Return to Transcripts main page
American Morning
Road Map to Mideast Peace Loses Its Way
Aired June 11, 2003 - 07:35 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.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Only a week after the talks between the Israeli and Palestinian leaders has the road map to Mideast peace now lost its way. Israel yesterday launched two missile attacks from helicopters, one directed at a senior Hamas leader. He survived, but Palestinian sources say five Palestinians were killed, dozens more wounded in those attacks.
President Bush and a strong rebuke from the White House.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I am troubled by the recent Israeli helicopter gunship attacks. I regret the loss of innocent life. I am concerned that the attacks will make it more difficult for the Palestinian leadership to fight off terrorist attacks. I also don't believe the attacks help Israeli security.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HEMMER: So then today where does all this leave the peace process?
Our guest here in New York, former Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs Jamie Rubin.
Good to see you again.
JAMES RUBIN, FORMER ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE/PUBLIC AFFAIRS: It's nice to be with you.
HEMMER: "L.A. Times," I think, puts it the best, the U.S. understands Israel's need to defend itself, but the timing was not appropriate.
RUBIN: Well, timing has been the big issue in these targeted assassinations for several months now. Many people think that every time we were getting to a point where the two sides were making some progress, Israel made a decision to conduct a targeted assassination and then it -- the Palestinians responded with brutal and unjustified suicide bombings that collapsed the process.
I think what's interesting here is that the person that the Israelis were assassinating was someone negotiating with the new Palestinian prime minister, Abu Mazen. And the basic difference between the Israelis and the Palestinians right now is the Israelis want Abu Mazen, the Palestinian prime minister, to crack down by destroying Hamas, destroying its capabilities, killing its leaders, arresting anybody they need to.
And the Palestinians want to negotiate with Hamas and to get a negotiated peace plan.
HEMMER: So then stop there. If you're trying to take out the head negotiator for Hamas, what is that saying on the Israeli side? They want this negotiation to end or not continue? Or is there more behind that?
RUBIN: Well, that's the big question, do they accept the idea that if Abu Mazen could negotiate a cease-fire with Hamas, that would be good enough? It appears for some time that the Israelis have believed that the Hamas infrastructure must be destroyed, either arrested or individuals killed, and that it's unacceptable to come to a temporary cease-fire where Hamas can come back whenever it wants to.
HEMMER: The big picture now, take a step away, if you could. It seems like you and I have talked about this for years and we talk about the same tit for tat. At what point does one side say hold your fire, let's wait a moment here and see what we can get done?
RUBIN: Well, there was some hope. One of the reasons why I was optimistic, and I think many people were optimism in the last couple of weeks is one of the senior Israeli generals had said that after 18 months of responding vigorously through military action to these terrorist attacks, Israel had reestablished deterrence. And because they had reestablished deterrence, because they were so strong now, they could withstand new terrorist attacks without having to respond instantly.
Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the policy and the bottom line here is, as President Bush said yesterday, what will make Israel more secure? Will attacks on Hamas that lead to retaliatory suicide bombings make Israel more secure? Is that the only way to go? Or will Israel eventually have to negotiate a way for the Palestinians to work with the Israelis and the Americans to crack down on these terrorists? And that's the open question.
HEMMER: Bring it back to Washington, if you could. Do you see President Bush right now being sucked into this cycle of violence just like his predecessor, Bill Clinton?
RUBIN: Well, I don't think there's anything to be sucked into. The Middle East peace process is one of the fundamental and important jobs of an American president and an American secretary of state. Keeping calm between Israelis and Palestinians is in our interests. And we have to work at it from the president to the secretary of state now, in this case, the national security adviser, ambassadors.
One of the problems has been for two long years the administration has not wanted to work at it. They were afraid that people like you would say you're getting sucked in, you're not achieving anything. If we want to make progress, the president has to not just articulate publicly what he said yesterday, which was important, but he has to have additional meetings. The secretary of state has to go to the region. These people have to be invited to Washington. We have to have a regular set of meetings week after week, because if they're meeting with the Americans, they're likely to be on much better behavior than if they're fighting with each other.
HEMMER: Just about 15 seconds left.
Martin Indyk, the former ambassador to Israel, and some others, are already suggesting that perhaps American troops need to be on the ground to police the peace.
Given what we're seeing right now in Iraq, do you see that as a reality at some point soon?
RUBIN: Well, what we're seeing in Iraq is the dangers of peacekeeping. And this is in a situation where we freed Iraq from Saddam Hussein and we're losing -- we're losing soldiers every day. I don't see that any time soon.
HEMMER: James Rubin, we'll talk again, unfortunately, on this topic many times.
