Israel and Palestine After Disengagement, Noam Chomsky Debates With Alan Dershowitz

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Noam Chomsky debat es with Alan Dershowit z

Kennedy School of Government, November 29, 2005

TIM HUONG: Good evening. My name is Tim Huong and on behalf of the Harvard Speech and Parl iamentary Debate

Society I'd l ike to welcome you all tonight to "Israel and Palest ine af ter Disengagement: Where Do We Go From Here?"

While we as an undergraduate group are usually involved with competitions around the world we are particularly

interested in promoting public debate and dialogue on campus, and tonight marks the first of many such events planned

for the Harvard community.

Now, the support throughout the entire of the university has been overwhelming, and I'd like to take a moment to thank

all our cosponsors. These are t he Harvard Students for Israel, The Palest inian Solidari ty Commit tee, The Progressive

Jewish All iance, The Harvard Society of Arab Students, The Jewish Law Students' Associat ion, Just ice For Palest ine,

All iance for Israel; and in the Kennedy School of Government, the Arab, Jewish and Muslim Caucuses, Students for

Israel, Palestine Awareness Committee, and the Jewish Muslim Dialogue.

I'd also l ike t o give special thanks to Bil l White and the IOP Forum staff for their really, fr ankly, invaluable help i n

putting this project together f or us. And now, I'll leave it to Brian to introduce the speakers tonight, but, suffi ce it to

say, you're about to wi tness a remarkable discussion between, really, t ruly two of the most prominent thinkers in the

ongoing discussion for peace in t he Israeli-Palest inian conflict .

So wit hout f urther adieu, I am proud, very proud, to pr esent this event tonight, and we hope you enjoy it.

And now it is my pleasure to turn the program over t o tonight 's moderator, Professor Brian Mandell . Professor Mandell is

a lecturer at the JFK School of Government and he directs the school's negotiations proj ect.

Brian?

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you. Thanks, Tim, and good evening everyone and welcome to t he John F. Kennedy, Jr. Forum.

One of the missions of this school is to t rain public leaders to t hink hard about cri t ical i ssues of the day. Certainly this

evening we are going to be addressing, confr onting and thinking hard about some of those issues as they relate to Israel

and Palestine.

Tonight, our cr it ical issue is--to bring it to point--i s "Israel and Palest ine aft er Disengagement: Where Do We Go From

Here?" As we know, both part ies, Israelis and Palest inians, are shortl y headed t oward elect ions. In January for the

Palestinians, probably in late March for the Israelis.

Since the disengagement in August, both sides are wr est ling might il y with their internal const it uents, some on board f or

peace, some reluctant , some not so anxious at all to proceed wit h what is sti ll an unknown and uncert ain future. But

there is a ray of hope if you've read the papers in t he past couple days: an Israeli -Palest inian Peace soccer t eam, a j oint

team, has shown up in Spain. What's interest ing about t his is that beneath the rhetoric, beneath the polit ics, t here is a

level of humanit y in both suf fering and hope, that these two peoples wil l soon j oin hands and pr oduce a better and a

and Palestine After Disengagement, Noam Chomsky debates with Al... http://chomsky.info/debates/2005

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dif ferent path. And tonight I think we're here to discuss what t hat path might look li ke.

What I want t o do before introducing our t wo speakers is to make clear what our f ormat is for t his discussion. Fir st ,

each speaker wi ll make a 10 minute opening statement on the t opic. Then, for approximately 45 minutes or so I wi ll

moderate a question and answer session f rom you, t he audience. We will conclude wi th two minute closing statements

from each speaker. And while I encourage you t o ask any quest ion you deem appropr iate t o Professors Chomsky and

Dershowitz--and I include in that tough quest ions-I also ask f or t he sake of t he audience that you be br ief and respect

the right of each speaker to respond as well . Please remember that civil it y is the cornerstone of our democracy, and

certainly a hallmark here at the Forum.

