Latest / Infidels / What did Oslo ever do for us? | Itamar Marcus | Palestine Media Watch
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- Richard Landes: We're here today with Itamar Markus, the director of Palestinian Media Watch, to discuss the Oslo peace process, which turned out to be a war process, and what were some of the errors that those who wished the best made in trying to bring about the best and ended up not with the Oslo peace process, but the Oslo war process. On the one hand, The positive sum formula of land for peace, Israel gives the Palestinians land, they get a state, they accept peace with their neighbor, and on the other hand, the zero sum vision of only the elimination of Israel can possibly be accepted by the Palestinian itamar: I don't hear you. Richard Landes: side. In the process of this seven year long fight filled with, among other things, the origins of suicide terror attacks. Itamar, you in a sense your career was shaped by these events. itamar: thank you, Richard. The Palestinian Media Watch was founded because it was clear to many people right from the start that the Palestinian Authority had two different messages. They had a message to their own people in Arabic, and they had a completely different message to the to Israel and to the Western world when they were speaking in English. And we felt it was very important to figure out what that That Arabic language message was. And to that end, we started videotaping all of Palestinian Authority TV, watching the reading their news official newspapers. And as time went on, we we not only did the TV and newspapers, of course, now we're we're stuck, we're following far over a thousand social media channels and listening to everything that's Richard Landes: Mm. itamar: coming certainly from the official Palestinian Authority sources, but from the different political parties. And we have a A really, really good sense of the of what the Palestinian Authority is all about, what they really mean, what they tell the differences between what they're telling to their own people. Two different worlds. There's the internal world for Palestinian for Palestinian messaging, and there's the English language world, the external world. And there's no difference between and there's no similarity between those two messages. And what it's critical is that the world Listen only to that message that they tell amongst their people and ignore the other message. if I can give you an example, right from the beginning of the so-called peace process, the Oslo process, very soon after the Oslo Accords were signed, Yasser Arafat went to South Africa and he had a meeting there in a mosque with a large group of Muslims who were all upset that he had signed a deal to essentially recognize Israel and what they thought was giving up part of the land, what they called Palestine, which was of course state of Israel, willing to give up some of that land for Israel. And his answer was so important and the world should have listened at that moment and it would have made everything so different. He said the Aslo Accords are no different than what Muhammad did when he signed an agreement at Khudibiya. Now what was that agreement? That was when when Muhammad turned to Muhammad started his his his political life in Mecca. it wasn't successful there. He had a few hundred followers after over ten years. So he decided to go to Medina. And there he started instead of preaching he became a warlord he started fighting he started conquering and Once he had conquered all of Medina, he decided to go back to Mecca, which was what he really, really wanted. That was the central place that had the that had the Kaaba there, the main religious worship of the whole region. So when he came back and he got close, he realized he couldn't defeat the Meccans. their their tribes were too strong. so he decided to sign a deal with the Karayas tribe, which was the main tribe of Mecca. he signed it at a place called Chudabiah. And he signed a deal to give them peace for ten years, and then to reconsider after ten years. Well, after two years he went and he conquered. Took him two years to be strong enough, he went and he conquered Mecca. That idea of making a fictitious deal with your enemy, to trick them into complacency, to trick them into believing that you actually want to live in peace, has become a principle in Islamic negotiation and Islamic warfare. ever since then because of course everything according to Islam everything that their prophet Muhammad did becomes a precedent for the future becomes a lesson for the future and Yasser Arafat went and told these Muslims just a week or two after the Aslow courts that that's the precedent. We are start we are making this deal so that we can be strong enough to come in and fight and defeat them. Now don't think it was just Arafat and don't think it was just for a moment. I'm going to jump ahead now. Probably close to twenty years. Yeah. Yeah. Richard Landes: Well wait, wait, before wait, wait, before we jump ahead, I think this came right after he had given his Nobel Peace Prize speech of the peace of the brave. So essentially, what you have the perfect example of to the outside world it's the peace of the brave, and to the inside world it's it's a trick, and we're gonna spring it on them. Now Given that he said that, didn't why didn't that put an end to the Oslo peace process? itamar: we at Palestinian Media