11/21/12 – Gershon Baskin – The Scott Horton Show

Hey folks, Scott Horton here for Veterans for Peace at VeteransForPeace.org.
I'm not a vet, but if you are, I'd like to ask you to consider joining Veterans for Peace.
As you know, in matters of foreign wars, a veteran's voice is given much more weight.
Well, Veterans for Peace is making veterans' voices heard in ways and places where they can really make a difference.
There are more than 175 chapters of Veterans for Peace in all 50 states working hard to eliminate nuclear weapons, seek justice for veterans and victims of war, and abolish war as an instrument of American national policy.
It's the peace vets versus the chicken hawks.
Join up the good fight at VeteransForPeace.org.
Hey y'all, Scott Horton here.
After the show, you should check out one of my sponsors, WallStreetWindow.com.
It's a financial blog written by Mike Swanson, a former hedge fund manager who's investing in commodities, mining stocks, and European markets.
Mike's site, WallStreetWindow.com, is unique in that he shows people what he's really investing in, updating you when he buys or sells in his main account.
Mike's betting his positions are going to go up due to the Federal Reserve printing all that money to finance the deficit.
See what happens at WallStreetWindow.com.
In an empire where Congress knows nothing, the ubiquitous D.C. think tank is all.
And the Israel lobby and their neocon allies must own a dozen.
Well, Americans have a lobby in Washington, too.
It's called the Council for the National Interest.
At CouncilForTheNationalInterest.org.
They advocate for us on Capitol Hill.
Join CNI to demand an end to the U.S.
-sponsored occupation of the Palestinians and an end to our government's destructive empire in the Middle East.
That's the Council for the National Interest at CouncilForTheNationalInterest.org.
Hey ladies, Scott Horton here.
If you would like truly youthful, healthy, and healthy-looking skin, there is one very special company you need to visit.
Dagny and Lane at DagnyAndLane.com.
Dagny and Lane has revolutionized the industry with a full line of products made from organic and all-natural ingredients that penetrate deeply with nutrient-rich ionic minerals and antioxidants for healthy and beautiful skin.
That's Dagny and Lane at DagnyAndLane.com.
And for a limited time, add promo code Scott15 at checkout for a 15% discount.
Introducing Gershon Baskin.
He is a peace activist from Israel.
His website is IPCRI.org.
That's the Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Information.
And Mr. Baskin, if I understand it correctly, you were one of the go-betweens in the negotiations for the release of the Hamas-held Israeli soldier, Shalit, Gilad Shalit, last year, correct?
That's right.
I got involved in those negotiations.
Six days after the soldier was abducted by Hamas in a military operation that took place on the Gaza-Israel border, someone who I had met at a conference in Cairo several months before who identified himself to me as a member of Hamas and a professor of economics at the Islamic University of Gaza started to talk to me.
We ended up having a very intense dialogue together.
And four months later, after Shalit was abducted, he called me up and said, Gershon, we're being bombed.
We have no electricity.
We have no water.
We have to do something.
He went to the office of the Hamas prime minister, and an hour later, half an hour later, I got a phone call from them and opened up a channel of communication between me and an Israeli citizen and the highest levels of the Hamas government in Gaza.
I immediately started passing on messages both to the family of the soldier and the Israeli government.
Two and a half months later, we ended up producing the first sign of life program, which was a handwritten letter sent to his parents, delivered to the Egyptian headquarters, the Egyptian representatives in Gaza.
And then I was asked by the Israeli government to leave the issue alone.
They were handling it.
It took another four, four and a half, almost five years before they would listen to me again and say, I have this channel that's leading to the people holding the soldier.
And when they finally listened to me, I opened up this channel at an official level, and we were able to produce a document of principles for the deal that was closed with the help of the Egyptian intelligence and the Mossad guy who was appointed by Prime Minister Netanyahu to run the talks, and Ahmed Jabari, the guy that Israel killed this week, was the negotiator on the Hamas side.
All right.
Well, and this is why I asked that.
