked about-- MR. ZION: Right. MR. BUCKLEY: --that was signed onto by the Israeli general, did that include plans for controlling Hamas? MR. ZION: I don't know what that deal was all about. All I can tell you is that if Bibi didn't like the deal, he had every right not to want it. I never thought they should have allowed the CIA in as any kind of a broker there anyway, because this is a sovereignty question. Now finally, if America comes in, we know what's going to happen, because we know-- I don't know what the president of the United States really believes or what he would believe, but he is surrounded exactly by the people that Mark likes. All of them are practically all Peace Now people--samuel Berger, people like that, and Dennis Ross from the former administration. These people have an absolute belief that the only way for Israel to be secure is to establish a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria--which they won't use those names; they call it the West Bank, right, as if it was the West Bank of Commerce, right? In any event, this is a very big bias that they have. That's why they wanted Shimon Peres in the worst way. And they believe it. I don't think they're anti-israel, but I think that they come out that way. The only thing they think they want to push is Israel, because they know they're not going to get Arafat. You listen to Hanan Ashra wi talk some day: We'll never turn over one prisoner, we'll never cooperate in that, that or the other thing, we won't stop anything. The propaganda is immense. Just the other day--on Fatah Day-- By the way, we always want to remember what that was. In 1965, the first foray down, in which the PLO--not even called that then, but Fatah--killed a 9

11 bunch of women and children. They celebrate that. Today they still celebrate it. And on that day in the Jerusalem, in the PLO newspaper, Arafat once again said, Don't worry about it. He was asked, Did we make a mistake by making this deal? He said, This is the old deal that we did--what we said in 1974 goes, meaning to stage this deal. We'll take what they will give us, and then later, when the Arab world is ready, we'll push them out just where they belong. That's why they don't get rid of the covenant that says we're going to destroy Israel. All of this he says in public. You do not read it in Tom Friedman or The New York Times. All of these things, all of them violations of Oslo. They were supposed to stop all of this anti-israeli rhetoric. They just promote it. And this is a horror and this is going on all the time. Now-- MR. BUCKLEY: Is this realistic? MR. ROSENBLUM: No. There are half-truths in what he is saying here. For example, he has mentioned three times now about the Palestinian covenant and the continuous refusal to amend and honor the obligation the PLO undertook in Oslo. This is a half-truth for the following reason. In April, a year and a half ago, the PLO--two years ago now this coming April--the PLO was asked literally by their obligation, You've got to amend your covenant, you've got to fulfill this. The due date was coming up, and Arafat went to both the sitting prime minister, which we know you don't agree with, Shimon Peres, and went to the State Department, to Dennis Ross, and said, How do I get this monkey off my back of the national covenant.? It's filled with articles that suggest politicide, the destruction of the state of Israel through means of genocide. How do we get this off my back and come into compliance? The recommendation was that you issue a declaration to the Israelis, in English to the Americans and in Arabic in your own newspapers, declaring that all of the articles of the Palestinian National Covenant that are inconsistent with the Oslo agreements to recognize the state of Israel, and live in peace and forswear violence, are now rescinded. He did that. He brought in--and the Israelis allowed him to bring in--palestinians from the Diaspora, and you had an unprecedented vote in Gaza of the members of the Palestinian National Council, and it took place on the 27th anniversary of Israel's declaration of independence. MR. BUCKLEY: Now that would-- 10

12 MR. ROSENBLUM: And they voted overwhelmingly to rescind the covenant, but what they did not do is they did not then take the next step, which they said they would do, they would have a legal committee that would draft the replacement document for that, an article by article replacement. They have not done that. MR. BUCKLEY: Well, is the rescission effective even though what was supposed to supplant it hasn't materialized? MR. ROSENBLUM: The Palestinians say it did, the Israeli sitting prime minister and Israeli foreign ministry said it did. The president of the United States-- MR. BUCKLEY: Does Sid Zion think it is? MR. ZION: Well, wait a minute now, if it did, why did he sell that piece [unintelligi.ble] again and in Hebron a year ago today? MR. ROSENBLUM: Look at what that-- MR. ZION: He sold it again. MR. ROSENBLUM: Sidney, look what that-- MR. ZION: Oh, come on now. MR. ROSENBLUM: --{unintelligi.ble] says. No, it says-- MR. BUCKLEY: We're talking about-- MR. ZION: You are kidding now. MR. BUCKLEY: We're talking about-- MR. ROSENBLUM: Sidney-- MR. ZION: They sent it to a committee, that's all they did. MR. ROSENBLUM: No, no, it said-- MR. BUCKLEY: When we're talking about the covenant of the PLO, we're back in the '50s-- 11

