MOMENT Interviews Israel's Defense Minister Yitzchak Rabin
MOMENT Interviews Israel's Defense Minister Yitzchak Rabin The following interview took place on March 17, 1988, in Yitzchak Rabin's office in the Ministry of Defense, Tel Aviv. Hershel Shanks:...
...There's nobody to talk to...
...YR: No one could tell and no one can now explain why it started on December 9, 1987, and not a year before or not a year later...
...It threatens the security of certain people who move along certain roads...
...He doesn't want this problem any more than Israel does...
...But— bad luck—they lost...
...HS: Have you learned anything from the experience...
...Many people in Israel believed that the status quo in the territories could not last forever...
...But I believe the only way Israel will achieve such a peace is to prove two things: first, that we'll not budge one inch except in the context of an overall settlement...
...HS: And you didn't recognize it when it came...
...YR: Look, Israel had to make its mind...
...They want Israel out...
...HS: Thank you very much, Mr...
...YR: Of course...
...This is why we put strict measures to prevent even a few millions of dollars to reach them...
...You don't know what the situation is...
...Many other people, however, say that the Jordanian option is absolutely dead as a result of the rioting...
...I have had to bring a change of mentality in the way that the soldiers behave...
...We see it even now...
...It's not the kind of activity that endangers Israel, in practical terms...
...YR: I believe on this there is almost a national consensus: that we all oppose the creation of an independent Palestinian state between Israel and Jordan...
...Only 80 kilometers of the border from south of Beit She'an to the Dead Sea is linked to the Palestinian problem...
...And I put the question to them: "Are you willing to be the masters of your own fate and future...
...In the past, Israel negotiated while there was the War of Attrition...
...YR: Look, I don't know what they really want or don't...
...And therefore, who suffers...
...HS: You were...
...HS: But isn't it true that if the current disturbances and uprisings are suppressed and there is calm in the territories again, then the political right in Israel is going to say, "See, we told you so, if you stick with it long enough, if you suppress it, you don't have to do anything...
...And when it came, you didn't recognize it...
...Look, in Israel we don't suffer...
...At the same time, my responsibilities as minister of defense are to bring tranquility, not a solution...
...Unfortunately they have not learned to do it in positive ways or by embarking on a course of negotiations...
...YR: I believe in it...
...YR: Look, the real problem is to overcome it now...
...There is no clear-cut leadership...
...YR: I didn't say there were no exceptions...
...I believe once it is overcome, it will take a long time for the Palestinians who live in the territories to do it [again...
...You cannot find any parallel to what we have to do in the territories...
...and not only threats, the threats materialized: But they were military threats...
...They are going to be the football of their leaders as has happened for the past 40years...
...HS: Do you feel that you were unprepared to cope with the uprisings that began December 9? 7 can t say that anyone was prepared for this kind of prolonged disturbance . . . We cope with it practically unarmed...
...HS: How much would Hussein's life be worth if he tried to absorb the West Bank...
...We don't use our tanks...
...And when you've got good intelligence, you know when the decision is made and in which direction...
...But Israel doesn't have much to lose by giving an image of greater flexibility, of a willingness to talk . . . YR: [interrupting] Let's distinguish between the need to cope with the violence in the territories and the political issue...
...I would love to see a situation in which we could cope with violence by spreading flowers...
...Do you want us to be dead...
...We don't use any kind of a weapon beyond a rifle, at the worst—at the worst for the Israeli soldiers...
...Who can Israel negotiate with...
...Do you know what the HS: Have you been in the territories and talked to them like that since the uprisings...
...This war, that they originated, brought about their first disaster...
...The result would have been ten times more difficult to overcome then...
...No, there is no democracy among them...
...there was an intelligence failure...
...We could cope with it in accordance with the laws of war...
...Do you know what the Syrians really want...
...How would any police do it...
...You can say the same thing about any war...
...HS: You would accept an international conference...
