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Page 3 of 3 AMY GOODMAN: Let me put that question to Shlomo Ben-Ami. SHLOMO BEN-AMI: As I told you, Amy, I really thought we were going to talk about the current crisis, as it is.  AMY GOODMAN: Well, I think -- SHLOMO BEN-AMI: I, of course, do not deny things that I say about the convergence plan. I dedicated my political life to trying to reach a settlement, that essentially meant disengaging from Palestinian lands, having the fully fledged Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital. These are my credentials. It's not books that I’ve written. It is things that I’ve tried to do. Now, we have a political crisis there, and we are trying to see how we solve it. My suggestion is, as I said before, not to invade, try to find a different quid pro quo, and that is, stopping the suffocation of the Palestinian economy in Gaza, improving relations with the Palestinian Authorities, and moving to a political phase. This is my solution to the current crisis. I don't want to go now into the wider picture. I have said things, I have written things about it. I don't want to repeat it right now. And frankly, I am in the middle of a business lunch. I had the idea that we are having a very short interview. AMY GOODMAN: Well, let me just ask you -- SHLOMO BEN-AMI: And now I am interrupting the whole reunion. AMY GOODMAN: I’m very sorry. I just want to ask you one last question: the strikes coming just hours after officials close to Mahmoud Abbas said Hamas had agreed on a document to implicitly recognize Israel within its June ‘67 borders. SHLOMO BEN-AMI: Yeah. I think it is a very important document. I think that if indeed they sign it, this will at least stem the decline into a potential civil war between Palestinians. I think it is in Israel's interest to have a united Palestinian polity, that is, that subscribes to a shared political plan. I would have preferred them to simply subscribe to the Arab Peace Initiative. I think they have departed from that legitimacy, or from that inter-Arab legitimacy, and created their own. I don't see the logic of it. I think that the Arab Peace Initiative has a worldwide legitimacy, and simply subscribing to it would have meant a lot, in terms of Israeli public opinion. As it is, I think it enhances the unity between Palestinians, but it creates a condition that, I am afraid -- and again, I’m not speaking theory and not generalities -- I’m afraid that the current Israeli government will not see that as a starter. AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you for being with us, Shlomo Ben-Ami, former Israeli Foreign Minister, Member of Parliament, book Scars of War, Wounds of Peace: The Israeli-Arab Tragedy. He is speaking to us from Spain. Thanks for joining us. We will come back to this discussion after break with Ali Abunimah, as well as Dr. El-Farra. [break] AMY GOODMAN: We are talking to Ali Abunimah, founder of Electronic Intifada; and Dr. Mona El-Farra, physician in northern Gaza. Ali Abunimah, your response to this document, that at least those close to Mahmoud Abbas said that Hamas had agreed to recognizing Israel within the ‘67 borders. ALI ABUNIMAH: I think if tomorrow Ismael Haniyeh and Khaled Meshaal and all the other leaders of Hamas get down on their knees and say, “We want to give up everything to Israel and accept a state on the West Bank and Gaza Strip and accept to cancel the rights of Palestinian refugees and to abandon our rights to resist the occupation in any form whatsoever,” it would make no difference whatsoever, Amy, because the stumbling block, the fiction, here is that it's the Palestinians who have rejected this. The Hamas leaders, like the leaders of Fatah, have said many times that they're willing to talk to Israel, they're willing to recognize Israel. The Hamas leaders have said, “Okay, we don't want to do that in advance, because the PLO did that in advance during the Oslo Accords and got nothing in return. So we do it on the basis of reciprocity.” The problem, Amy, is that Israel is still completely 100% committed to colonialism. That is why Israel is continuing to seize land in the West Bank, to build new settler colonies every day, to pave Jewish-only roads in the West Bank, to build the apartheid wall, to treat Gaza as a giant prison. The reason that Israel pulled its settlers out of Gaza, as Shlomo Ben-Ami has said before, is to create the fiction that Israel is not ruling over a Palestinian majority, exactly as South Africa created the Bantustans to try and fool the world into thinking that Blacks had their rights within these so-called independent homelands and didn't need to have rights within the South African state. The same trick will not work in Palestine, as it did not work in South Africa. And the world needs to recognize that. And I’m thrilled that there's a growing civil society movement for boycott, divestment and sanctions that does. This is what is going to put pressure on Israel to end the colonial practices, no matter what document is signed between Hamas and Fatah. That will make no difference if there is no active worldwide opposition and resistance to Israel's colonialism. That is what will make a difference. AMY GOODMAN: Dr. Mona El-Farra, I wanted to give you the last word. When we last spoke -- Shlomo Ben-Ami was talking about the shelling of Kassam, and we last spoke, Dr. El-Farra, when you were at the hospital after the children, the families were -- the explosions on the beach in Gaza and a number of members of one family killed. What is the latest on that situation? DR. MONA EL-FARRA: Okay. First, just quickly, I totally agree with the analysis of Mr. Abunimah, totally agree with his analysis. Israelis did not try in the excuse of the soldier. The plan was ready to invade Gaza -- not physically invade it. Anyway, Israel did not invade Gaza. They are controlling us from outside. Regarding the Kassam rockets, I would like to know how many people really were injured by these Kassam rockets. As I told you before, the balance of power is towards Israel. These Kassam rockets and the other rockets is just very primitive devices. It is just a show of -- protesting against what's happening here. But seriously, it doesn't hurt Israeli security. What was your question? AMY GOODMAN: The latest on the family that we last spoke to you about, that member -- a number of members of the family, of the Galia family, who were killed at the Gaza beach, and the conflicting reports. Human Rights Watch and you, yourself, as a doctor in the hospital, saying that it was as a result of Israeli shelling, and the Israeli military saying it was Palestinian bombs. DR. MONA EL-FARRA: Yeah, yeah, okay. This is a big joke for me, and I’m totally, like all of us here in Gaza, totally convinced by the fact that it was Israeli shelling. I met the doctors who received the injured. I saw the injured myself, and the site of injuries show that it was not from mines. Minefield injuries are different from shelling injuries. The site of the injuries were in the upper side of the bodies. Beside, the shrapnel we found, it was the same like what we received in the case of Jabalia two years ago. So no matter what Israel is trying to say -- it is Palestinian mines -- this is not acceptable for us. And you forget all this. We don't need to add a new crime to the Israeli crimes. Even if this was from the Palestinian side, we have a large record of Israeli assault against Palestinians. And just I need somebody to explain to me, why this sonic bombing? And now, since 3:00 in the morning until now, we are under heavy sonic bombing from the sky. This, I consider, collective punishment, and it will not secure Israeli security. It is just they are humiliating us as Palestinians. They want us to kneel down. And I agree with Mr. Abunimah, what Israel is doing now sort of revives the idea of colonialism in the area. AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you both for being with us, Dr. Mona El-Farra, physician, community activist in northern Gaza, and Ali Abunimah, who is founder of electronicintifada.net. We thank you both for joining us. Recommend this article...
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