Watch where we're we're publ we're publicizing things that were being said by Arafat all the time. and not just him, but things that were happening in the school books. And I'll give you a line that was said by Shimon Peres and repeatedly by Shimon Peres, occasionally by Yitzhak Rab, but Shimon Peres was the sh was the one who was really the architect for the Rabin government of the Oslo Accords. Robin was the prime minister, and Shimon Peres said, We will continue the process. since since there was a peace process on the ground, he said we'll continue the the the process as if there is we don't care what he says, as long as the process goes on. I can't remember the exact words. We'll continue the process as long as it's going on and and we don't care what he's saying. So basically what and and I heard also our regularly from the left-wing Israeli media would say things like he's only saying that to calm down the people, the Palestinian population that's against the agreements. He's just really saying that to them. What he's telling his own people, therefore, is a lie, and what he's telling you is the truth. This was the great deception, Richard Landes: He doesn't believe it? Right. itamar: and the Israeli media was very much a part of it. I remember when I I had some of these things and I brought it to Israeli media, and they would say to me in the very beginning of the process, why would we publicize And they said, why would we publicize right wing propaganda? This was the main Israeli TV station at the time. Presenting what Richard Landes: Okay. itamar: Arafat was saying to his own people in Arabic was said to me as right wing propaganda. Richard Landes: Yeah. itamar: He's only saying that because he has to. Look, he made a deal, he signed. it's obviously a new era. We Richard Landes: Okay. itamar: are now in an era of peace. Richard Landes: Right, right. Okay, hold on. So I mean to transpose this to Troy, essentially he announced, he's Odysseus, he announces to the Trojans that he's got this horse he wants them to bring into the city, and they respond by saying open the gates. Okay. All right. So now you wanted to go forward 20 years to itamar: Yes, I wanted to just point out that that message to their own people that it's a treaty of deception was repeated not just in the period of Arafat, but in the period of Mahmoud Abbas as well. when he went through a year of negotiations. This was if I can think back, it was about two thousand and nine, I think, maybe ten. Richard Landes: Yeah, the beginning of the Obama administration with Kerry. Right. itamar: Yes, yes. Yeah. They they convinced Arafat Arafat, they convinced Mahmoud Abbas that in Israel would release a hundred terrorist murderers over the period of the year in exchange for him coming to negotiations for a year. And also there was a freeze in Israeli building for the first time in Judean Samaria. Two terrible, terrible things Richard Landes: Right. Right, right, right. itamar: that were done by the Israeli government at the time. In exchange for him not giving any concession other than that he would come and negotiate peace. So we released murderers and we stopped building, which we had every legal right to do. And we stopped building just so that he would come and talk peace. Now, of course, he wasn't interested in talking peace. He was interested in getting in having the land freeze, and he was interested in getting the terrorists released. and when Richard Landes: Right. Right. This was this was negotiations led by Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State of Obama. itamar: Exactly. And then what did and and there was a lot of opposition because it implied that he was going to make some kind of a peace deal. And there's a very fact that you were negotiating. So so Mahmoud al Habash, who's Abbas's at the time he was minister of religion today, he's his his close advisor. He's very, very close to him. He's his close advisor on Islam, he's head of the Sharia courts. and he goes on TV. And he tells Palestinians, I hear a lot of you are complaining about us going to negotiations. And then he says, What did Yasser? What did Muhammad do? Muhammad had negotiations and he signed the deal with with the Quraysh and he signed for 10 years. And then he stressed. And look what happened then. After two years, he went in and conquered all of Mecca. And then he said the incredible words. This is the model. This is our model. He said it explicitly, even more explicit than Arafat had said it. Richard Landes: Right. itamar: Said this is our model. And we, of course, publicized it right away when he said it. and and everybody was listening. And from the Israeli side, everybody was sort of on on some a perpetual motion machine. And and even the Netanyahu government, the I think they knew in their gut, but because the entire world was telling them this is authentic, almost like what's happening exactly today as well, they they know it's a fraud, they know it's a fake, but the world is saying it's authentic and the Israel didn't want to be isolated from the world. So therefore we went along with this outrageous, I would you called it a war process. It's a terror process. It's a death process. How many thousands of Israelis have been murdered because of this outrageous process that's supposed to be a peace process. Richard Landes: Okay, so you mentioned that when you went to the press with the Kudai Bia speech in in South