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| TROUBLED LAND | |
 October 23, 2000  |
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A conversation on the Middle East crisis with Former Secretary of State George Shultz, following a brief update on the latest violence.
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JOHN IRVINE: The gaping hole this Palestinian child is
looking through was made in his bedroom wall last night by an Israeli
tank shell. Three-year-old George Nazal is alive because his father
moved him to the back of the house when firing started. Then came the
shell. It passed through YASSER ARAFAT: Let him go to hell. JOHN IRVINE: And relations will sour further if Ehud Barak achieves his goal of setting up an emergency unity government that includes opposition leader Ariel Sharon, the Israeli hard-liner that Palestinians hate most. As the politicians bicker and maneuver, the fighting on the streets goes on. This has been the 26 day of clashes. |
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| Camp David -- an overreach? | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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GEORGE SHULTZ, Former Secretary of State: I think the Camp David meetings were an exercise in overreach. And the result was that every raw nerve imaginable got exposed. And then we have seen this sort of interaction of violence that presents us with all of these horrible pictures. ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Explain what you mean by "overreach." GEORGE SHULTZ: Well, there has been a long process here going on for decades, step by step by step. And always the people involved have said, "we know you inch forward." Then occasionally maybe there's a good big step. But be careful you don't go backwards because there's always this tension there. It's also important, I think, to get the parties directly involved. Sadat's trip to Jerusalem came about after there were a lot of subterranean discussions, as I understand it, between is Sadat and Begin or their representatives. The U.S. was not involved in that. The Oslo Agreement was produced by negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians. The U.S. was not involved. The U.S. was informed about it. And then they came to Washington for a handshake, and we participated and it was good. But it was essentially their doing.
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: So you think they took on too much, tried to do too much there given the fact that Arafat wasn't ready? GEORGE SHULTZ: Well, if he says... If you have one person, two people coming and one of them says, "I'm not ready to make an agreement," you're asking for trouble by bringing them together. ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And do you think essentially it was destabilizing to the whole process or that it made him look bad because he had to say... how do you think it then led to this? GEORGE SHULTZ: Well, looking at it from the standpoint of people in Israel who have been in the let's-make-peace camp, what are they saying to themselves now? They're saying, "we were told that Syria wanted to Golan Heights back and then there would be peace." So the Syrians were offered the Golan Heights. They said no. We were told that if we want peace with the Palestinians, they basically have to get control of practically all of the West Bank. I don't think it crossed many minds in Israel that they also should have control of certain portions of East Jerusalem and other elements in the Temple Mount area, but anyway, that was also put there, and they said no. So now I'm an Israeli. What am I supposed to think are the prospects for peace? Now, from the other side of the equation, I think two things have happened that are unfortunate. One is that when it comes to something like Jerusalem, that was an area that the Israelis had sovereignty over. They respected the holy sites. The holy sites were really administered by the holy people. An effort was made to provide access, although it wasn't satisfactory, but there are real security concerns there. But at any rate, there was a situation that certainly the Palestinians, the Arabs couldn't agree to, but anyway, it was there. And it hadn't gotten to the point of real controversy. ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: The status quo was working, more or less? GEORGE SHULTZ: Well, it was working more or less, but at least it wasn't exacerbated to the point of all of this conflict.
