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CNN Sunday Morning

Interview with Raza Deh Moaveni, Richard Wolfe, John Barry

Aired April 14, 2002 - 11:24   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.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Twenty-four minutes now after the hour. As the search for peace continues, we explore the historical events that led to the crisis. So let's turn back the hands of time to 1967 and the six-day war. Here's our Gary Tuchman.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): It only lasted six days in June of 1967, but its ramifications have loomed large every day since. Arab forces of Egypt, Syria, and Jordan massed on Israel's borders in preparation for an all-out attack. Fearing Israel would be destroyed, the Jewish State attacked first, targeting Arab airfields, destroying the Egyptian Air Force on the Sinai Peninsula.

The ground war began shortly after. After the first day, the Egyptian military was largely routed. By the third day, Israel reached the eastern bank of the Suez Canal. By the fourth day, Israel was in a position to head into Egypt's capitol, Cairo, something it chose not to do.

PROFESSOR KENNETH STEIN, EMORY UNIVERSITY: By the time you get to June 10th and June 11th, after the Israelis have lost about 600 or 700 people in fighting, the Arabs lost 25,000.

TUCHMAN: The war had been fought on numerous fronts. The battle against Syria was the last battle of Israel's victorious six-day war. The Jewish State had taken control of Syria's Golan Heights, Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, and the Gaza Strip, and Jordan's West Bank, which included the entire city of Jerusalem.

STEIN: Israel felt because it had won this war that the phone was going to ring, that the Arabs were going to call and say, okay let's make peace. But no one called.

TUCHMAN: The land Israel occupied in 1967 soon became the basis for an entire diplomatic concept, land for peace and at the heart of the Camp David and Oslo Accords.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TUCHMAN (on camera): But it still hasn't brought security to the Israelis, or a state to the Palestinians. Gary Tuchman, CNN.

WHITFIELD: And we'll discuss the history of the Middle East and how it might affect peace negotiations now in our Reporter's Notebook. Joining me from New York, Raza Deh Moaveni from "Time Magazine," and in Washington, John Barry from "Newsweek," and Richard Wolffe from the "Financial Times." Thanks very much for joining us this morning.

JOHN BARRY, NEWSWEEK: Good to be here.

WHITFIELD: Okay, we are seeing that this is a decades old problem. We saw it just as a reminder in that peace that nothing is going to be solved overnight. So if there is a way to at least deem some success now to the fact that Secretary Powell has met with Arafat and has met with Sharon, is it your belief, John I'll begin with you, is it your belief that this is at least a tiny step toward progress?

BARRY: Yes, it's a tiny step. You characterized it correctly. The difficult problems still lie ahead, but at least America has made the leap of acknowledging that despite what Prime Minister Sharon says that Arafat is the only viable Palestinian leader. That's a big step for the Bush Administration, because it was not clear they were going to take that step.

The world factions within the administration who wanted to disavow Arafat and wanted to look for some other Palestinian leadership. But now Powell has at least begun the process of talking. The problem is going to be first, whether Arafat can in fact bring about any ceasefire, because as your correspondent there was pointing out, significant numbers of the people running the suicide bombing campaign actually are rivals to Arafat and disagree with almost every concession and almost every negotiation that Arafat has taken part in.

WHITFIELD: And in fact, we heard once again, Arafat's aides as well as from Sharon's camp that they are reiterating there are conditions, Arafat saying my hands are tied. I can't do anything unless there's an Israeli withdrawal. And, of course, the Israelis are saying well, you stop the violence and then we'll withdraw.

BARRY: Yes, and the other problem is that even if you get some sort of tenuous ceasefire, and if you get some sort of withdrawal and withdrawal is almost an infinitely flexible term, so I suspect we'll get something that will satisfy both sides. It won't be complete withdrawal, but it will be enough to get talks going.

The problem then is how you transition the talks on substance. On substance, it's going to be very, very tough indeed, because Sharon -- Arafat, first of all, I think has changed his views about Oslo. And, Sharon never agreed with the Oslo Accords in the first place. So it's not clear what the substance is going to be.