Africa, their response was to say to you, he doesn't really mean it. So when the antifada broke out, after first when he said no, which they had assumed he would say yes, and then the antifada broke out, did they acknowledge that they had? Called it wrong? itamar: Yes. When when the when the Intifada broke out, there was incredible acknowledgement. I'll never forget all the newspapers that were, you know, hesitant about us and you know, they were reporting us with a little bit of skepticism. All of a sudden Ma Arive, one of the main dailies still today, Richard Landes: Okay. itamar: gave us a four page story in the magazine section about a month Richard Landes: Well. itamar: or two into the Intifada and the the article started off quoting All of the different things, all of our reports that we had sent straight to the government, because every report in those days we were sending faxing it straight to the minister, straight to the government, straight to everybody who was involved, who should have been aware. And he writes, This is what was sent by PMW, this and this and this and this. And he says, Unfortunately, he writes, the government was sleeping. And he says, No, they weren't sleeping, they were in a coma. Richard Landes: Whoa. itamar: And then he goes in the rest of the four pages to describe all the things that PMW had reported on over the last four years, literally. all the all the the school book reports that we had done, all the statements showing that everything's Richard Landes: Right. itamar: a farce, everything, everything that the that that their goal was was all of Israel. and and that this was a temporary a temporary a temporary deal to just be able to get a foothold. Richard Landes: Ok, sam itamar: I mean we we had shown we had given let me just give you something we had publicized, we had publicized from Palestinian leadership, that and we're talking about before the the the terror war started in 2000, we were publicizing things like a minister in government who said the the purpose of the Oslo Accords was to continue the war from the inside. He said, because war was difficult from the outside, and now it's much easier to continue from the inside. We have another one from who was it Nabil Shah who was a senior senior Palestinian in charge of negotiations in fact in charge of international relations and he was this was actually filmed at a private meeting but we got a copy of this film where he said no one should be concerned about the Asla courses if we don't get everything that we demanded and now he he said this a year before the identified us started. He said if we don't get everything we demanded, which means All the refugees back, which means Jerusalem, which means the sixty-seven borders. And then he stressed again all the refugees. We're talking about millions of so-called refugees swarming Israel, turning it into a binational state. He said if we don't get all of those things, we will continue the war as before. But now we'll continue it with thousands of rifles and a standing army inside, right inside Palestine. He says it black on white, and we publicized it. In fact, what was so interesting is after they started their terror war which they called it defada we gave that video out to the press and this time they showed it on tv again and they said why are we surprised they promised they were gonna do this and look now they're doing it so there was Richard Landes: Right. All right. itamar: a there was an awakening of the media. Richard Landes: Right, right. There was an awakening in the media, but what about the peace camp? itamar: So the peace camp p p political people are the hardest people to to to get them to change their opinions, especially the political leaders, because they their whole identity as as as human beings becomes their political identity, and their whole political identity is to prove that their political opinions was c were correct. and that when you come and you show them that not only were they mistaken But they led Israel into a catastrophe with hundreds of people already killed and murdered. And they had no idea where this was gone. They had no idea where this was coming from, these fools. So for example, Shimon Peres, one of his classic lines, says, There was nothing wrong with the Oslo Accords. They were very good accords. It's just that the other side didn't keep them. I mean, it's you know. And he doesn't realize that the whole purpose of a deal is to do something that the other side keeps. or there's some kind of repercussion if they as soon as they don't. But he said it was a perfect deal, they just didn't keep it. So it that was the the political leadership. Although I do remember there was a little honesty from someone like Yassi Sarid. Yossi Sarid was the extreme left party merit, Richard Landes: Right. itamar: and and and we sent him all of our material. We sent it by facts in those days, we sent it by whatever was available in those days, by by regular letters. and then when he was after he'd left office already, he had one of those long interviews in the newspaper, and they said, Richard Landes: Right. itamar: Tell us about your period, tell us about this, what was it like? And then he says, Did you have any regrets? And he said, Yes, my regret is I didn't take more seriously what the Palestinians were saying to each other and were saying to their children in the school books, something to that effect. And I