...I prefer that Israel be the first to accept it...
...They went to war and they believed that victory was in their hands...
...Even as regards terrorism, terrorism basically has a chain of command...
...The reason he gave was very simple: The presence of television encourages and inflames violence...
...Now, as to what happened or what started in the territories on December 9, 1987, it was not planned...
...No doubt they [Jordan] would be the dominating force in negotiating a peace agreement with us...
...If Israel wants peace on its eastern border, the only partner is Jordan...
...Therefore, we are totally limited in coping with a hostile confrontation between the Palestinians and Israel...
...This is not the problem of the Paris police in coping with the French students...
...The government of Israel believed that in a few' days it would be over...
...I'd like to review some of these criticisms...
...It's an initiative to bring the parties to negotiate a solution...
...But you can prepare your intelligence to have the information at the right time so as not to be caught by surprise—even though, let's face it, we have been caught by surprise in the past...
...We don't use our artillery...
...For 40 years, there have been two basic threats of violence...
...HS: That's the Shultz plan...
...Do you believe that the Palestinians in the territories want Israel to stay there...
...YR: It's a repetition of the tragic history of the Palestinians in the last 50 years...
...They know that they are facing a disaster and they know that there is nobody to compensate them financially...
...It doesn't threaten Israel's security in any way...
...Jordan opposes it...
...Any peace east of Israel must have a border with Jordan and therefore I believe that the solution of the Palestinian problem must be solved in a context with Jordan...
...YR: I'm not saying when...
...Do you know what the Jordanians really want...
...YR: You are like any American media man who doesn't know what is going on in the Arab community...
...The current disturbances are something unique...
...But you have to cope with the violence...
...Israel negotiated the peace treaty with Lebanon while we were in Lebanon, while there were clashes and soldiers were getting hurt...
...YR: The Shultz initiative, not plan...
...A solution must be achieved by political means...
...The Palestinians...
...But Israel wasn't...
...YR: Well, I hope that there will be no next time, although no one can be sure...
...This is the issue that now divides our people, our country, our legislative body the Knesset, our government...
...I am an Israeli and I can speak as an Israeli...
...At the present, there is only one practical proposal to bring the parties to the negotiating table...
...There's almost a national consensus: We all oppose the creation of an independent Palestinian state between Israel and Jordan...
...YR: All the time they stress, "We are under your occupation...
...We had [this possibility] in the back of our minds, but only as a remote and less threatening [possibility...
...from south of Beit She'an along the Jordan River up to the north...
...First of all, it's said that you didn't see it coming...
...We are] in the mode of a police action, or a little bit more [than this...
...YR: Just as it was in the past...
...HS: As we sit here, the Palestinians are encouraging resignations of Palestinian police on the West Bank, there is a general strike going on, many Palestinians are not coming to work in Israel, the fuel at their gas stations has been cut off, exports have been cut off, banking relations have been cut off...
...The phenomenon we face now—the use of civilian violence, basically without the use of firearms (beyond petrol bottles)—is to achieve the same political goals that the Arabs failed to achieve by war and by terror...
...Yitzchak Rabin: Let's distinguish between what can be recognized beforehand [and what cannot...
...We went to war in Lebanon in June 1982...
...HS: The situation is certainly complex...
...But basically my instructions—and I made them public—[were] that whenever there is violence, whether a small demonstration, a road block, a petrol bottle thrown, stones, first of all, tear gas grenades, rubber bullets, and then to assault, to assault with sticks, to hit those who are engaged in the violence while they're out there [or when the soldiers are] in hot pursuit of them...
...HS: So you don't think there is any parallel anywhere...
...Would you know how to deal with it better next time...
...option...
...YR: Look...
...Israel opposes it...
...I believe by this way we practically eliminated the big demonstrations...
...It's difficult to get both sides to agree...
...Are you sorry you used those words...
...I believe that it would be a major mistake on Israel's part to reject it...