13 MR. ZION: Right, right. To destroy Israel. MR. BUCKLEY: --to wipe Israel off the face of the map. MR. ROSENBLUM: It contains several dozen articles-- MR. BUCKLEY: Yes. MR. ROSENBLUM: --that talk about the destruction of Israel through armed struggle. MR. BUCKLEY: Right. MR. ZION: It's still there. MR. BUCKLEY: You say it has been rescinded but not replaced. MR. ROSENBLUM: They have been rescinded-- MR. BUCKLEY: And you're saying-- MR. ROSENBLUM: --in a full body of the Palestinian Council. MR. ZION: That they have never rescinded it. It was a lie to begin with. They didn't rescind it. That's why they promise to do it again. Oh, come on. MR. ROSENBLUM: And the Israelis in Sidney's world did not expropriate any Palestinian land in Har Homa. They're basic facts that we cannot change. You're right, Sidney, they need to do more. MR. ZION: In Hebron they agreed to it again and they didn't do it, so what do you want? MR. ROSENBLUM: Not again. MR. ZION: They agreed in Hebron. MR. BUCKLEY: We've got a couple of minutes. Let me suggest this. MR. ZION: Let's go on to other things. 12

14 MR. BUCKLEY: Let's talk exclusively in terms of American interests here. MR. ZION: Yes. MR. BUCKLEY: Now my understanding is that America is committed, in a sense even legally, to the survival of Israel, which is fine by me. This is okay. MR. ZION: I understand. MR. BUCKLEY: Now question number two, is the option mentioned by Thomas Friedman, one that appeals to any of you, which is: Okay, we've tried and tried and tried and failed to effect a reconciliation, so let's let them argue about it. They're both well armed and our guarantee of Israel's essential frontiers is operative. Is this a diplomatic recourse that appeals to you in any sense? MR. ZION: It does only because I know that America is not going to be evenhanded. We did write a note for the record in Hebron, in which we underwrote all of these obligations that once again Arafat promised to do and he hasn't done. If America came in and said, You do this and then Israel will of course do that and if they don't, we'll put our pressure on him, that would be one thing. But that's not the way this is going. The way this is going is, Let's not even think about what they didn't do and let's go on with it and start re-deploying it out of the territories, and guarantee us-- By the way, they all talk about only three percent of the territories that have been left. It is 27 percent. It's not three percent. And 97 percent of the Palestinian people are living under the Palestinian Authority governance. So it's not true what they are telling you every day in the papers, and the real truth is that they have got 27 percent and they want to keep chucking up more before the deal is finally cooked. So that finally it will come down to this. MR. BUCKLEY: That-- MR. ZION: They'll have everything but Jerusalem, and then they'll say, You want to kill this over Jerusalem. And then you guys will come up with ideas for Jerusalem and they won't have Jerusalem. MR. BUCKLEY: Sidney, we've got a problem here, which is that if we go back to the particulars of the ontroversy, then tat distracts us 13