felt that was incredible honesty from from Yassi Sareed. Richard Landes: Yeah, although although in terms of incredible honesty, here it is a response to a question. He didn't write an extensive essay on how I got it wrong. I mean, you know, one itamar: Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Richard Landes: of the things that strikes me is that In response to the failure of the peace process, the response of the world was to blame Israel. And that set up a dynamic that I called in my book, Why Two K Mine, because it's born in the year 2000. And the principle is: when Jihad attack a democracy, blame the democracy. And that's what happened in 2000. And my sense is that the peace camp in Israel in fact continued to blame Israel for the failure of the of the process. And as a result, that set in motion what happened a year later at 911 when the Europeans were only too happy to blame America for what had happened to it. And were stuck in this cycle that I I In some ways, starts with the Oslo peace process of blaming the democracy for the jihad that's been declared on. itamar: Yeah. it's it's of course and people have written about this that it's very similar to the what they call the Stockholm syndrome, in in the sense that for Israelis, if we weren't responsible for the failure, especially for the left wing Israelis, who their whole identity in terms of politics and in terms of being against, you know, Judean Samaria settlement, you know, their their whole identity is that as long as we give the Palestinians what they want, we'll have peace. For them to recognize that we're not gonna have peace, that the other side doesn't wanna have peace, that it's believing that it was something we did gives us control. It's the battered wife syndrome. The battered wife, she's Richard Landes: Yes, yes, yes. itamar: battered. I it he's he's he's hitting me because of something I did, therefore I have control. If he's hitting me because he's gonna hit me no matter what I do, then therefore I have no no control and therefore I'm desperate. So the left wing in Israel did not want to be desperate. They didn't want to feel Like they are going to hate us and they're going to kill us no matter what we do. So instead of saying that, we must be at fault. What can we do more? What can we give them more? What can we stop doing? There Richard Landes: Right. Right. itamar: must be something. So that's what happened here. And and the outrageous thing is that it's gone on for all these years. Now, the the one positive thing about the Israeli population I can say is that the the two parties that really led that ideology of One disappeared completely. That was the left wing merits party. Completely disappeared more or less. and then the Labour Party also, which was the you know the party that ruled the you know for so many years the the government and and brought us this tragedy of the Oslo Accords, they also more or less disappeared. I think the last elections you know, I don't you know, whatever the name they were running by, they got a very, very minor less than ten seats. I can't remember the exact number. They basically disappeared. The left wing Of Israeli politics merits and labor basically disappeared. And that means that the Israeli population, in spite of the media telling a different story, the Israeli population looked beyond them and said, okay, we we see what's going on now, and we're not going to be tricked anymore into believing that there's a Palestinian side. And I would just say one more thing is that whereas, you know, 15 years ago you had a very strong majority of Israelis who were willing to give up. you know have what they call then a two state solution and have you know land for peace. today I think amongst Israeli Jews it's what close to eighty percent, seventy-five percent who definitely do not want a Palestinian state. They understand how dangerous it'll be. There's only I don't know, maybe fifteen percent or so that actually want it and the rest are sort of undecided, you know, are are not sure. But the Israeli population would never now That doesn't mean in these elections we won't get a left wing government because people don't know who they're voting for. But in the ideology at least of the Israeli population is there, and if there were a party on the right, center right really that would represent this ideology, the Israeli population Richard Landes: All right, so w one of the interesting sort of paradoxes of this misunderstanding is that for the peace camp, it didn't succeed because we didn't give enough. For those who listen to the Palestinians, the more we give, the weaker they are we are, in their opinion, and the more likely it is that we're gonna bring on war. S so they're essentially arguing for a peace process that literally is a war process. itamar: Give you some let me let me give it to you in their own words what you just said because it's so important to listen to what they say. This is a guy named Abbas Zaki. He's a member of the Fatah Central Committee for many, many years. He's Richard Landes: Yes. itamar: very close to Mahmoud Abbas. He sometimes he sometimes represents him in speeches out of the country. Abbas Zaki is his name. He was being interviewed once on Al Jazeera, and and we of course had a copy of that, we got a copy of that interview, and he said he was asked about Abbas's opinion. He said, Well, of course Abbas wants the greater Palestine, all