Born in Brooklyn, Professor Alan Dershowit z graduated f rom Brooklyn College and Yale Law School. At Yale he

graduated f ir st in his class and served as edit or-in-chief of the Yale Law Review. Af ter clerking for Chief Judge David

Fresli n (sp?) and Justice Arthur Goldberg, he was appointed t o the Harvard Law facult y at age 25 (t here wasn't even

t ime for you to j oin a mid-career program here at the school) and he became a full professor at 28, the youngest in the

school's history. When not teaching students he found time to be one of the countr y's most accomplished defense lawyers

and authored over 20 books. His latest , The Case for Peace: How the Arab-Israeli Conflict Can Be Solved, has received

favorable reviews from former President Bil l Clinton and Middle East negotiator Dennis Ross. At Harvard Law School,where he is the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law, Professor Dershowitz teaches courses in criminal law; constitutional

li t igation; civil libert ies; and violence, legal ethics and human rights.

Professor Noam Chomsky: son of a Hebrew scholar, Professor Chomsky was born in Philadelphia. While he acquir ed his

Ph.D. f rom the Universit y of Pennsylvania in 1955, much of his research leading to his degree was done here at Harvard

between 1951 and 1955. In 1955, he joined M.I.T. , and in '61 was appointed full professor i n the Department of Modern

Languages and Linguistics. From his art iculate opposit ion to the Viet nam War in t he mid '60's, to his book, Manufacturing

Consent in 1988, and t o his even more challenging text, 9-11, published aft er the terr orists attack that year, Noam

Chomsky has never retr eated f rom taking on the most pressing issues of our day. Professor Chomsky is the Inst it ute

Professor of Linguist ics at M.I.T. , and teaches classes in linguist ic theory, syntax, semant ics, and the philosophy of

language.

Before we begin, and t o set t he appropr iate tone and context f or t his evening, I'd l ike us to have a br ief look at a short

clip from a forum event last year.

(CLIP BEGINS)

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hi, my name is Laura Daghi, I'm a Junior in the college, and I was wondering, as a leader who is

internationally recognized in the struggle for peace, what advice do you have for the rising leaders of our generation?

Shimon Peres: Fir st of all, don't be l ike us. Be dif ferent. You know, personally, I have very li tt le pat ience for history. I

believe that to imagine is more important than to remember.

(CLIP ENDS)

BRIAN MANDELL: Let me just repeat that so that we have that as the tone and t he context for our discussion tonight.

And I quote f rom Shimon Peres: 'Fir st of all, don't be li ke us. Be dif ferent . Personally, I have very li t t le pat ience for

history. I believe that to imagine is more important to remember". So tonight let us imagine what should be t he next

steps in the process of achieving peace in the Middle East.


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For your knowledge, a coin t oss conducted by t he Harvard Speech and Parl iamentary Debate Society has determined

that Professor Dershowit z wil l speak f ir st for 10 minutes. Af ter t hat , we will go to, dir ect ly to Professor Chomsky and

then the floor will be open. Professor Dershowitz.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Thank you very much. It 's a great honor for me to be par t icipating in a debate wi th a man who has

been called the world's top publi c intellectual. My connecti ons to Noam Chomsky go back a long t ime. In the 1940s, I was

a camper, and he a counselor in a Hebrew-speaking Zionist camp in the Pocono Mountains called Camp Massad. In the1960s we both worked against the Vietnam War. In t he 1970s, we had the fi rst of our many debates about the

Arab-Israeli confl ict . I advocated ending the Israeli occupation in exchange for peace and recognit ion of Israel; he

advocated a one-state solut ion, modeled on Lebanon and Yugoslavia. We debated again in the 1980s and the 1990s. I

have the text. I hope that our once-a-decade encounter will continue for many decades to come, though I doubt we will

agree with each other.

The debate today occurs at a t ime of real potent ial for peace. Shimon Peres, Israel's elder statesman in the peace camp,

today quit the Labour Party and announced his support for Ariel Sharon in the upcoming election. Quote: "In my eyes, it

is not a problem of par t ies, but a problem of peace, how to create a strong coalit ion for peace. The elements are now

in place for a real peace." As I wrote in The Case for Peace, when the Palest inian leadership wants a Palestinian state

more than it wants to see the destructi on of Israel, there wi ll f inally be a two-state solution.

The untimely death of Yasser Arafat makes the two-state solution a real possibi li ty. I call Arafat's death untimely,

because i f it had occurr ed f ive years earl ier, we might now be celebrating the anniversary of Palesti nian statehood.

Arafat 's decision to turn down the Cli nton-Barak plan for Palestinian statehood was characterized by Prince Bandar of

Saudi Arabia as, quote, "a crime against the Palest inians, in fact against the enti re region." The crime and the death

that it needlessly caused can never be undone, but this is a t ime to move forward and t o assure that the crime is not

repeated.