I really wanted to lay that groundwork so that everyone listening understands that you're not some Israeli peace activist who has a thing to say.
You're somebody who's been very involved in extremely important negotiations, and very recently, and as you were just alluding there, it's this same channel of communication that you set up with Hamas leadership that is part and parcel of this most recent story.
This guy Jabari, who was assassinated as part of the escalation of the recent conflict, the current conflict in Gaza, you reported and wrote in the New York Times and the Daily Beast and it's in Haaretz and all over the place that you had actually seen to it to deliver a new peace initiative, not just to Hamas, but to this man Jabari, their military leader, just before he was killed.
A couple of corrections in what you said.
Okay, please.
It was not a peace initiative.
We were not talking about making peace with Hamas.
We cannot make peace with Hamas.
Hamas is a political Islamic movement committed to the destruction of the State of Israel.
Peace with Hamas was not in the cards, and that's not what we were talking about.
And Jabari wouldn't even talk about peace.
Jabari not only wouldn't talk about peace, he wasn't willing to meet an Israeli directly or to speak to an Israeli directly.
They had to be go-betweens.
But he did appoint someone in Hamas to be the go-between, and that person and I were the ones that we, together, worked on negotiating the release of the Israeli soldier and the prisoner exchange deal.
Let's not forget they got 1,027 Palestinian prisoners free from Israeli prisons in exchange for one Israeli soldier.
Not a very balanced deal, but that was the deal that brought the soldier home after five years and four months.
My counterpart and I began talking about a long-term ceasefire a month after Sharif came home, and those talks ended up leading to very intensive discussions between us, starting three weeks ago.
And on the morning, on the day that Jabari was killed, he saw a draft of a text that was written by my counterpart in Arabic, which had been the version, the latest version we were working on, and he was showing it around to other people in Gaza.
Now, I can't tell you that they would have agreed to it, but there was a chance.
They were interested.
Jabari himself was interested in a ceasefire, not because he wanted to make peace with Israel, but because he understood that every round of rocket fire with Israel, he ended up with 10 to 30 dead people in Gaza.
And that simply wasn't working for him anymore.
Okay.
So now, is it just a matter of semantics?
Because in a sense, we have a ceasefire in Korea, but it's held for 60 years.
It's a de facto peace.
Is that completely different?
Yeah.
We were talking about something we called it long-term, but no one has any illusions that it would be something like Korea.
I see.
But compared to our present circumstances, it would have been a major improvement.
Now, I'm not sure.
I don't think that you've ever put it exactly this way, so I'll put it to you exactly this way.
Do you believe that, or I don't know if you have any reason to believe or any actual knowledge of this, but do you think that this is why Netanyahu killed Jabari, because there was a possibility of negotiating a ceasefire with him?
No, definitely not.
I'm sure that Netanyahu knew that there was a new draft of the ceasefire that we were talking about that Jabari saw that day.
I'm not sure that information got to him.
Definitely people below him in the security establishment knew about it, but not Netanyahu, and maybe not the defense minister.
I think that the Israeli security establishment, military establishment, had gotten fed up with the continued rocketing of the Israeli civilian population.
The periods of time in between the ceasefires got shorter and shorter, and the intensity of the rocket fire increased, and they decided this is an organization that we don't negotiate with.
This is an organization that we teach a lesson.
We have to build our deterrence, and the selection of Jabari as the target was very meaningful because he's the most important target there.
He's the head of the armed forces.
He's the one who has the greatest security around him and the most difficult to kill, so the message is if we can kill him, we can kill anyone.
We can get to every single leader of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, or any other rogue group in Gaza that threatens Israel, so the message that Israel wanted to send out was don't mess with us because we're going to get you.
Although I'm kind of confused because it seems like the same point could have been if we can deal with him, then we can deal with anybody too, and wasn't he the guy in charge of, say, if a different group other than Hamas started shooting off rockets?
He was the one in charge of stopping them and actually had done so on numerous occasions, right?