of Palestine, which everyone knows means all of Israel. He says, but it's a difficult thing to say. So we say that we want the June 1967 borders. And then he goes on, because everyone knows Israel can't survive those borders. He said it black and white. We know. And and then he adds at the end a very cute line. He says, You can say this to yourself, but you can't say this to the world. Now, of course, we're the world, Palestinian Media Watch. We heard him say it, and of course we publicize it. and Richard Landes: Right? Right. itamar: of course people shrug it off. Okay, what do we care what he says? But that's the whole point. That's exactly what Palestinians believe. They know. And and I'll tell you, if if they thought this before October seventh, twenty twenty three, they absolutely believe it now. on October seventh, twenty three, how many? Twenty, twenty or so kilometers. the the terrorists, you know, invaded and and crossed into and reached Israeli cities and and they and they could have almost done the same thing going north had they not stopped at the at the festival murdering people at the Nova festival, they would have reached who knows how many cities they would have reached along the coast. well if Israel were to go to the June nineteen sixty seven boundaries, which weren't borders but they were ceasefire lines, if they were then I Israel could be would have been cut in half You know, Israel would is about ten kilometers wide. They could have been they would Richard Landes: Right. itamar: have been, you know, had that happened, they would have been in Tel Aviv, they would have, you know, overrun Petachtikva, Ranana, they would overrun thousands and thousands of people, most of whom don't have weapons and guns. You didn't have an army sitting there. so if they believed before October seventh, that everyone knows Israel can't survive the sixty-seven borders or boundaries, It's absolutely clear it should be to every pal certainly clear to Palestinians today that Israel can't survive those borders. And that's why our Abbas is pushing so hard for them. They realize that Israel would is vulnerable, that you can't that you know, without having a standing army, could you imagine Israel Israel didn't even have enough soldiers to to to really patrol and and keep enough soldiers on this on the tiny Gaza border, you know, forty-four kilometers long. altogether. Well look at Judean Samaria, which would be altogether way over a hundred. I don't know exactly the numbers here. Israel could possibly Richard Landes: Right. Yeah. No itamar: have an army at every you know at every Richard Landes: Mm. itamar: hundred meters along Judean Samaria. It's impossible. The army would have to be sitting in the middle of Petachtik Ved Ranana. You know, so which so everybody knows, to quote Ma Abbasaki, everyone knows Israel can't survive the sixty seven borders. That is everyone except the entire West. Macron, Britain Richard Landes: Well okay. itamar: All these fools say just go back to those borders and you're gonna have peace. Richard Landes: Right. Okay, so now given, you know, there's a scene in Independence Day where the the s flying saucers have surrounded very come in the skies above various cities, and in one city the the hippies are out there saying, Welcome, welcome, we love you, we love you, and the bottom of the spaceship opens up and zaps them, pulverizes them. Now, in that scene, they couldn't know what the people in the spaceships were thinking. But in this case, when the Europeans in particular, America seems to be a sort of well, the Democratic Party would be happy to go along with this. This idea that, force Israel to give back the give back, to give the West Bank and to allow Arab sovereignty there, the way they did in Gaza, even without formal treaty. Is it's not only not in the interests of Israel, it's not in the interests of democracy, the West, global civilization. It's it's it's courting catastrophe, it's literally doing what our enemies want us to do. Why do they do it? itamar: Well, you know what? To give them the benefit of the doubt, maybe what they're doing is the same thing that that a lot of Israelis did for many, many years. As I just described before, the the be the the beaten Richard Landes: In the nineties. Right. itamar: wife syndrome. you know, Israel is part of the West. and if the radical Islam or Islam, depending on how you want to define it, has a goal of of really conquering. all of all of the globe as their sources say they want and they must. so now that's something too that means that there's never going to be peace. Well that's something that Europe, especially with the Muslim population now what it is in countries like the Netherlands and Britain and France, you know, to to accept that the Muslims really do want to destroy Western civilization is too hard for them to accept because that's out of control. So maybe their hope is well let's hope that it's really our fault. And it's not just our fault in general, but it's primarily our fault that we haven't, it's primarily our fault that we haven't forced Israel to create a Palestinian state. So if we just force them to have a Palestinian state, that means we're in control. Because otherwise they have to say, my God, this is a war against the entire Western civilization. Israel is one front and and the London the British front is in the middle of London and the par and the French front is in the