The time has come for compromise. My fr iend, Amos Oz, the great novelist and leader of the Israeli peace movement,

has said t here are t wo possible resolutions to a conf lict of this kind: the Shakespear ian and the Chekhovian. In a

Shakespear drama, every r ight i s wronged, every act is revenged, every i njust ice is made ri ght , and perf ect j ust ice

prevails, but at the end of the play, everybody li es dead on the stage. In a Chekhov play, everybody is disil lusioned,

embit tered, heart-broken, and disappointed, but they remain alive. We need a Chekhovian resoluti on for the

Arab-Israeli tragedy.

This wil l requir e the elevat ion of pr agmatism over ideology. It wi ll require that both sides give up r ights. Rights. Giving

up rights is a hard thing to do. It will require that each side recognizes and acknowledges the pain and the suffering of

the other. And it will require an end to the hateful attitudes and speech that some on each side direct against the other.

Sometimes it 's bett er to start at the end. The ult imate solution is not as much in dispute t hese days as is the means for

get ti ng there. I believe t hat even Professor Chomsky and I have t he same basic agreement about a number of very

important elements of what a pr agmatic r esolution might look l ike. Professor Chomsky now acknowledges that the

two-state solution may be, quote, "the best of the r otten ideas around." I'll settle for that. He also seems t o

acknowledge that those who advocate the so-called Palesti nian right of return are pandering t o their people and

misleading them into believing that there is yet another weapon, a demographic weapon, that can destroy Israel. I think

we both agree that Jerusalem should be divided essentially along demographic lines with the Palestinians controlling the


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Palestinian population and Israel controlling the Jewish population, that the borders between Israel and the Palestinian

state should be based roughly on the U.N. Resolution 242, that Israel properly ended its occupati on of the Gaza, and

that it should end i ts occupation of all Palest inian cit ies and population centers on the West Bank, that terrorism must

stop, and that the Palestinian state t hat r esult s fr om this peace must be as contiguous as possible, and economically and

politi cally viable.

There r emain considerable dif ferences between us and, more important ly, between the Israeli government and the

Palest inian authority that must resolve t hese issues and actually sit down and make peace. Some of these differences

are attitudinal. I believe that peace is a realistic possibility, whereas Professor Chomsky apparently believes there is no

chance for peace, at least as reflected by the German title of his new book, Keine Chance fr Frieden, which translates

as No Chance for Peace: Why a Palest inian State is Not Possible to be Established wi th Israel and the Unit ed States. I

hope you're wrong.

Other dif ferences are quit e specif ic, relating to precise boundaries and considerat ions that are quite import ant , the

devil always being in the detai ls. I strongly believe, however, that there is a genuine wil l for peace on both sides now

and t hat the pragmatic diff erences can and will be resolved. And here, I t hink the academy can play a very important

and posit ive role in fostering peace. At the moment, I'm sad to report that many academics around t he world arecontributing to an atmosphere that makes peace more difficult to achieve. They are encouraging those Palestinians who

see the end of Israel as their ultimate goal to persist in their ideological and terrorist campaign.

By demonizing and de-legit imat ing Israel in the internat ional communit y and on universit y campuses throughout the

world, they send a doubly destructive message to t hose who must make peace on the ground. To the Palest inians, the

message is don't compromise. If you hold out long enough, the next generat ion of leaders wil l buy into your effort s to

de-legitimate Israel and will give you the total victory you seek. To the Israelis, the message is: Whatever you do in the

name of compromise, you wi ll continue to be att acked, demonized, divested f rom, boycott ed and de-legit imated, so

why make the compromise eff ort s?

As I t ravel around college campuses in t he United States, I notice a stark dif ference. Many of those who support the

Palest inian cause t end to be vir ulent ly opposed t o Israel, comparing t he Jewish state to Nazism and apartheid,

comparing Shimon Peres to Hit ler and Idi Amin, calli ng Israel the world's worst human rights violators, and suggesting

that Israel should be f lat tered by a comparison with the Gestapo. These are all quotes, the Amin/ Hitler quote f rom

Professor Chomsky, the comparison wit h Gestapo f rom Norman Finkelstein. Whereas most of those on the Israeli side

tend to be support ive of a peaceful Palest inian state. Put another way, pro-Palest inians tend to be anti -Israel, whereas

pro-Israelis are often pro-Palestinian, as well.