WHITFIELD: Raza let me bring you in. What do you see as the major obstacles here as Secretary Powell embarks on a plan that is supposed to be broad based. It's not just about the ceasefire, but it's about rebuilding the infrastructure. It's about law enforcement. It's about rebuilding two communities and trying to bring the two together.

RAZA DEH MOAVENI, "TIME": Well, part of the -- I mean an obvious first obstacle is going to be how the Palestinian Authority is going to be able to get its security forces back on the ground, because obviously any component of a ceasefire is going to be attempts or efforts by the Palestinian Authority to bring a halt to suicide attacks on civilians.

Now with the security forces largely in disarray after this Israeli military incursion, Arafat is not going to have, the PLA is not going to have the logistical political ability to perhaps go about getting a ceasefire, you know, monitored, supervised.

WHITFIELD: Richard, are you there?

RICHARD WOLFFE, "FINANCIAL TIMES": Yes, I'm here.

WHITFIELD: In what way are you seeing that, you know, there is some sort of progress that's been made, even though the White House is only qualifying this as a useful and constructive meeting? How do you extrapolate from those words? What do you suppose that means?

WOLFFE: Well, of course, any talks represent some kind of progress but it's a bit like digging an escape tunnel with a coffee spoon. You're making progress all the time, but it's a long time before anyone sees the light of day. The truth is here that the only real progress can be defining what constitutes a ceasefire.

This was a problem that Secretary Powell faced when he was out there almost a year ago, and we're not really talking about a ceasefire as normal people would understand it. What you're talking about is defining a level of violence that is acceptable to both sides, low-level violence the kinds of things that in northern Ireland, the British and the Irish found ways to agree on.

So that's the kind of things that would constitute some kind of progress, limiting the violence and moving very swiftly into political talks.

WHITFIELD: And to all of you, we just heard moments ago in this broadcast that now the issue of burials, once you know international aid groups or once ambulances, anyone is able to get into the Jenin Refugee Camp area, we're going to be dealing with mass burials. Both sides have conflicting views on how they should go about doing that. Are we now opening up another can of worms, if it turns out the Israelis decide that they want to conduct these burials without the Palestinian families being able to be a part of the process? John.

BARRY: Absolutely. One of the things, whether rightly or wrongly, I make no judgment about that, but one of the things that is absolutely clear is that when the international aid organizations and foreign observers like journalists get into the camp, particularly Jenin and get into Nablus for instance, there is going to be an international outcry about the degree of devastation, which has been caused.

And there is also going to be, you've already heard this, a call for some sort of independent international assessment of what happened, that will undoubtedly be called to the United Nations for some sort of war crimes trial. Again, I make no judgment whether that's justified or not. I'm merely predicting that's what's going to happen, and I think it's going to further inflame the situation, because there clearly have been a lot of people killed, and clearly a lot of them have been civilians by any definition.

So I think it's going to increase both the pressure on Israel, on Sharon, and I think it's also going to make Powell's task somewhat harder, because it's going to raise the level of emotions.

WHITFIELD: Raza, what's your view as to what is being hidden behind the tanks?

MOAVENI: I think that at this point without, you know, international observers, people from the Red Cross able to go into Jenin and see for themselves, hear the testimony of the refugees who are remaining about what happened, it's impossible to speculate really. I mean all we know is that a great number of people have been killed.

Now speculating how they were killed, was it a massacre? None of this is going to be resolved until journalists together with, you know, people from the Red Cross and the relief agencies are able to get in there. It's not helpful to keep Jenin closed off because this is just going to spiral in terms of the emotion that's going to rise among, you know, Palestinians who are outraged understandably at not being able to go back in there and bury their dead.

You know, there are reports coming out of Israel that perhaps Shimon Peres privately referred to what happened in Jenin as a massacre. Until, you know, the international community is let back in there, it's impossible to speculate.

WHITFIELD: And, Richard, everyone covering this story is finding that their obstacles are quite great too, just as the obstacles are huge when we're dealing with trying to bring about peace there. While you're covering the story, what do you find to be the greatest hurdle in trying to find some balance, because both sides seem to be saying the same thing all the time, don't they?

WOLFFE: Yes, they do. The balance is very, very hard here because very quickly you get sucked into questions of whose side are you on, of emotional balance on one side or another. It's really very, very hard I think for everyone concerned.