middle of Paris and the Netherlands front's in the middle of Amsterdam and and we're and Richard Landes: In the suburbs of Paris. itamar: we're losing. And there's the and then we're and then they're desperate. So it's possibly to give them the benefit of the doubt that it's not anti Semitism, it's not hate of the Jews, that it's only that it's really an issue of psychological self preservation. They're Richard Landes: But but no, it's psychological self destruction. itamar: Yes, yes. No, no, I'm saying it's they w they want to save their psyche. They wanna preserve their minds. They Richard Landes: Right. They think they think they're itamar: wanna preserve you know, 'cause otherwise they have to recognize that they've already been defeated, many of these countries. You know, Eastern Europe was smart, they didn't let them in, Western Europe wasn't, they they they've overrun them. To recognize that this really is the global war against all the infidels, to use the title of you know that we're talking about here. to recognize that means that they've already lost, 'cause then they have to look but if they could say, Well, let's just get let's try one last thing. Let's destroy Israel, create a Palestinian state there, and maybe then the Richard Landes: All right. itamar: the the the the Muslims who are running through our streets here, they have they they Richard Landes: Right. Right. itamar: have they won't be able to yell free Palestine. So they'll say, Okay, we want to be good citizens of Franston. Richard Landes: Right. Right. Okay. So no, I mean, i it's true, life imitates parity. you think that it's over, or is it still possible for countries in Europe to acknowledge the war, to take measures to enforce legal measures to deal with this problem, and to turn it around over the course of the next Five, ten years? itamar: I know that in some of the countries where the apparently the overwhelming majority of the immigrants that have come, a large number of them, specifically from Syria, I think over a million from Syria, don't really have citizenship yet. And they came in as refugees because there was instability and there was a war, so they had this obligation under their own law laws to accept refugees. and they're talking now about sending them back. And you hear you hear the chants in the streets of London, send them back and hear it all through Europe, send them back. So in in the countries where it's legally possible, and and and assuming that strong right wing or I hate to use the term right wing in this context, reasonable, rec you know Richard Landes: Yeah, not right wing. itamar: what? Just normal, you know, just rec exactly democratic, yes. You know. Richard Landes: Democratic Democratic governments. itamar: th those who aren't in the process of self deception. You know, if they wake up and they say, Listen, you're Muslims, you're not really absorbing well into our country. We don't care, you know, we don't mind having Muslims here, but you're not absorbing. You don't really want to be part of our culture. Richard Landes: Right. itamar: Syria is your culture. It's your country. It's a Muslim dominated. Go back to Syria and we'll be very happy to facilitate that. We'll pay for the flights. You know, go back now because there's no war going on there anymore. So if if the countries go ahead and do that and if there's you know a legal way to do that. then theoretically the process could stop and could turn around, you know, in the countries that have smaller, you know, smaller numbers. will they be accused of being, you know, racist, Islamophobes, this and that and the other? They might be. But I think anyone who's seen what's happened, you know, in terms of crime, personal crime, rapes, everything else that's been going on in Europe, we don't have to go into all the details, they're all well known. anyone who understands that there's you know, Europe has changed. Europe has changed and Europe would like to go back to being the the democratic, free, open culture that they had before. So, you know, it's it's a matter of if there's gonna be the will of the leadership or they're just gonna say, Okay, let's all move to to Eastern Europe where they still where there's still some sanity. Richard Landes: They'll end up moving to Israel. the only place that defends itself. Right. itamar: We should have a s we should build a special city for refugees from Europe in the middle of Judean Samaria. New London, New Paris, New Amsterdam. Well and here all of you can come here and have Richard Landes: Exactly. Well no, I actually think and I broach this right. itamar: a good life with a woof western culture that you like. Richard Landes: Right. So I suggested to an Assyrian Christian that the West Bank, the Judean Samaria be opened, turned into refuge territory for the minorities in the Middle East who are being oppressed by the Muslims. So we get it at the Middle Eastern countries of Europe. Okay, so So, yes, so on the one hand, you've got so it could be possible if there were what the French would call a prise de conscience, taking consciousness, becoming aware of what the problem is. And yet, the economist just came out with an editorial in which it dismissed all of these fears and in fact asserted with a link that didn't prove anything. That there were no no go zones in Europe. So right. So we're dealing with a level of denial that is impressive to say the least, but how do how do