It was not the Israelis who scuttl ed the United Nations' two-state solution in 1948 and themselves or iginally occupied

Gaza and the West Bank wit h li t t le or no obj ection from the international community. That was Egypt and Jordan. It was

not t he Israelis who turned down Resolution 242 in 1967 wi th the famous three no's: no negot iat ion, no peace and no

recognit ion. As Abba Eban put it , this is the fi rst t ime in history that the side who won the war sued for peace, and the

side that lost the war demanded unconditional surrender. It was not Israel that turned down the generous offer at Camp

David i n Taba. The Palest inian leadership has never missed an opport unity to miss an opportunit y, but it is not t oo late

for peace now.

I wish to end my opening remarks today by making a specific proposal directed to my distinguished opponent. I propose

here today a peace t reaty among academics who purport to favor peace between Israel and the Palest inians. I believe


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that by agreeing t o this peace tr eaty and by implement ing i t, academics can actually contr ibute to encouraging a

pragmatic peace. I call today f or those who have supported t he Palest inian cause t o stop demonizing Israel, to stop

de-legitimating Israel, to stop defaming Israel, to stop applying a double standard t o Israel, to stop divest it ure and

boycott s of Israel, and most import ant ly, to stop being more Palest inian than the Palest inians themselves.

I call on academics who support Israel not to call for a greater Israel, nor to call for a continuation of the occupati on of

Palest inian cit ies, to stop being more Israeli than the Israelis themselves, and t o j oin the vast majorit y of Israeli and

American supporters of Israel who favor t he two-state solut ion. If the two elder statesmen of Israel, Sharon and Peres,

can place pragmatism before ideology and peace before party and come together toward the center in the interest of a

pragmatic peace, then surely t wo elder statesmen of the American academic debate over Israel, who share this

plat form t onight, can also make our contr ibut ion t o t he peace process by encouraging t hose who respect us and

sometimes follow our guidance t o move closer to t he center and closer to accepting a pr agmatic, non-ideological

resolution of this bit ter confl ict . Ecclesiastes many years ago said, "To everything there is a season, a t ime to t hrow

stones, a time to gather stones, a time for war and a t ime for peace." This is the season of peace. Let us not let i t pass

us by. Thank you very much.

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you, Professor Dershowitz. Professor Chomsky.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Mr. Mandell wi ll confirm, there was an explicit conditi on for this debate. That is, that neit her

part icipant t ry to evade the issue by deceit ful allegat ions about the other. So, I, therefore, congratulate Mr. Dershowitz

on having made a tr ue statement. I was a counselor at Massad. About t he rest, there happens to be an ample record in

pr int , or i f you like, you can ask a quest ion, but I'll keep to the topic and the rules.

The topic is: Where do we go fr om here? The answer to that is largely up to us. Evidently, it requires some

understanding of how we got here. The question of where we're going now has a clear answer. It 's given accurately by

the leading academic specialist on t he occupation, Harvard's Sara Roy, as she wr it es that under the terms of

disengagement, Gazans are virtually sealed within the Strip, while West Bankers, their lands dismembered by relentlessIsraeli sett lement, wil l continue to be penned into f ragmented geographic spaces, isolated behind and between walls

and barr iers.

Her j udgment is affi rmed by Israel's leading specialist on t he West Bank, Meron Benvenisti , who wr it es that 'the

separat ion walls snaking through the West Bank wi ll create three Bantustans (his words): north, centr al and south, all

vir tually separated f rom East Jerusalem, the center of Palest inian commercial, cult ural and poli t ical l if e. And he adds

that this, what he calls the soft t ransfer f rom Jerusalem, that is an unavoidable result of t he separat ion wall, might

achieve its goal. Quot ing st il l, 'the goal of disintegration of the Palest inian communit y, after many ear lier attempts,

have failed.' 'The human disaster being planned, ' he continues, 'wil l turn hundreds of t housands of people into a sullen

communit y, hosti le, and nurt uring a desir e for revenge.' So, another example of the sacri fi ce of securit y through

expansion that's been going on for a long time.

