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CNN Live Today

Interview With Tamara Wittes

Aired April 03, 2002 - 13:38   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: In recent months, we have come to know others who support the Palestinian cause so strongly, they are willing to die for it. They, of course, are the suicide bombers. So, joining me now to talk about who they are, who supports them and who if anyone controls them is Tamara Wittes. She is director of programs for the Middle East Institute in Washington. Tamara, thanks so much for joining us.

TAMARA WITTES, MIDDLE EAST INSTITUTE: Good afternoon.

LIN: Good afternoon. Let's start with a primer here for our domestic audience. We have been talking about over the past several years, four primary groups. I know there are several splinter groups, but could you quickly go through who these groups are, starting with the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, which is responsible for several of the most recent suicide bombings.

WITTES: That's right. The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade is a relatively new organization. It emerged during this most recent uprising which began in September 2000. And it grows out of the Fatah movement, which is the main secular nationalist Palestinian movement within the PLO, the movement that Arafat founded and still heads.

LIN: All right. And Hamas?

WITTES: And Hamas is an outgrowth of the Muslim Brotherhood in Gaza and in the West Bank. In addition to its violent activities, it also has mosques, schools, health clinics, and other social welfare agencies that enable it to recruit new members and get some support within the wider population.

LIN: And a smaller group just as fierce, the Islamic Jihad.

WITTES: That's right. The Palestinian Islamic Jihad is the other main Islamist terrorist group in the West Bank and Gaza. It's concentrated mainly in Gaza. And unlike Hamas, it doesn't have that social welfare side. It concentrates on a violent means of replacing the state of Israel with an Islamic state.

LIN: And a group, Hezbollah, which is having growing influence with the Palestinian movement.

WITTES: That's right. Hezbollah is actually a Lebanese movement that grew up in Lebanon in response to the Israeli invasion in 1982. It also has, over the years, targeted Americans. It was responsible for the bombing of our Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983 and the bombing of our embassy annex there in 1984. And unlike these other groups, it also seems to have global reach. It is suspected of involvement in two bombings in Argentina in the mid-1990s.

LIN: All right, obviously, all organizations with potentially dangerous bent here. So when we hear the Bush administration say Yasser Arafat has not done enough yet to stop the violence, they still believe he is the one who has some sort of control, that can stop these suicide bombings, is that true?

WITTES: Well, certainly, if you are looking at the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, which is a group out of his own movement, as I said, he has at least theoretical authority. And if the Israeli documents that were released yesterday prove authentic, he has direct authority over that group.

In the case of the Islamist movements, Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, it's been in his own interests for many years to counter these groups and counter them firmly because they are as opposed to his leadership and his vision for the state of Palestine as they are opposed to Israel and to the peace process.

LIN: And it is not that Yasser Arafat created these groups, per se, but he allowed them to grow since the Oslo peace accords in the last 10 years, isn't that right?

WITTES: Well, on and off, Arafat and the authority have tried to counter Hamas and the other opposition organizations. They've at times arrested even several hundred activists. But they have never made a real determination that this is their opposition, their enemy that they need to fully dismantle.

LIN: So, who do these groups answer to then? And who gives them the money to fund their operations?

WITTES: Well, they all have different sources of funding. Hamas has a very wide range of funding. It comes from throughout the world, sympathizers, including in the United States and in Europe. And our government has been trying very hard to crack down on those funding sources. Palestinian Islamic Jihad gets some funding and some logistical assistance both from Hezbollah and from Iran and Syria.

LIN: Well, it seems then, Tamara, it sounds to me like a futile attempt to ask for Arafat to do simplistic things like get on Palestinian television or Arab television and call for a cease-fire in Arabic. It almost seems too simple a solution.

WITTES: Well, certainly, that wouldn't make the problem go away but he has tremendous prestige as the leader of the Palestinian national movement, as the leader of the struggle over all these decades. And if he argues, makes a strong case, that this is time to turn away from violence and to pursue the path of negotiation, that will have an impact. These groups continually have to recruit new members and people who feel that there is no other option. If he can offer them that option, then, of course he needs help from the Israeli side to offer them a credible option, then I think he can have an impact.

LIN: You know, I spoke with someone over the weekend in an interview that we did that what Ariel Sharon is doing with Yasser Arafat, perhaps, is a fate worse than death, if Arafat indeed says that he wants to become a martyr, and that is to isolate him but also humiliate him, to show Yasser Arafat standing there with a dying cell phone and a flashlight in his ruined compound. And that is the picture that the Arab world will have of the Palestinian leader. So, it sounds like what you are saying is despite that image, that these militants still see him as a leader of the Palestinian movement.

WITTES: Well, I think throughout the Arab world, he has tremendous symbolism. And, in fact, what the Israelis have managed to do in isolating him and humiliating him, as you said in this way, is make him even more symbolic of the plight of everyday Palestinians, whereas a year or so ago, Arafat was sitting in a comfortable home on the coast of Gaza and enjoying the luxuries that would be his as leader of the Palestinian Authority, and his people were suffering tremendously.

Now, they are all in the same boat. And he really does come to symbolize the cause and the struggle in a way he didn't before.

LIN: So you believe that Yasser Arafat has the power and the authority and the influence to stop the violence?

WITTES: I think he certainly has the influence. He has authority, although it has waned in some sectors. I think, moreover, he does still have a capable security force if Israel would give them the ability to act. He hasn't ordered them to act up until this point. And that's why Israel has taken these unilateral steps.

LIN: All right. Tamara Wittes, I could talk to you all day long. It's a fascinating subject. Thank you very much...

WITTES: Thank you.

LIN: ... for at least outlining some of the groups involved we hear so much about in the news.

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