how do we reach the sane people in Europe to realize the mistake they're making? itamar: Look, I think tragically to change, you know, beliefs that are you know, a lot of these things aren't intellectual beliefs. You know, you go in and you studying about you know you know some of some physics theories and then you read Einstein and it's okay, he's convinced me. It's not like you're you know, emotionally attached to it. When it comes to political opinions, people are emotionally attached to it and they Because they're emotionally and not just intellectually attached to these opinions and and they they they've chosen their friends over the years because of the people and certainly in recent times, because of the opinions that they have, and they've they've they've left friendships with people who have those terrible opinions, you know, the the other opinions. And this goes true on all sides. So because of that, it's it's very, very hard for people. It would mean that they have to find a whole new social circle. Because now in Israel. There was still a certain hardcore group that had those opinions until October seventh. And you know, tragically a lot of the people a lot of the people who were murdered in the in the area right around Gaza were these people who had those beliefs, who were in this denial. I mean w where there were stories of this wonderful woman who, in the goodness of her heart, was traveling back and forth from hospitals taking you know, Palestinians who were coming in for you know who had permits to come in how to get to Israeli hospital. She was driving them back and forth. You know, and you know, she absolutely believed that she was building peace and she was one of the people who were killed. Now this is another woman who had Palestinians, you know, who worked for her in her house and she described how she had coffee with this guy regularly and and that he was WhatsApping her from within Israel on October seventh. He was trying to find her apparently to kill her on October seventh. So yeah, again, the Some people need a major tragedy to realize what they should have realized for a very long time. And I I I I certainly don't wish an October seventh equivalent on Europe. God forbid, you know, that would mean, you know, something really terrible would happen to lots of people. I hope. I hope they don't need that to wake up. I hope they can wake up before that happens. And if they don't wake up before that happens, I think at some point it's inevitable that it's going to Richard Landes: Wow, so I consider myself an an October first, two thousand Jew, in the sense that up until that point, even though I knew about the Hudai Bia speech, I was still hoping Arafat would come through, etc. But when the Antifada broke out, and particularly the story of Muhammad Abdullah hit, it was clear to me that I had completely misread what was going on. You woke up even before. Some people have only woken up on October 7th. Some Americans woke up on September twelfth, 2001. the cumulative effect of this, shouldn't there be a significant population of people who understand that we have to talk about this? itamar: Let me tell you something. I I I speak regularly in different parliaments and different countries to members of parliament and different committees and also to members of government. And and they act on the things that we're showing them. I mean, I'll just give you an example. When it comes to the Palestinians paying salaries to terrorists, I spoke in the Netherlands and literally one week later, their parliament voted ninety-six to fifty-four to cancel off funding to the Palestinian Authority. Something similar happened with Australia without even a vote. The Prime Minister, a few weeks after I spoke to MPs who had visited Israel, the Prime Minister froze funding and a month later she actually canceled the funding to the Palestinian Authority. and Canada years ago stopped funding the PA and only funded UNRWA. So what happens is there is no there's no governmental memory. New government comes in, new new members of parliament are elected, Richard Landes: Okay. itamar: everything that the Everything that the other people learned is irrelevant and they're gonna now create a smart policy that's based on you know their own truth and everybody and if it didn't work and if my truth didn't work before, it was because they were b poor leaders, they didn't understand and therefore and and I I fear that's Richard Landes: Right. But I understand. itamar: but I understand. Now, what's the tragedy with these populations? you look at America today, unfortunately, you know the the generation That lived and experienced the the World Trade Center bombings. there's another a whole different generation of youth today. and they are filled in the campuses. And we might point out, which we didn't even get into, but you know, this this this global you know stealth jihad, non-military jihad that's going on has been funded with the tens and tens of billions of dollars, so much of it from Qatar. They've taken over, you know, with all their funding, you know, starting in the nineteen eighties, they were putting money into American universities to set up these big, you know, very, very large and well-funded Islamic education department and Arab education branches and Middle Eastern branches. Okay, you you know, all we want in exchange is that you let us help you decide who are gonna be the professors. So