A European Union report concludes that U.S.-backed Israeli programs wil l vir tually end the prospects f or a viable

Palest inian state by the cantonization and by br eaking the organic l inks between East Jerusalem and the West Bank.

Human Rights Watch, in a recent statement, concurs.

There was no ef fort to conceal t he fact that Gaza disengagement was in r eali ty West Bank expansion. The off icial plan

for disengagement stated that Israel wil l permanently take over major populati on centers, cit ies, towns and vil lages,


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securit y areas and other places of special interest to Israel in the West Bank. That was endorsed by the U.S.

ambassador, as it had been by the President, breaking sharply wi th U.S. policy.

Along with the disengagement plan, Israel announced investment of tens of mill ions of dollars in West Bank sett lements.

Prime Minister Sharon immediately approved new housing unit s in t he town of Maale Adumim--that 's to the east of

Jerusalem--t he core of the salient that divides the southern f rom the central Bantustan, to use Benvenisti 's term, and

also announced other expansion plans.

There is near unanimity that all of this violates internati onal law. The consensus was expressed by U.S. Judge

Buergenthal in his separate declarat ion attached t o the World Court j udgment, ruli ng that the separat ion wall is il legal.

In Buergenthal's words, "The Fourth Geneva Convention and International Human Rights Law are applicable to the

occupied Palestinian territory and must therefore be fully complied with by Israel. Accordingly, the segments of the wall

being built by Israel to protect the sett lements are ipso f acto in violation of international humanit arian law," which

happens to mean about 80%of the wall.

Two months later, Israel's high court rejected that j udgment, rul ing that the separation wall , quot ing, "must take into

account the need to provide securit y f or Israelis living in the West Bank, including their propert y r ights." This is

consistent with Chief Just ice's Barak's doctr ine that Israeli law supersedes internat ional law, part icularly in East

Jerusalem, annexed in violation of Securit y Council orders. And practically speaking, he is correct, as long as the United

States continues to provide the requir ed economic, mil it ary and diplomatic support , as it has been doing for 30 years, in

violation of the international consensus on a two-state settlement.

You can find detailed documentation about all of t his in work of mine and others who have support ed the internati onal

consensus for 30 years in print, explicitly. In Israeli literature, like Benny Morris's histories, you can find ample evidence

about the nature of the occupat ion. In Morr is's words, "founded on brute force, repression and fear, collaborat ion and

treachery, beati ngs and torture chambers and dail y int imidation, humil iati on and manipulation, along wi th stealing of

valuable land and resources." Like other Israeli polit ical and legal commentators, Morr is r eserves special cri t icism forthe Supreme Court , whose r ecord, he wri tes, "will surely go down as a dark day i n t he annals of Israel's j udicial

system."

Keeping to the diplomatic record, the fi rst -- both sides, of course, rejected 242. The first important step forward was

in 1971, when president Sadat of Egypt offered a full peace t reaty to Israel in return for Israeli withdrawal f rom the

Occupied Terr it ories. That would have ended t he internat ional confl ict . Israel rej ected the off er, choosing expansion

over securit y. In this case, expansion into t he Egyptian Sinai, where General Sharon's forces had driven thousands of

farmers into the desert to clear the land for t he all-Jewish city of Yamit . The U.S. backed Israel's stand.

Those decisions led to the 1973 war, a near di saster for Israel. The U.S. and Israel then recognized that Egypt could notbe dismissed and f inally accepted Sadat's 1971 off er at Camp David in 1979. But by then, the agreement included t he

demand for a Palest inian state, which had reached the internat ional agenda.

In 1976, the major Arab states int roduced a resolut ion to the U.N. Securit y Council calli ng for a peace sett lement on the

international border, based on U.N. 242, but now adding a Palest inian state in the Occupied Terr it ories. That's Syria,

Egypt, Jordan and every other relevant state. The U.S. vetoed t he resolution again i n 1980. The General Assembly

passed similar resolutions year after year with the United States and Israel opposed.