...HS: Why aren't Israeli officials going into the villages now . . . YR: We go...
...Whoever gives in under the pressure of violence invites more violence and undermines the hope for peace...
...The whole Palestinian society is in a total shambles...
...YR: I can't say that anyone prepared himself or any organization for this kind of prolonged disturbance or the way it has been carried out...
...This brought the first disaster on the Palestinians and created the Palestinian refugee problem...
...Whoever dared to say this would not be allowed by PLO terror to live...
...We would have had to open fire on a larger scale with hundreds of people who would have gotten killed...
...HS: Isn't it true that without the uprisings, there would be no peace-process movement, such as it is, even today...
...Do you believe that the [Palestinian] commercial community would strike without threats on their life, without throwing petrol bottles against anyone who dares open his shop...
...Why didn't they create a Palestinian state then...
...I am ready for a territorial compromise, in a context of peace, that is viable and that changes the pre-Six-Day War lines to provide for Israel's security...
...YR: No, we cannot do it...
...HS: But you have negotiated and talked with them before...
...and the other, terrorism...
...They have to do it...
...We participated in American efforts—the Rogers initiative—that brought the end to the war of attrition in August 1970...
...And they are going to suffer...
...And then let anybody that wants to rule Gaza do so...
...HS: Local leaders...
...How do you it...
...Every leader—their own leaders— brought catastrophe on their heads...
...It's a rule of terror from within...
...And second, we can use our strength— since the violence is occurring within territories under our control—only in accordance with the laws of Israel and not in accordance with the laws of war...
...Then they had Arafat who brought one disaster after another...
...Do you believe that without the killing of the Palestinian policeman there would be a resignation of policemen...
...It was up to them to decide...
...Why, in 20 years, has no Palestinian leader from the territories dared to stand up and say, "I would like to be the master of my own fate and future...
...Tomorrow we can do whatever we want...
...Why not continue the dialogue...
...HS: Is there any parallel anywhere in the world of this kind of thing where nations have coped, for example, in Korea, where there have been some very violent demonstrations...
...In the three years that I have been minister of defense—long before'the riots of December—I talked with Palestinian leaders...
...Let the Egyptians do it, let the United Nations do it...
...The basic situation of "no solution," the status quo, cannot be prolonged forever...
...YR: Not at all—the way I used them, not the way that they were publicized...
...Touch wood, not one Israeli has gotten killed,* and I refer to civilians as well as soldiers and border policemen in the more than 100 days of disturbances...
...They don't dare to say anything because the more extreme young groups threaten them not to do so...
...You know their policies...
...He was shot twice in the head at close range while guarding a government building—Ed...
...The whole Palestinian society is in a total shambles...
...The Arabs all say—I've talked to many of them—that they are behind it, that at first they were scared but now they support it...
...Yet it's not difficult to propose a solution...
...It has lasted now almost six years...
...and second, that we will not give in to the use of violence against Israel...
...HS: Some people have suggested that Israel ought to announce that it's getting out of Gaza and putting a cordon sanitaire around the city so that no weapons would get in...
...Some people say, "Why didn't you allow them to continue with the demonstrations...
...Allow me to remind you that till the War of Independence that came about as a result of the Arab rejection of the UN partition plan, they opposed the very existence of a Jewish state regardless of its boundaries...
...The current disturbances were not initiated by him, but he jumped on the wave, and now he and all the other extremists are calling [for action]—at whose expense...
...Look what the spokesman of the Soviet government said when he did not allow any foreign television to reach Armenia...
...HS: Is there no better way than what you're doing...
...Decisions are made...
...HS: . . . telling our story...
...HS: But you must be prepared nonetheless...
...HS: Do you think there's any realistic possibility that the Palestinians will ever make peace without a Palestinian entity in the West Bank...
...YR: I'm for the Shultz initiative, on the assumption that the other parties will accept it...
...HS: Is there any way that you can develop a responsible indigenous local leadership among the Palestinians...
