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CNN Live Today

Interview with Ehud Olmert

Aired June 19, 2002 - 14:10   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.
Now back to that top story we've been following all this afternoon, for about two hours now -- the suicide bomber striking the area in Jerusalem.

We're going to go back to our Sheila MacVicar. She's live at the scene with an update now on the latest numbers and the situation there -- Sheila.

SHEILA MACVICAR, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Kyra, the Israeli police are confirming that -- they have said there are at least seven dead as a result of this deadly attack in the northern part of Jerusalem, 37 more have been wounded. At least five of those are known to be in critical condition.

I'm joined now by Gil Kleiman. He's the foreign press spokesman for the Israeli police.

Tell me, what do you know about how this took place this afternoon?

GIL KLEIMAN, ISRAELI POLICE SPOKESMAN: What we know now -- of course this is the initial investigation, from people who are wounded and giving the initial statements, is that a car pulled up close to junction. The suicide bomber got out of the car and either ran or walked briskly toward the people waiting for a bus. Our initial assumption is that he ran.

He approaches the bus station, enters in among the people in the bus station, blows himself up while a border policeman who is stationed here is either running after him or approaching him.

As a result of that explosion, like I said, the border policeman was wounded very seriously and we have, like you said, 37 wounded and seven dead.

MACVICAR: Now, this border policeman was stationed here specifically because there have been previous attacks here?

KLEIMAN: We've had a number of attacks. We've had suicide bombings at this juncture a number of time. And in certain cases, the presence of a -- police presence on the scene has avoided it. The border policeman has approached the suicide bomber, and he's blown up far away from the center where the people are standing. So, there have been successes. This junction itself has seen shooting incidents, the works. It's been under attack for a long time.

MACVICAR: Now, in this instance you say that there was a car that pulled up and that this suicide bomber got out of the car?

KLEIMAN: That is correct.

MACVICAR: What do you know about the car and where the car went to? Any details?

KLEIMAN: What we do know is that the car fled the junction, evidently it was headed toward Ramallah. That's being checked.

We've had a lot of reports after the initial explosion, what's been going on, and they're very unclear. But right now, we know that the car fled the scene and, of course, the police have their helicopters out, and we're trying to find them.

MACVICAR: OK. Thank you very much. Gil Kleiman, the foreign press spokesperson for the Israeli police.

KLEIMAN: You're very welcome.

DORNIN: Now I'm also joined here by Jerusalem's mayor Ehud Olmert.

Mr. Olmert, I saw you yesterday at the site of yesterday's tragic bus bomb explosion in southern Jerusalem. Tell me, what is your reaction to yet another attack here in the city?

EHUD OLMERT, MAYOR OF JERUSALEM: Unfortunately, we meet too often in those places.

I heard that a person once connected with CNN thought that the Israeli are terrorists. I would be honored to invite him to these places to see the bodies of 2-years-old babies and to ask for his opinion, whether this is not terror, and what he thinks of the Palestinian that are doing it and of Yasser Arafat, who condones it and support it.

This is a terrible war, and this is very tragic. And it's -- it doesn't seem to end, because Yasser Arafat doesn't want it to be finished. He wants to continue and he wants to carry on.

And I don't believe that as long as he's here, that it will stop. And it leads to -- almost inevitably to one conclusion: that the only way to start stopping terror is first to stop Yasser Arafat.

MACVICAR: Now, obviously, as a result of yesterday's attack, Israel's government took a decision late last night where they would go in and they would begin to essentially reoccupy, retake control, of Palestinian centers.

We know that the Israeli Defense Forces have gone into Jenin. That statement said that if there were further acts of terror, there would be additional territory that was reoccupied. In your view, is this the way to try to combat this?

OLMERT: This is one of the ways. There is not one single way that I can suggest, or that anyone can suggest, that will end it all.

We must be, I think, realistic enough to understand it. There are many different ways. There are physical obstacles that will encircle the city of Jerusalem with fences and walls, will be one layer in this defensive measures, but we have also to take offensive measures, and this is what the military is doing now.

The nature of this operation, if it is to be successful, is to continue until it will be accomplished, until the mission will be accomplished. Which means that we have to carry on, regardless of any outside pressures, regardless of any outcries by Yasser Arafat and his people to European governments -- we have to carry on until we have wiped out all the bases of terror in every part of the Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza district, and this is a long, and it's going to be very painful -- and I know, I'm certain, that in the course of this, we will still have to battle with terror inside some of our cities.

But there is no shortcut. There is not a short way. We have to carry on until we finish. And, no -- not to stop before, because -- the price that we have to pay afterwards is always increased and increased and increased, and there is so much that we can take.

MACVICAR: Now, a spokesman for the Palestinian Authority, Saeb Erekat, has said that one of -- one of the major difficulties that they have in combating any form of terrorism is that they, of courses, have no infrastructure.

He also points out that it is Israel's military which controls the roads, the territory, in and out of the territory.

OLMERT: First of all, who does the terror? My forces or his forces? It's his force at the are doing terror, to start with. So these are ridiculous arguments.

Number two, you must understand that all these security forces that were built as a result of the famous Oslo agreement, which were financed and equipped by the Palestinian Authority, are the ones that are committing terror now.

The terror is not done by some outside forces that -- that Saeb Erekat or Yasser Arafat can't control. It is done by the forces which are directly under their control. That -- they are financed, they are equipped, they are supported, and they are controlled by Yasser Arafat and his close inner circle.

If they can't fight, why can't they be relevant for political negotiations? If they can't stop terror, why should we negotiate with them?

MACVICAR: This is -- we're at a stage -- where we are -- with Israelis and Palestinians, awaiting a major statement from President Bush, a statement which is supposed to be made in the coming days, where he will outline his administration's view of the way forward, back towards political dialogue.

Do you -- what would you like to hear from the president?

OLMERT: Look, the president, I think, is a very decent person. And not only that he is decent, honest, but I think he tries to be true to himself throughout. And the fact that he refrained from shaking hands with Yasser Arafat and never talked to him, I think is the living evidence that he knows precisely the nature of Yasser Arafat.

He knows that he is a murderer. He knows that he is a killer. He accused him many times of betraying the hopes of his own people, of missing golden opportunities to make this, and so on.

Now he has to make one step forward in this state of mind. He must draw the inevitable conclusion from what Arafat is continuing to do, and actually authorize the state of Israel to remove Yasser Arafat from center stage.

I don't suggest that he will be expelled, necessarily. I don't suggest that he will be touched physically by anyone. Not at all. He should be arrested. We can do it easily. He should be removed from center stage. He's not a leader, he's a murderer. And a murderer -- and I know, and when I look at the eyes of George Bush, I can see in his eyes that he knows that Yasser Arafat is a murderer and a butcher and a killer and a terrorist, of the ones that he fights in Afghanistan.

And, therefore, he has to give a hint to this move, which will not be simple, but which will lay the foundations for a new administration of the Palestinian Authority that will surface after Arafat, and which will, I believe, be a lot more committed to living in peace with us and to stop the terrorist menace and measures that now characterize Yasser Arafat.

MACVICAR: Mr. Olmert, thank you very much.

That was Jerusalem's mayor, Ehud Olmert, here on the seen of another suicide bombing.

The Israeli police authorities say that there are seven people who have died as a result of this bombing here, just a little more than two hours ago -- 37 others, they say, are wounded, Kyra. Five of them in critical condition -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right. Our Sheila MacVicar, live there on the scene. Sheila, thank you so much for bringing us all that information.

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