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The matt er reached a head in 1988, when the PLO moved fr om tacit approval to formal acceptance of the two-state

consensus. Israel responded wit h a declaration that there can be no, as they put it , "additi onal Palesti nian state

between Jordan and the sea," Jordan already being a Palesti nian state -- t hat's Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Shamir -- and

also that the status of the terr it ories must be sett led according to Israeli guidelines. The U.S. endorsed Israel's stand. I

can only add what I wrote at the time: "It's as if someone were to argue the Jews don't need a second homeland in

Israel, because they alr eady have New York. "

In May 1997, for the first time, Peres's Labour Party agreed not to rule out the establishment of a Palestinian state with

limit ed sovereignty in areas excluding major Jewish settlement blocks, that is, the three cantons that were being

constructed wi th U.S. support . The highest rate of post-Oslo sett lement was in 2000, t he f inal year of Cli nton's term and

Prime Minister Barak's.

Maps of the U.S.-Israel proposals at Camp David show a salient, east of Jerusalem, bi secting the West Bank, and a

northern salient vir tually dividing the nort hern fr om the centr al canton. I have the maps if you want them. The curr ent

map considerably extends these salients and the isolat ion of East Jerusalem. My maps are fr om the leading Israeli

scholars, Ron Pundak, the Dir ector of the Shimon Peres Center. The crucial issue at Camp David was terr it orial, not t he

refugee issue, for which Arafat agreed to a pragmatic solution, as Pundak, the leading scholar, reveals. No Palest inian

could accept the cantonization, including the U.S. favori te, Mahmoud Abbas.

Clinton -- we don't have to debate it , because Clinton recognized t hat Palestinian obj ections had validity, and in

December 2000 proposed his parameters, which went some way toward satisfying Palest inian rights. In Clinton's words,

"Barak and Arafat had both accepted t hese parameters as the basis f or further efforts. Both have expressed some

reservations."

The reservat ions were addr essed at a high level meet ing in Taba, which made considerable progress and might have led

to a sett lement, but Israel called t hem off . That one week at Taba is the only break in 30 years of U.S.-Israeli

rejectionism. High-level informal negotiations continued, l eading to the Geneva Accord of December of 2002, welcomed

by virt ually the entire world, rej ected by Israel, dismissed by Washington. That could have been the basis for a j ust

peace. It st il l can. By then, however, Bush-Sharon bull dozers were demolishing any basis for it .

Every sane Israeli hawk understood that it was absurd for Israel to leave 8,000 settlers in Gaza, protected by a large

part of the army, while taking over scarce water resources and arable land. The same conclusion was to withdraw from

Gaza while expanding through the West Bank, and that wi ll cont inue as long as Washington insists on marching on the

road t o catastrophe by reject ing minimal Palest inian r ights. I'm quoting the warning of the four f ormer heads of Israel's

Shin Bet Securi ty Service. "There are clear alternat ives, and if that march to catastrophe conti nues, we wil l have only

ourselves to blame."

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you, Professor Chomsky. In the spir it of discussion of this forum, we are now going to open the

f loor to your questions. So there are four microphones, one here, one-got it --there, one here in the intermediate stage,

and one on the floor directly in front of me. We're going to proceed as follows, and so I want you to listen carefully to

respect the civi li ty of the discourse that I intend to make sure that we follow here. I'm going to ask you to introduce

yourself , and t o ask j ust one quest ion, as the dean of our school always reminds people, 'questions end wit h a question

mark'. And out of respect for all of our colleagues and students here this evening wait ing patiently at t he mics, I wi ll

insist on only one bri ef question. I would also ask that you, where appropriate, direct your questi on to one of the


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panelists. Aft er that panelist responds I wi ll invite his colleague for a br ief comment and t hen we will return t o the

f loor. So that you know what's coming I wi ll begin over here, go up, across, and t hen back down.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hi, my name is Michi Harmon, I'm from Jerusalem and t his i s a questi on for Professor Chomsky. I

wanted to know if you think that it actually is relevant to dwell upon forming a shared narrative of both sides in going

forth towards any solution of peace between us. Is it important for us to actually agree [on] what '48 represents for one

side and what '48 represents for the other in order to live together in peace in the future?

NOAM CHOMSKY: Yes, I think i t 's very relevant to understand history if you want t o understand t he present.