...We don't use the Air Force...
...I am not King Hussein...
...YR: I am sure that we can have peace on our eastern border with Jordan within which the Palestinian problem can be solved...
...What is the uniqueness of this phenomenon...
...Now we must cope with Palestinian civilian violence—which has the same political goal as war and terror...
...HS: Do you deny these stories...
...HS: And they know how to put down the violence very well, don't they...
...This is what decides [what they want...
...But no one could give a warning as to when there would be a spontaneous outburst...
...We negotiated the disengagement agreements with Egypt and Syria in 1974 while Israeli soldiers were being killed...
...There is no plan for a solution...
...And the image that Israel is projecting is one of intransigence...
...Rabin, you have been the lightning rod, the focus of the criticism [of Israel's handling of the Arab uprisings...
...The one, the armed forces of the Arab countries...
...HS: What about having some higher Israeli officials go into the Arab villages and talk with the people, to distribute leaflets, to engage in some kind of dialogue with the local people...
...We cope with it practically unarmed...
...It might affect some countries' political positions, although I'm not aware of any country that has basically changed its political attitude toward the Arab-Israeli conflict and how it should be solved...
...It has got public relations aspects—a setback to Israel outside [the country...
...Many factories are starting to realize that they cannot rely for normal operations on the Arabs...
...HS: What do they say now...
...Who stands to lose most from this...
...They told me, "Are you crazy...
...Any attempt to describe the way it started as a plan, either in an organized way, or even in a not very well organized way, is total nonsense...
...HS: What is going on...
...Some of the [Palestinian] police who resigned actually wept when they had to submit their resignation...
...Over two-thirds of the line east of Israel borders Jordan without any presence of the Palestinians—between Eilat and the Dead Sea, for almost 300 kilometers...
...Come with whatever position you would like...
...They had Ahmed Shukeiry as their leader during this period...
...But, still, there is a system that makes decisions and therefore, you can prepare yourself to get the information...
...YR: No . . . There are parallels—in the Arab countries and now in the Soviet Union...
...There was no demand for it because they still believed that they would be able to get rid of Israel as a Jewish independent state within the boundaries of the pre-Six-Day War...
...It was not ordered...
...HS: Well, who can Israel talk to...
...They are going to again be the football of their leaders and the Arab countries in the same way that it has happened for the last 40 years...
...HS: You think there will be other disturbances like this...
...they prefer to be 30 meters away to open fire...
...He called upon the Arabs to leave in view of the invasion of the Arab armed forces in 1948...
...You have to put these kinds of questions to King Hussein...
...HS: Don't you think that it's possible to have a security arrangement for Israel with a Palestinian entity on the West Bank...
...Through violence, they'll come to it, after suffering a real setback to all the advances they have achieved in their education, their services and their standard of living...
...But the Palestinians say that any leader that does arise is subject to Israeli oppression, to being jailed, to administrative detention, and that's why they insist on having a leader outside the territories to speak for them...
...HS: You recognize that there have been reports of widespread beatings, breaking of arms, breaking of legs, not during a confrontation but afterward . . . YR: [interrupting] I am not talking about stories, I am talking about reality...
...And if the others do not accept it, to make it clear who would like peace—who wants to give peace a chance—and who doesn't...
...YR: They insist for the simple reason that they know if they would dare to have their own [leaders], they would be assassinated...
...Will it have any political effect on Israel...
...We will not give in to the use of violence...
...And I believe this is going to be the major issue in the coming elections...
...YR: I won't say who I talked to because if it becomes public even that they met me, their life will be in danger...
...To the best of my knowledge, Jordan is ready to enter negotiations—on its terms—and to take responsibility, with the participation of the Palestinians...
...we can go with tanks there if [the disturbances] really endanger Israel's security...
...In the past, whenever we had to deal with violence by Arab people or Arab countries or Arab groups, we could cope with it with our military strength...
