WEBVTT

00:00.000 --> 00:04.440
My name is Chuck Freilich. I used to be in the government in Israel. I was the

00:04.440 --> 00:09.900
Deputy National Security Advisor and for the last decade I've been an

00:09.900 --> 00:14.400
academic teaching both in Israel and here in the United States. Well there's

00:14.400 --> 00:19.200
a deep national conflict here that's been going on for the last hundred years.

00:19.200 --> 00:25.120
There are two sides who claim sovereignty over the same piece of

00:25.120 --> 00:34.720
territory. I understand the Palestinian position. I believe that they have for

00:34.720 --> 00:39.760
the most part rejected any compromise proposals. Now I don't want to put all of

00:39.760 --> 00:44.500
the blame on the Palestinian side. There's a right-wing government in Israel today

00:44.500 --> 00:49.340
and Israel hasn't accepted all of the Palestinian claims of course. There's the

00:49.340 --> 00:54.640
settlements issue which is considered to be a big problem by the Palestinian side

00:54.640 --> 00:59.140
and of course it isn't one of the obstacles to an agreement. But I think

00:59.140 --> 01:04.300
Israel has put some dramatic proposals on the table which unfortunately the

01:04.300 --> 01:08.860
Palestinian side has rejected. They've never put a Palestinian proposal on the

01:08.860 --> 01:14.680
table. I think we have to see change in the government in Israel. I think we have

01:14.680 --> 01:17.880
to see some more fundamental change on the Palestinian side before we can reach

01:17.880 --> 01:23.980
an agreement. Well I think that the only realistic solution is the so-called two

01:23.980 --> 01:28.720
state solution. In other words a Palestinian state which would hopefully live in peace

01:28.720 --> 01:32.920
and security next to Israel. I don't believe that people throw out some other

01:32.920 --> 01:38.980
ideas. I don't think they're realistic. Unfortunately after 20 years of ongoing

01:38.980 --> 01:44.860
contacts between the sides we haven't reached that solution yet. But I don't

01:44.860 --> 01:50.440
think that there is any alternative. And as I was saying we need change in terms of

01:50.440 --> 01:56.200
leaderships on both sides before we can potentially reach a breakthrough. I don't

01:56.200 --> 02:00.880
think that there are various programs to promote understanding between the

02:00.880 --> 02:06.040
peoples between Israelis and Palestinians between Jews and Muslims as a whole. And I

02:06.040 --> 02:10.240
think they're very important. But I think the real change has to be at the

02:10.240 --> 02:12.440
level of national leaderships.

02:12.440 --> 02:18.200
So we have to change the ideas of the leaders themselves.

02:18.200 --> 02:26.260
The ideas and the political parties in power. The Palestinians are split between the West

02:26.260 --> 02:34.200
Bank and Gaza. Gaza is ruled by Hamas which is a radical fundamentalist organization. The

02:34.200 --> 02:40.440
Palestinian Authority does speak about peace with Israel. Hamas does not. First of all

02:40.440 --> 02:47.320
they have to reunify and become one unified government again before they can reach a final

02:47.320 --> 02:53.680
deal even if they wanted to. Mr. Abbas the Palestinian president cannot sign a final deal

02:53.680 --> 02:57.780
because he doesn't speak on behalf of all of the Palestinians. He doesn't speak on behalf

02:57.780 --> 03:02.220
of Gaza. And then as I was saying we need a change on the Israeli side as well because

03:02.220 --> 03:08.940
this government is not one that wants to make concessions. There will be elections sometime

03:08.940 --> 03:15.420
in the next year maybe even sooner. And we'll see which government is elected next time.