Is Peace (in Israel-Palestine) Possible?
Many years ago, in the Introduction to my first book, Arafat, Terrorist or Peacemaker?I said that, generally speaking, the Jews are the intellectual elite of the Western civilisation and the Palestinians the intellectual elite of the Arab world. What those two peoples could do together in peace and partnership was, I suggested, the stuff that real dreams are made of. They could play a major role in changing and developing the region for the better and, by so doing, give much needed hope and inspiration to the whole world… I still believe that dream can be made to come true, BUT ONLY IF…..
I’m now back to where I started, and to bring my prepared remarks to a conclusion, I’ll put some flesh on the bones of “only if”.
In my assessment, peace is possible only if there can be agreement on the creation of ONE STATE FOR ALL – a secular, democratic state in which Jews and Arabs could live together in full and complete equality. In other words, I think peace requires nothing less than the de-colonisation of Palestine. De-colonisation is, of course, a euphemism. What I really mean is the de-Zionisation of Palestine.
Will it ever happen? Zionism’s answer is “No! Never!” And that’s because Zionism sees everything in terms of “them or us”. The Zionis
t mind cannot conceive a “them and us” scenario.
So I think the most important question is something like this… Is there any power on earth that could call the nuclear armed Zionist state of Israel to account?
Because of Israel’s dependence on the U.S. there is a widely held view that an American president (any American president) has the leverage to do so. In this scenario an American president recognises, better late than never, that the Zionist state of Israel is more of a liability than an asset…. I do not myself believe it’s as simple as that.
In my ITN reporting days, I asked General Moshe Dayan, Israel’s one-eyed warlord and master of deception, why, really, Israel had a nuclear bomb. (This story is also in Volume Two of my book). I said to him in private conversation: “We both know you don’t need it vis-à-visthe Arabs.” The following was his reply. “Ben-Gurion was not stupid and I’m not stupid. We know how international politics works. We take it as read that a day could come when even our best friends will say to us, ‘Thank you very much, Israel. You’ve served our purpose. Now you must do this.”
The clear and obvious implication was that if ever a day came when Israel was really pressed to do what it did not want to do, it would respond by saying: “Don’t push us further than we are prepared to go because we have the capability to destroy the region.”
As those of you who’ve read Volume One of my book know, I quote from a conversation I had with Golda Meir when she was prime minister and I was reporting for Panorama. At a point I said to her: “Prime Minister, I want to be sure I understand what you’re saying… You are saying that if ever Israel was in danger of being defeated on the battlefield, it would be prepared to take the region and even the whole world down with it?” Without the shortest of pauses for reflection, and in the gravel voice that could charm of intimidate American presidents according to need, she replied: “Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying!” In a lead editorial, The Timesof London quoted what Golda had said to me and added its opinion – “We had better believe her.” I did and do.
In my opinion there is a political reality to be faced. It is that no American president will even think of confronting Zionism unless he (or she) knows that he would be doing so with the understanding and support of a majority of Jewish Americans.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is where I believe the key to peace is – IN THE HANDS OF JEWISH AMERICANS. Only they, I believe, with the assistance of the non-Israeli Jews of the world, have the influence needed to give politics for peace their very last chance, be it the peace of a one or two-state solution.
I also believe that the Jews of the world have a powerful self-interest in using their influence. And that self-interest is explained by the title of my book, Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews.
I insisted on that title because it reflects in seven words two related truths for our time. The first is that the sleeping giant of classical anti-Semitism has been re-awakened. The second is that a prime cause of the re-awakening is the Zionist state’s behaviour… behaviour which, in my view, qualifies it to be described, at least sometimes, as a terrorist state.
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