15 from the point I'm trying here to emphasize, namely the imperatives of American diplomacy. Now okay, we'll hear from Mr. Rosenblum. What you have said is, we're better off doing nothing, because to the extent that we do anything, we're going to end up on the pro-arab side. MR. ZION: We are negotiating for them. MR. BUCKLEY: Your comment on that point is what? MR. ROSENBLUM: That I am not attracted to the idea. I think it's a non-starter. I think it's a non-starter because Washington and America have vital interests under the ground. Oil will continue to fuel us well into the 21st century. It still is a place that is very important to America's commercial interests. The oil sits, for better or for worse, in the Persian Gulf. Why-- MR. BUCKLEY: How does that bear on the Israeli question? MR. ROSENBLUM: Because you want to stabilize those regimes that sit on top of that. There is no doubt about it here that America has linkages to some Arab states they think have been brought into a pro American orbit and now can be integrated into a regional alliance with Israel. And the prolif era ti on of weapons of mass destruction is a second key interest in Washington. And this is still a region that is having the potential for accumulation of these weapons. And the way the State Department and the president think about this, I think correctly, is one of the ways--not the only way--to insure continued access at reasonable prices at this under-the-ground oil, and some control over proliferation of weapons of mass destruction is to succeed in a breakthrough on the Palestinian-Israeli implementation. MR. ZION: Well-- MR. BUCKLEY: Hold on, wait. Do I understand you to be saying that unless we continue actively engaged in this process, we will alienate those adjacent contiguous countries that do have oil--because there is no oil in the West Bank, as far as I know--are you saying that in order to appease Saudi Arabia at all, we've got to stay in this act? MR. ROSENBLUM: It's not appeasement of Saudi Arabia. There are fundamentalists--politically violent fundamentalist movements--that are alive and well in the region. The goal here is-- 14

16 MR. BUCKLEY: But to appease is not necessarily bad. MR. ROSENBLUM: No, no, but it's a word like "pressure"-- MR. BUCKLEY: Yes. MR. ROSENBLUM: --that generally does not resonate in a positive way. MR. BUCKLEY: Yes, right. MR. ROSENBLUM: So the search for alternative words is important here, and I think it's not a-- MR. ZION: Well, sure, the word you are doing here is blackmail. MR. ROSENBLUM: No, Sidney-- MR. ZION: You're saying because of oil-- MR. ROSENBLUM: Sidney, it's not blackmail. MR. ZION: --Israel should have to do this. MR. ROSENBLUM: No, no, no. No. MR. ZION: And that's nothing but blackmail-- MR. ROSENBLUM: No, the Israeli-- MR. ZION: What's interesting, by the way, is not one of those states, not one you mentioned, wants a Palestinian state. MR. ROSENBLUM: No-- MR. ZION: Everyone is against it-- MR. ROSENBLUM: Sidney, that's not true. MR. ZION: --they don't want it, they've expelled their Palestinians, they hate them, and now we're told, oh, to appease them, make them happy-- 15

17 MR. ROSENBLUM: This is not-- MR. ZION: --have a Palestinian state. It's a joke. MR. ROSENBLUM: It's not-- MR. ZION: It's straight blackmail is what you're saying, and you want Israel-- MR. BUCKLEY: Whoa, whoa, whoa-- MR. ZION: --to go under that gun. It is, it's blackmail. MR. BUCKLEY: Sidney, quiet, quiet, quiet. MR. ROSENBLUM: It's not a joke, I think. It's not a joke to Washington's strategic interests. MR. ZION: Yes, right. MR. ROSENBLUM: Second, 1-- Sidney, look, you can repeat-- MR. ZION: You can repeat the Iraq line. That's a line that Iraq-- Iraq put that out. MR. ROSENBLUM: Don't stick Iraq in this. Iraq is independently- and Saddam Hussein is an independent problem, he's a thug and a regional international threat. The truth is the absence of a breakthrough on the Palestinian-Israeli level makes it more difficult to contain Saddam. But even if there were-- MR. ZION: That's a lie. MR. ROSENBLUM: That makes-- MR. ZION: That's a complete 100-percent lie. MR. ROSENBLUM: That's a lie? MR. BUCKLEY: Why would he lie to us? MR. ZION: You bet it is. And this is the lie that they are putting out. That Iraq somehow, because Israel won't establish a West Bank state, 16

18 unconditionally, by the way, somehow that is going to make it more difficult to deal with Iraq-- MR. ROSENBLUM: Sidney, this is not unconditional. MR. ZION: --who doesn't care about Palestinians and wants to kill t hem all. MR. ROSENBLUM: None of this-- The terms for the-- MR. BUCKLEY: Ten seconds. MR. ROSENBLUM: The terms for the discussion here are not unilateral American pressure to steamroll Israel. It's mutuality. It's Netanyahu's word, "reciprocity." Both the Palestinians and Israelis have obligations. It's curious that the American government went to the security issue first to try and come up with an understanding. It was the prime minister that vetoed that security understanding. MR. BUCKLEY: Thank you, Mr. Mark Rosenblum; thank you, Mr. Sidney Zion; thank you, ladies and gentlemen. 17