you've got all these Middle Eastern studies around the world. Richard Landes: Right and what they get to say. itamar: You know, you know, the l Middle Eastern studies, you know, you want to keep getting a million dollars, two million dollars, three million dollars a year? Well, you know, it'd be good idea if you hired this person. We're not conditioning it, of course, but it would be a good idea. And and then you have an entire, you know, American university world which has been bought by this Islamist money with their sole purpose is Richard Landes: By the enemy. itamar: By the enemy who who wants to undermine Americans' belief in themselves and in their wonderful culture that the that you know that American culture was at least a few years ago. The freedoms, the democracy, the the openness, all of this is being, you know, undermined in the name, in the name of freedom and openness in democracy. And that's the irony here. you know, you you couldn't imagine something, you know, it's not being done in the name of totalitarianism. All of the All of the openness, the freedom except where? Richard Landes: Except except in Arabic. Except in Arabic. itamar: exactly, exactly. No, all the freedoms that are being taken away are being taken away in the name of freedom. All the democracy that's being taken away is being taken away in the name of the democracy. All the freedom of expression that's being taken away is in the same of having truthful freedom of expression. Of course pravda is freedom Richard Landes: Right, right, right, itamar: of expression. Richard Landes: right. Okay, so if we see this as a hundred years' war that started in the nineteen eighties and foresees a global caliphate in the year fifteen hundred of the Muslim calendar, which is twenty seventy six, which is also three hundred years of democracy. The first half of this war has gone on and we haven't even gotten on the playing field, particularly the cognitive war playing field. If we show up to the Can we turn this around? itamar: Well, you know, it's a a fantastic question and you're saying the we there's look, let's look at the at at Africa No, but the we inference but l you know, let's let's Richard Landes: We infidels, we itamar: look at some of the continents today. I don't know the numbers, but you know, Richard Landes: Right. itamar: we're coming from the West, and people who probably visit Europe more often, aren't aware or or or following or are unfortunately, tragically, haven't been as concerned about the the horrors that have been going on in Africa. And it's it's you know it's like all it's like the continent is soon gonna be lost with with countries that were certainly fifty, sixty, you talk about nineteen eighties, you know, years ago, were a combination of either Christian or, you know, local religions, but certainly not Islam the way it is today. And Richard Landes: Or like the Netherlands right. Or like the Netherlands you know, sort of an ideal progressive society, which Bruce Bauer describes, you know, while we slept, it was taken over. itamar: Right, right. So so what I'm saying is you say, can we turn it around? So I don't think in the in the countries that have disappeared already in Africa where the majority Muslim you know, or almost majority I I so it could be that they're already gone. and and what does that mean for the future? Who who knows what that means for the future? But could the Western countries that we're familiar with, who who have you know, Europe could could it be turned around? We have to believe that it can be turned around. We have to believe it Turned around because otherwise you're talking about surrender. now, you know, there have been many. I mean, we as Jews have been in very difficult positions at many, many times through our history, and we somehow overcame and we somehow managed and we found our allies, or we did it without allies. And look where we are today, this tiny little country of 10 million people in the Middle East. That's one of the most powerful countries, certainly the strongest country in the Middle East. And one of the most powerful countries in the world technologically and and even militarily. So it can happen, it can be turned around. But they you know the the the Europe, the European countries have to have their intellectual October seventh moment without October seventh. That's what we have. They have to have their wow moment. They have to see something. You know, that's gonna wake them up and say, my god, I didn't realize what was happening right under my nose, right under my eyes. I didn't realize it. Let's change this. And you know, and and look, we know if you look at the polls, you look at some of the elections, it's happening in some countries. You see that it's happening in Germany, it happened we saw in one election, but we saw it didn't happen in Berlin, but it happened in other parts of Germany. we we so we s we see it happening. We see the public opinion polls see in Britain and the elections as well. We see it's happening. The people are waking up. The question is, is it too late? We can't assume it's too late. No matter we can't give up on Western society, we can't give up on Western freedoms and culture and democracy. It can't be too late. We have to go with that attitude. It can be turned around and then figure out how to do it. Richard Landes: All right. Thank you very much, Itamar. itamar: You're very welcome. Thank you.