RUBIN: Nice to see you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired June 11, 2003 - 07:35 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Only a week after the talks between the Israeli and Palestinian leaders has the road map to Mideast peace now lost its way. Israel yesterday launched two missile attacks from helicopters, one directed at a senior Hamas leader. He survived, but Palestinian sources say five Palestinians were killed, dozens more wounded in those attacks.
President Bush and a strong rebuke from the White House.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I am troubled by the recent Israeli helicopter gunship attacks. I regret the loss of innocent life. I am concerned that the attacks will make it more difficult for the Palestinian leadership to fight off terrorist attacks. I also don't believe the attacks help Israeli security.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HEMMER: So then today where does all this leave the peace process?
Our guest here in New York, former Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs Jamie Rubin.
Good to see you again.
JAMES RUBIN, FORMER ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE/PUBLIC AFFAIRS: It's nice to be with you.
HEMMER: "L.A. Times," I think, puts it the best, the U.S. understands Israel's need to defend itself, but the timing was not appropriate.
RUBIN: Well, timing has been the big issue in these targeted assassinations for several months now. Many people think that every time we were getting to a point where the two sides were making some progress, Israel made a decision to conduct a targeted assassination and then it -- the Palestinians responded with brutal and unjustified suicide bombings that collapsed the process.
I think what's interesting here is that the person that the Israelis were assassinating was someone negotiating with the new Palestinian prime minister, Abu Mazen. And the basic difference between the Israelis and the Palestinians right now is the Israelis want Abu Mazen, the Palestinian prime minister, to crack down by destroying Hamas, destroying its capabilities, killing its leaders, arresting anybody they need to.
And the Palestinians want to negotiate with Hamas and to get a negotiated peace plan.
HEMMER: So then stop there. If you're trying to take out the head negotiator for Hamas, what is that saying on the Israeli side? They want this negotiation to end or not continue? Or is there more behind that?
RUBIN: Well, that's the big question, do they accept the idea that if Abu Mazen could negotiate a cease-fire with Hamas, that would be good enough? It appears for some time that the Israelis have believed that the Hamas infrastructure must be destroyed, either arrested or individuals killed, and that it's unacceptable to come to a temporary cease-fire where Hamas can come back whenever it wants to.
HEMMER: The big picture now, take a step away, if you could. It seems like you and I have talked about this for years and we talk about the same tit for tat. At what point does one side say hold your fire, let's wait a moment here and see what we can get done?
RUBIN: Well, there was some hope. One of the reasons why I was optimistic, and I think many people were optimism in the last couple of weeks is one of the senior Israeli generals had said that after 18 months of responding vigorously through military action to these terrorist attacks, Israel had reestablished deterrence. And because they had reestablished deterrence, because they were so strong now, they could withstand new terrorist attacks without having to respond instantly.
Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the policy and the bottom line here is, as President Bush said yesterday, what will make Israel more secure? Will attacks on Hamas that lead to retaliatory suicide bombings make Israel more secure? Is that the only way to go? Or will Israel eventually have to negotiate a way for the Palestinians to work with the Israelis and the Americans to crack down on these terrorists? And that's the open question.
HEMMER: Bring it back to Washington, if you could. Do you see President Bush right now being sucked into this cycle of violence just like his predecessor, Bill Clinton?
RUBIN: Well, I don't think there's anything to be sucked into. The Middle East peace process is one of the fundamental and important jobs of an American president and an American secretary of state. Keeping calm between Israelis and Palestinians is in our interests. And we have to work at it from the president to the secretary of state now, in this case, the national security adviser, ambassadors.
One of the problems has been for two long years the administration has not wanted to work at it. They were afraid that people like you would say you're getting sucked in, you're not achieving anything. If we want to make progress, the president has to not just articulate publicly what he said yesterday, which was important, but he has to have additional meetings. The secretary of state has to go to the region. These people have to be invited to Washington. We have to have a regular set of meetings week after week, because if they're meeting with the Americans, they're likely to be on much better behavior than if they're fighting with each other.
HEMMER: Just about 15 seconds left.
Martin Indyk, the former ambassador to Israel, and some others, are already suggesting that perhaps American troops need to be on the ground to police the peace.
Given what we're seeing right now in Iraq, do you see that as a reality at some point soon?
RUBIN: Well, what we're seeing in Iraq is the dangers of peacekeeping. And this is in a situation where we freed Iraq from Saddam Hussein and we're losing -- we're losing soldiers every day. I don't see that any time soon.
HEMMER: James Rubin, we'll talk again, unfortunately, on this topic many times.
RUBIN: Nice to see you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
