This has to be ended, or we're going to see more and more actions like the one we saw in Tel Aviv. I abhor them. I think that they are the worst possible thing, not just for the Israelis, but for the Palestinians. But I see no way of even beginning to address what drives people to do this unless you can end this occupation. It's been going on for 39 years. In June, it will be the beginning of the 40th year of it, and I just see no movement in the international community, I see nothing in this country, nothing whatsoever to address it. And any time anyone tries to address it in this country, we're screamed down as Israel-haters or we’re screamed down as anti-Semites, and so the occupation rolls on, protected by this kind of rhetoric.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to ask you both to stay with us for a few more minutes. We have to break right now for 60 seconds. Rashid Khalidi is the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University. Shir Hever is economic researcher at the Alternative Information Center in Jerusalem. 

We're speaking with Shir Hever, who is an economic researcher for the Alternative Information Center in Jerusalem. Rashid Khalidi joins from us here in New York. He's Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies and Director of the Middle East Institute at Columbia University. On Friday, the U.S. government barred Americans from doing most business with the Palestinian Authority. The Treasury Department memo said transactions with the P.A. by U.S. persons are prohibited unless licensed. It said that the decision had been based on existing terrorism sanctions. Professor Khalidi, your response to this and how significant is this? 0

RASHID KHALIDI: Well, it is significant. I mean, it's part of this blunderbuss legislation, which treats anyone who deals with anything which has anything to do with anything which can be described as terrorist as illegal. And it's a very blunt tool. I mean, there is a problem with the financing of terror, and there is a legitimate concern, particularly when we're talking about things like al-Qaeda, which actually attacked the United States. It has been largely used in this country against supporters of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, by the way. A large number of the terror trials that this administration has engaged in had nothing to do with attacks on Americans, or at least nothing to do with attacks on the United States. And I think that it will make even more complicated the task of humanitarian organizations dealing with the consequences of Israel's occupation.

I only wish that the United States would face up to the fact that Israel, as the occupying power, under the Third Geneva Convention is responsible for the safety and the welfare of the entire Palestinian population under occupation. The sham and the fiction that there is a Palestinian sovereign independent government which has that responsibility is, in law, completely unjustified. Israel is the occupying power. The Palestinian Authority has no sovereignty and almost no jurisdiction and is about to be eliminated almost, as its limited control is further eroded. And that means we in the international community and Israel are responsible for the welfare of these people. Laws like this, which are as blunt and as indiscriminate as they are, are going to make individuals who are trying to deal with these humanitarian problems very worried about their safety from prosecution.

And I would remind you, you can deliver humanitarian aid in a variety of ways through N.G.O.s, but some things have to be delivered by a quasi-governmental body, like education and health, and that has to be this Palestinian Authority, which has simply taken over the services that were performed by Israel's civil administration in the many decades of occupation before the P.A. was set up in the mid-‘90s. And that has now been described as a terrorist authority, both by Israel and the United States. Well, terrorist teachers and terrorist doctors and terrorist nurses and terrorist tax collectors, it is obscene. It makes absolutely no sense, but it is a weapon that this administration has chosen to wield, both an ideological weapon and a financial weapon, here, in the case of Palestine, and elsewhere, and until the American public wakes up and realizes that we're not well served by these laws, I think we're in real trouble.

AMY GOODMAN: Do you think that the economic crisis will destabilize Hamas?

RASHID KHALIDI: It may. It's hard for me at this distance to judge. And I think that Hamas may -- the Hamas government may crumble. I don't think that will necessarily mean that Hamas will be less popular or that it will be possible to create a stable alternative to it. I think destroying the democratic process in Palestine, which would be the result of that, wouldn't be good for anybody. We would go back to a situation where armed groups would dictate Palestinian policy, which was the situation for much of the Intifada, which I think was one of the worst things that could possibly have happened to the Palestinian people. I don't think the Intifada served them well, the Second Intifada, the one from 2000 until 2004, 2005. And I'm afraid that that is where the situation is being pushed, and I think that will be catastrophic, both for the Palestinians and the Israelis, frankly. I don't think the Israelis will benefit one bit either.

AMY GOODMAN: The Telegraph, a London tabloid, Shir Hever, reported Saturday that aid --

RASHID KHALIDI: It's actually a broad sheet, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: Okay, reported Saturday aid work has been nearly paralyzed on the West Bank, because many aid workers fear the United States now sees them as terrorists.

SHIR HEVER: Yes, I think that the United States is only proving to a large extent that the money -- its double standards towards terrorism, because while the United States is putting all these obstacles in the face of people who try to deal with Palestinian businesses, at the same time the United States is funding the Israeli occupation of the Occupied Territories, and it’s providing Israel with weapons with which Israel violates international law, violates human rights, and commits atrocities against the Palestinian population. So it's actually the United States government itself that is responsible for many violent actions that Israel is committing and is funding these actions, and we should ask ourselves if, morally, is that any better than funding terrorist Islamic organizations.

AMY GOODMAN: And where do you think the change will come from in Israel? Is there a peace movement that you feel actually has weight?

SHIR HEVER: Well, I am part of the anti-occupation forces in Israel. I wouldn't exactly call it a peace movement, because the peace movement is a very general name, but I think the forces against occupation in Israel are not very strong, especially not the Jewish parts of that movement. What is very strong, however, is the gradual erosion of the Israeli society's ability to maintain the occupation, to keep bearing the economic burdens, the social burdens. Israel used to be one of the most egalitarian and fast-growing economy in the western world. And today, it's the most unequal economy in the western world, if at all it is part of the western world. It suffers from high levels of unemployment, and a lot of people are losing interest in the Zionist nature of the state because of that, and they're becoming more apathetic and more centered about their daily survival. And this is actually the source, as cynical as it may sound, this is a source of hope for a solution to the situation, because only when Israelis are not willing to participate in the army and in the actions that it undertakes, only then the Palestinians will be finally able to claim their independence and their right.

AMY GOODMAN: Shir Hever, we'll have to leave it there, economic researcher for the Alternative Information Center in Jerusalem, and Rashid Khalidi, Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies and Director of Middle East Institute at Columbia University in New York.

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