GEORGE SHULTZ: Well, I think it was premature to do it, because if you tackle something like that, particularly if important matters are put on the table, and you don't get anywhere, then you have taken something that is potentially always explosive, and you've exposed all of the raw nerves, as I said, and then that really is an aggravation. Then I think there's also been something that's happened here, and I feel this, although it's hard to document it, but for a long time, the strength of the Israelis led extremists on the other side to have to take a backseat for there to be a kind of understanding. Yes, Israel is here to stay, and we're going to have to make some kind of accommodation. And there is no real military option because Israel is too strong. Now, as violence has worked, at least so it seems, I think there on -- the position of extremists on both sides has been built up, whereas the whole process has been one to kind of marginalize them and focus on the big center people who want to have reasonably peaceful relationships and get on with decent lives. |
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| Is the peace process dead? | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Do you think that the peace process as we've known it since 1993 is basically dead? GEORGE SHULTZ: Well, the effort to achieve greater stability, peace or at least stable working arrangements, certainly isn't dead. Presumably there are lots of people who want to work at that. And that has to be worked at. But there is a lot to be done, I think, before you can try to reassemble people at a bargaining table or at the discussion table. ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: What should be done? GEORGE SHULTZ: In any negotiation, any negotiator knows that in a way
the tip of the iceberg is my negotiation with you. My first responsibility
is to look at my constituency and be sure that I have people assembled
who understand what I'm trying to do and who are going to support what
I agree to. And I'm not going to agree to things that I know won't be
supported. And also, I look at you on the other On the Arab side, there are all these questions about the degree to which the Palestinians are coherent. I think they're probably a little more coherent than they're given credit for, but it's a real question. But I think the Arab leaders too have to be a part of this. And for example, when you take holy sites, are Barak and Arafat really the only people who should have a say? Are there people in Islam who presumably have something to say? For that matter, there are people in the Jewish religion that have something to say, and I would have to say as a Christian, I think we have something to say, too. So I think there ought to be a lot of thought given to how to form the groupings that have something to say here, and they need to be much more coherent. And in the meantime, however, I think that Israel needs to stand there and quell the violence and be strong and presumably Arafat has to gather his forces together. But the violence has got to stop. |
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| A troubled region | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: How do concerns and issues and problems in the wider Arab world play into all of this? GEORGE SHULTZ: Well, among the things... I don't know if you want to say Arab world, but among the things around in the region, and I don't know that we've heard from Iran yet or Iraq coming back into the picture. They're very antagonistic to any settlement with Israel. And I was stunned to read that an agreement had been made between Vice President Gore and Prime Minister Chernomyrdin back in 1995 with Russia that went along with the sales of really major pieces of equipment with submarines, with fighters, with torpedoes and things like that that are very damaging to get into the hands of the hands of the Iranians and not having that trigger the sanctions that were there in a bill that Senator Gore with Senator McCain had sponsored. So that's part of the picture here, that it isn't just the Israelis and the Palestinians, but you are have to think more broadly about the situation in the region. ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Secretary Shultz, thanks for being with us. GEORGE SHULTZ: Thank you. |
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two
walls before hitting the family's washing machine. The Israelis fired
on the village from a Jewish settlement across the valley on the edge
of Jerusalem. In between family homes on the Palestinian side, we found
one of the firing points used by the gunmen who started last night's
exchanges. For three hours, there was firing across the valley. As well
as tanks, the Israelis used helicopter gun shells. On the Israeli side,
residents gathered to watch and cheer each hit. However, this morning
they, too, had damage to assess. 16 apartments were hit by Palestinian
fire. There have been several gun battles across this valley over the
last three weeks. Indeed, the Israelis believed their position is so
vulnerable they've put in this new concrete wall. At a time when many
people hoped new bridges would be built between the two communities,
it's fresh barriers that are going up instead. And all the while, the
gulf between political leaders is widening, too. This was Yasser Arafat's
message to the Israeli prime minister. 
ELIZABETH
FARNSWORTH: With me is George Shultz, who was Secretary of State during
the Reagan administration. He has occasionally advised Governor Bush
during this presidential campaign. What's gone wrong, Mr. Secretary?
We just saw these pictures, barriers, violence. What has led to this,
in your view? 
Camp
David was done by the United States, and I think it's obvious after
the fact that it was a mistake. But before the fact, there were a number
of people who said, "Don't do it." And one of them was Yasser
Arafat. He basically said directly, "I'm not ready for this meeting."
And I think he should have been paid attention to, because the Israelis
basically crossed every red line they had, and still that wasn't acceptable.
So I think you have to respect the fact that each party within itself
has to be ready to make an agreement if it's going to be made, and probably
you have to inch along. You can't just do everything at once. 
ELIZABETH
FARNSWORTH: So you wouldn't have tried to deal with the Temple Mount
or Haram al-Sharif at this point? 
side,
and I ask myself, "are you in that same position?" Because
if I see that you aren't, then it's a question whether I ought to make
a lot of concessions to you. So each side I think at this point has
a lot of work to do. For example, in Israel right now, they have an
electoral system that makes it almost impossible to form a government,
because instead of there been two main parties with some others, as
has been traditionally the case, the Labor and Likud Parties are becoming
less and less important, and all sorts of little groups are there, and
if you try to form a government out of that mishmash, it's very difficult
to have anything that really is stable.