He had done so on numerous occasions, and that's what we were hoping to build in a formalized, institutionalized way with the transference of intelligence information through the Egyptian General Intelligence Agency.
That was the idea, and while I don't know that it would have worked, it was worth a test.
That's what I said to my Israeli counterpart.
Let's test him.
Give some intelligence information to the Egyptians.
Let it go to the Hamas.
We have 24 hours, 48 hours, whatever is required to stop an operation which is impending, not a ticking time bomb.
If someone comes out of a tunnel and is ready to shoot a rocket, well, you take care of them immediately.
You don't wait.
But if we have information about some cell that's organizing and planning to put bombs on the border fence or shoot a rocket over to Israel and it's not imminent but being planned, then let's see if they're willing to do it.
I think that maybe in the end of the day we would have had to use force anyway, but at least we would have known that we tried everything else, and that's my point.
I believe that we had an opportunity to try something, and we didn't do it.
Now, when you say that neither side is ready for peace and all of that, what about the role of the push for a Palestinian state and recognition at the United Nations?
Because at least on American television I've seen members of Hamas say that, you know, yeah, it says that in the platform, but really we're willing to accept 67 borders if you would just lift the siege and treat us with a modicum of respect back, you know?
Well, I think this is exactly the point.
Unfortunately, the party which is losing the most in this battle is Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization.
They're coming out the losers here because the extremists are coming out on top with showing that we're the fighters and we're doing it.
But what really has to happen is that Israel and the PLO need to engage in talks that we already know what the end game is.
We know the foundation and establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank with the East Jerusalem as the capital and Gaza as part of that state as well.
Now, what we have to say is the Palestinian state includes all those Palestinian territories, West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem, and when there will be a regime in Gaza that accepts the terms of the agreement, the agreement will be implemented there as well.
In this, we hand the people of Gaza the hope that they can get out of the squalor and out of the despair and out of the horrible life they're living and have the hope that they can live in freedom and liberation and possibly prosperity.
I furthermore assert that we should, with the help of the international community, build the link.
There's going to be a road or a bridge or a tunnel or a rail link connecting the West Bank and Gaza.
It's all of 25 miles.
That's the distance between West Bank and Gaza.
Let's build it one mile short of Gaza.
Let the people of Gaza see that there's this alternative there and then let them make a choice if they want to live under a regime which rejects peace, which rejects living an open and free life, or if they want to keep living the life that they have today.
That's a choice that has to be given, but they have to have the alternative to see.
And that's doable.
And we Israelis who advocate peace need to put pressure on our prime minister to do that, to make that bold decision to bring peace to Israel, and we need Mr. Netanyahu to do it, because it goes back to the American history of the old Nixon China.
It was Nixon, the right-wing conservative who could break the boycott of dealing with China.
We need Mr. Netanyahu, the right-wing conservative, to be the one to reach out and make peace with the Palestinians, because that will keep Israel united behind peace rather than divided if someone like me were prime minister and making the peace.
All right.
Well, the bad news here on TV is the bomb attack in Tel Aviv, 24 civilians wounded, and I guess politically speaking that probably means that the ceasefire in Gaza is that much further away and perhaps the chances of full-scale invasion have even been raised again.
Do you think so?
Yes, I think it's very likely.
I think there are people on both sides who are not satisfied with where we've gotten to today.
There are people in Israel who say we have to finish them off, we have to do a regime change, we have to do what America did in Iraq to Saddam Hussein, get rid of the Hamas government there, and until we do that we will have no chance of living a quiet life.
And there are people, unfortunately, on the Hamas side who are saying bring them on, because we haven't had an opportunity to kill enough Israelis yet.
We want to kill some soldiers, we want to blow up some tanks, and the cherry on the pie for them, the cherry on the cake, on the whipped cream, would be if they could abduct another Israeli soldier and hold him captive and ransom him off for more Palestinian prisoners.
That would be ideal for them.