...An Arab leader, an Arab people will be ready to make peace only when they come to the conclusion that any use of violence leads nowhere and brings on them more hardships, more suffering, than a political solution...
...Israeli officials often do...
...YR: Local leaders...
...Look, if this situation continues, there's going to be among the grassroots of the Palestinians a certain fatigue...
...Who would allow us to do that...
...Are you willing to solve things by negotiations with Israel...
...YR: As you know, I have never been [in favor of holding] the whole Land of Israel...
...In my interviews, the real interviews, that are on the record—you know, I don't go to any interview without a record—what I decided since, in the first 12 days, we had 36 Palestinians killed, I wanted to reduce the use of firearms...
...Had it been planned, we would have known it...
...HS: You didn't know it was coming...
...These were the instructions...
...Or to use force against violence...
...HS: Of course, there's some truth to that...
...What does Israel need Gaza for...
...In Israel we don't suffer . . . They are going to suffer...
...It didn't happen in 40 years...
...But I don't know when...
...Are we going to give in to violence...
...HS: You're in favor of the Jordanian Egyptians really want...
...This is in addition to what they sell here...
...YR: Ask those who either like or don't like the initiative...
...If they resist being caught, the use of force is allowed...
...It was an outburst from within...
...YR: Look, I was ready to accept Shultz's initiative six months ago...
...YR: No, we immediately realized that we had gotten into something on a much larger scale...
...There is no clear-cut Palestinian leadership...
...Hussein would never take the West Bank...
...You are talking in a way completely unrelated to the situation...
...YR: Well, I believe that it [the uprisings] will occur again [if that happens...
...It's all a border with Jordan...
...When you face a threat of war by an Arab country or countries, you know their potentiality...
...Hershel Shanks: Mr...
...Israel might have a shortage of certain workers, but we are in the process of adjusting to it...
...HS: What gives you that assurance...
...There is not one lover of Zion among them...
...How can you draw any parallel to it...
...I believe that Israel should give a positive answer...
...YR: They [these countries] know the meaning of democracy even though they never experienced it...
...The real problem is to know what can bring about a beginning of a war...
...In the political arena, as you know, the government of Israel is divided...
...Because from the beginning, it was a spontaneous explosion, not directed by any organization...
...To what extent has what happened affected the defense of Israel...
...YR: If you ask our soldiers, they will tell you: They are ready to throw out the stick and use the rifle...
...HS: But that's what the Palestinian people really want, isn't it...
...But we are not allowed to do it in accordance with our laws...
...Therefore, the question is, under what kind of threat and terror do they live...
...Whoever gives in under the pressure of violence invites more violence, gives more incentive to violence in all its forms, brings closer the threat of war and undermines the hope for peace...
...YR: Look...
...YR: Have you asked Hussein if he wants the West Bank or not...
...It started with the Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin Husseini, who rejected the partition plan of 1947 and encouraged the beginning of the riots and the struggle that led to our War of Independence...
...Initiative...
...YR: I don't believe that we have to negotiate with the Palestinians as long as they have no leadership...
...Then for 19 years, from 1948 to 1967, the West Bank, East Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip were all in Arab hands...
...YR: There it was within the same nation—not a struggle to get rid of the existence or the control of one nation by another...
...HS: Would it have been better to allow demonstrations and have fewer images on television of Israeli soldiers beating women and children...
...YR: There is nobody to talk to...
...HS: But is there a way to cope other than by, to use your words, ' 'force, might and beatings...
...They stress a Jordanian-Palestinian delegation...
...HS: But you can't find an Arab who will say that...
...Let's not forget, Palestinians in the territories get salaries of 600 to 700 million dollars every year...
...On March 20, 1988, the first Israeli soldier was killed in Bethlehem...
...What's the answer to that...
...Better ask him...
...What's going to happen...
...Or not to accept it...
...But in a democracy—we are not a totalitarian regime—you have to have a majority...
Vol. 13 • May 1988 • No. 3