One point I'd make about Jenin is this. It doesn't look good that reporters are barred access. We always want access to any story, and particularly a story involving conflict in civilian areas. There was a lot of international outcry though as to the way the Pentagon kept people out of combat zones in Afghanistan, and a lot of concern from humanitarian groups about civilian casualties there.

This is a problem for journalists. It's a problem for military commanders engaged in this kind of activity, but the intensity of this conflict makes it also very difficult for journalists personally who are reporting on this.

WHITFIELD: All right, Richard, Raza, and John, stick around for a moment. We're going to continue this discussion on the other side of this break. We're also going to update you on our other top stories. Venezuela's President is back in office, but is the chaos in Caracas over? An update coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(NEWS ALERT)

And we continue our discussion this morning on the search for peace in the Middle East. Reintroducing our panel now, Raza Deh Moaveni from "Time Magazine" is in New York, and in Washington John Barry from "Newsweek" and Richard Wolffe from "The Financial Times." Thanks again for sticking around all of you.

All right well, John, let's begin with you. You know, is it time now for the U.S. to start thinking very seriously about pulling back on its $3 billion that it gives to Israel if they don't find the cooperation they're looking for as they, as well as the U.N., continues to ask for an immediate withdrawal?

BARRY: No, I think that's premature. First of all, it would cause President Bush, even if he were to voice it publicly, it would cause enormous domestic controversy here and it would cause a monumental clash in Congress, and the last thing that Bush needs as the Secretary of State tries to patch together some sort of deal, the last thing Bush needs is domestic controversy.

So I think that the idea of threatening Israel with a withdrawal of subsidies is not yet on the table. At some point, it might be, because I think it's clear that I think that a lot of people, both in the Pentagon and in the State Department believe that at some point the U.S. is going to have to lay out for both sides its own view of what a proper settlement will be.

And that's going to be difficult for both sides to accept, because it's not going to be palatable to either side. And conceivably at that point, the U.S. may have to start exerting more pressure upon Israel. But I think to talk about taking such punitive action now is premature.

WHITFIELD: Well, Richard, the question is often asked of the U.S., how can it be the mediator if it is already demonstrated there's no neutrality? There's obviously, you know, a great ally of friendship between the U.S. and Israel, the U.S. being Israel's best friend. So how do you respond when you received that question a number of times from the Palestinians or Arab Americans that you talk to and you interview in your story?

WOLFFE: Well, the truth is that it's the mediator because there's no other super power in the world, and there's nobody else to turn to. It's a bit like who else do you turn to apart from Arafat? The United States is the only power with the political muscle and the military muscle to effect this kind of settlement.

Now the truth is that the Palestinians and the Israelis both look to America for that kind of leadership. At the moment, though, American politics is not really aligned in the right way to achieve what the Palestinians are looking for, and that really means introducing some kind of peacekeeping, some kind of monitoring force that goes well beyond what the administration is talking about at the moment, which is a few members of the State Department personnel.

WHITFIELD: Raza, there's been so much criticism from all sides toward Arafat saying how do you explain such a great delay of condemning, outwardly condemning the violence, particularly of last Friday?

MOAVENI: And that criticism is justly leveled at Arafat, because he will come out and condemn attacks on civilians, but when he speaks to his population in Arabic, more often -- I mean at least since this latest Israeli military incursion, he is speaking of other things.

He's speaking of the rhetoric of endurance and of suffering, because I mean in a sense understandably how his Palestinian constituency looks to him for leadership in terms of the fact that they're both under siege and suffering.

And so understandably, he feels that perhaps while he has no political leverage in terms of a ceasefire, he's had no accomplishments in terms of getting the Israelis to at least withdraw from, you know, a majority of the cities that he can't come out and make blanket condemnations too frequently; although, that doesn't justify the fact that, you know, a sporadic comment is all that we'll hear from him.

WHITFIELD: All right, thanks very much, Raza Deh Moaveni from "Time Magazine." From Washington, John Barry of "Newsweek," and Richard Wolffe of "The Financial Times." Thanks very much for joining me this afternoon.

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