And we have these people who are in the decision-making circles, who don't mind so much of all the bloodshed that will happen as a result of that, and would rather go that direction than find a way out through negotiations and dialogue.
I was reading this article by Richard Sale about how the Israeli intelligence services helped Yassin to create Hamas in the first place, and he said, the Israelis are like a guy with his hair on fire who's trying to put it out by hitting himself in the head with a hammer.
That's not really accurate either.
Ahmed Yassin was running a thing called the Islamic Associations, and he was establishing schools and health clinics and orphanages, and there was nothing political about it, and there was nothing violent about it.
And the Israelis supported it back in the 1970s as an alternative to the PLO, who were engaged in terrorism against Israel.
So they saw it as a counterbalance to the influence of the PLO.
Of course, later, Ahmed Yassin took these Islamic Associations, which I'm telling you were social organizations, social health, welfare organizations, and turned it into Hamas, which combined a radical Islamic political ideology together with a sanctification of killing in the name of Allah.
But that was not what Israel created.
That was created in Gaza by those people.
It's wrong to say that Israel created Hamas.
All right, well, there's reporting in the Wall Street Journal and UPI that have a bit more detail than I think you or I could cover today, but my point was simply going to be, I mean, even if just the degree to which you described it is correct, it's still the same difference, because all they keep doing is creating enemies.
It seems like the government of Israel keep creating worse and worse enemies, not just more and more enemies, but worse and worse.
In Gaza, Hamas a year ago attacked and killed a bunch of Al-Qaeda guys.
Well, if they regime change Hamas, who's going to be left to take care of Al-Qaeda?
That's right.
If we don't deal with Fatah and the PLO, we end up with Hamas.
If we don't deal with Hamas, we're going to end up with Islamic Jihad.
If we don't deal with Islamic Jihad, we're going to end up with Al-Qaeda.
This is exactly my point.
I agree entirely.
All right, listen, I know you're in a rush.
I thank you so much for giving us some of your time today, Gershon.
I really appreciate it.
My pleasure.
Thank you very much.
Okay, everybody, that is Gershon Baskin from the Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Information, IPCRI.org, and you can read them at the New York Times, Israel's short-sighted assassination, and at the Daily Beast, assassinating the chance for calm in Haaretz.
The piece is about him, not by him.
It's called Hamas Leader Jabari Killed Amid Talks on Long-Term Truce.
And we'll be back.
The Scott Horton Show is brought to you by the Future Freedom Foundation at FFF.org.
Join the great Jacob Hornberger and some of the best writers in the libertarian movement, like James Bovard, Sheldon Richman, Anthony Gregory, Wendy McElroy, and more, for a real individualist take on the most important matters of peace, liberty, and prosperity in our society.
That's the Future Freedom Foundation at FFF.org.
Hey, y'all, Scott here.
As you know, I've been laid off from Antiwar.com, and have embarked on a mission to make this show into a real business.
And as you can tell, I've been doing all right at lining up some sponsors, and some great ones at that.
But it isn't enough, so the perpetual fund drive rolls on.
The Scott Horton Show needs donors.
Needs donors and more advertisers, if the show is to outlast my meager savings.
So please, stop by ScottHorton.org to slash donate.
You can make single donations or sign up for a monthly subscription with PayPal.
You don't need an account with them to do so.
Or use Google Wallet, WePay.com, Give.org, and now even accepting Bitcoins.
And if you own or represent a company or organization interested in sponsoring the show, please email Scott at ScottHorton.org so we can work it out.
That's ScottHorton.org/donate.
And thanks.
Hey, everybody, Scott Horton here for LibertyStickers.com.
If you're like me, then you're right all the time.
Surrounded by people in desperate need of correction.
Well, we can't all have a radio show, but we can all get anti-government propaganda to stick on the back of our trucks.
Check out LibertyStickers.com.
Categories include anti-war, empire, police state, libertarian, Ron Paul, gun rights, founders quotes, and of course, this stupid election.
That's LibertyStickers.com.
Everyone else's stickers suck.