Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Live Sunday

Is Peace Imminent or Even Possible in the Middle East?

Aired July 03, 2001 - 17:07   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.
STEPHEN FRAZIER, CNN ANCHOR: Joining us now with a closer look at this conflict in the Middle East, the newest parts of it, is Jon Alterman, a program officer with United States Institute for Peace.

Mr. Alterman, thanks for joining us today.

JON ALTERMAN, AMERICAN INSTITUTE FOR PEACE: My pleasure.

FRAZIER: I think our viewers could be forgiven for thinking this is a huge game of whack-a-mole going on over there, when the Palestinians seem to be closer to peace then somebody else pops up and creates trouble.

ALTERMAN: I'm not sure anybody is very close to peace right now. We've seen a deterioration, not only between the Israelis and the Palestinians, but also the Israelis and there Syrians. There were a lot of hopes in the last 10 years that we may be moving very close to at least having some kind of deal between these parties that have been in conflict for a half century or more.

And there is a feeling, I think, now among many in the administration that Arab-Israeli peace is like a bicycle. If it's not at least slowly moving forward, then you're going to fall over, you're going to have a big, big problem and a mess to clean up.

FRAZIER: Well, I guess the question for the viewers is have we fallen over?

ALTERMAN: I don't think we've fallen over yet. Certainly. after the bombing at the disco June 1st in Tel Aviv, was a time in which all hell could have broken loose and it didn't. Ariel Sharon showed restraint. Yasser Arafat seemed to show a lot more interest and a lot more ability to hold back on people who wanted to use violence to resolve this conflict.

We've seen a lot of diplomatic maneuvering since then. What we haven't been able to do is really established forward momentum to keep us from falling over in the next couple of weeks.

FRAZIER: I think that's the last time you joined us here on CNN SUNDAY, and I think you were concerned that it wasn't going to stop, but we did have an effort to get the bicycle moving again this week with a lot of diplomatic efforts that ended on Thursday. What was apparent from those? ALTERMAN: I think Colin Powell was trying to do a few things in his trip to the region. First, he was just trying to listen to Sharon and to Arafat and to get a sense for where these guys really are to give Powell an ability to understand how he should work things in next few months.

I think also going to send a message about the U.S. really wanted to get down to facts. We don't want to talk about how the sides feel. We want to talk about serious facts on the ground, security issues, what's really going to happen rather than people's emotions, and I think the third thing that he was trying to do was try to get the Mitchell report as something that people agree on as the vehicle forward; an agreement that both sides have to de-escalate tensions, both sides have to give each other a little more space, and then at some point in the future, we can get back to negotiations between the sides to resolve the outstanding issues.

FRAZIER: That Mitchell report that you referred to is said to be something that would be implemented after seven full days of no violence. Is that a realistic expectation in your view?

ALTERMAN: Depends what you mean by no violence, and one thing that was very clear to me when I was in the region last month is that the sides do not agree at all on when constitutes violence, what constitutes Palestinian violence, what constitutes Israeli violence. I think one of the things that Secretary Powell saw face-to-face in last week was how far apart the two sides are, even if they can agree on the same words.

FRAZIER: So, that's the key. We're still negotiating over definitions of terms...

ALTERMAN: Very much so.

FRAZIER: ... before we even get down to the harder stuff. Well, Jon Alterman, thank for joining us once again. It's always a pleasure to see you and to hear your insights.

ALTERMAN: Thank you, Stephen.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com