BRIAN MANDELL: Professor Dershowitz, a comment.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I agree and I think that the history has to be objecti vely ver if iable, and it doesn't become t rue

because Professor Chomsky says it 's true. There was a two-state solut ion proposed by the Unit ed Nati ons in 1948, and if

the Palest inians had accepted what the Israelis accepted, a small non-contiguous state with "Bantustans", to quote

Professor Chomsky, and instead had not invaded, and if the Egypt ians had not occupied the Gaza, something t hat

nobody complained about- it was li terally a prison f or 20 years-and if the Jordanians hadn't occupied the West

Bank-l it erally a pri son for 20 years, and had the sit uat ion gone forward as it was supposed to go forward in '48, wewould not be here. We would have a two-state solut ion. But, what happened is, it 's clear t hat the Palest inian and Arab

leadership was more interested in destroying the nascent, Jewish state of Israel than in establishing a Palestinian state.

That is simply the truth, and there is no way to deny that. And no amount of rhetoric can undercut that reality.

NOAM CHOMSKY: You'll not ice that he starts wit h 1948 and I'd be glad to discuss that if you like but it 's not r elevant .

BRIAN MANDELL: Ok.

NOAM CHOMSKY: I began wit h 1967 for a good reason. Because it 's in 1967 that U.N. 242 was passed and a f ramework

was laid for peace sett lements and since then it 's the way I described.

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you if we can j ust

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Well, let me brief ly respond only because I was

BRIAN MANDELL: Whoa, whoa.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I part icipated in t he draft ing in a small way of 242. I was Arthur Goldberg's assistant at the

Supreme Court . He drafted 242. He conferred wi th me and consulted wit h me. Two-four-t wo clearly contemplated

Israel retaining some of the terr it ories needed t o create secure boundaries in 1967. The UN rejected a f ormulat ion of

Israel returning all t he terri tories, or "the" terri tories, and kept only "terr it ories", and as the result of t hat Israelaccepted 242, and at Khartoum, all the Arab states and t he Palestinians unanimously r ejected 242 and issued their three

'no's: no compromises, no recognition, no peace.

BRIAN MANDELL: If we can j ust

NOAM CHOMSKY: The truth of the matt er is

BRIAN MANDELL: If we can j ust, uh


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NOAM CHOMSKY: easily discovered

BRIAN MANDELL: If we can j ust hold t here

NOAM CHOMSKY: from the foreign relat ions of the Unit ed States which points out that Art hur Goldberg

BRIAN MANDELL: Professor Chomsky.

NOAM CHOMSKY: approached the Jordanians and the others and got them to agree to accept--a quali f ied acceptance

of 242 on the condit ion that t here would be minor and mutual adj ustments with no substantial change to the map. There

were curved lines and it was agreed that they should be straightened.

BRIAN MANDELL: All r ight, what you can't see behind the podium is that both of my colleagues are armed wi th several

dozen maps and t hat could getthat could get dangerous in this part of the conversation so I'm gonna ask f or some

restraint so we make sure that we go directly to our part icipants. Yes, sir.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you. Ken Sweder. I'd l ike to br ing it to the present, and I'd l ike to ask Professor Dershowitz

since this was a maj or point made by Professor Chomsky, whether or not you believe Israel is ready to negot iate for a

cont iguous state, not one of three separate Bantustans.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Yes. Now, contiguous depends of course on whether it means contiguous wi thin the West Bank, or

cont iguous, including a connecti on between the West Bank and the Gaza. Now, it was the UN that created the lack of

contiguit y between the Gaza Str ip and t he West Bank. In fact , the ori ginal proposals for Israel required complete

non-contiguit y. The Nort h was separated f rom Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv from Jerusalem, yet Israel accepted a noncont iguous

state. Under the Clinton parameters there would be complete contiguit y wi th a cir cumvent ial (sic) highway around

Jerusalem, much like route 128. It would take nine extra minutes to get from Ramallah to Bethlehem, than in the middle

of the night t hrough Jerusalem, because the shortest distance between two l ines, taking into account tr aff ic, is not a

straight l ine. Now, there are all k inds of creat ive proposals for functional cont iguit y between the West Bank and Gaza,

including a high tech rail line recently designed by t he Rand Foundation. I have a picture of that in my book. It also

looks much like the Danish railroada high tech waterwayall kinds of ways of connecting all the Palest inian cit ies to

each other. Under this proposal no point in Palest ine would be more than 90 minutes away from any other point in

Palest ine, including Gaza. It would t ake 34 minutes to get f rom Hebron to Gaza Cit y on the rail line. That is functional

contiguit y. And the fact that the leader of t he Labour party f or years, has quit his party t o j oin a new part y, and the

leader of Likud has quit his part y, both in the interest of making peace, persuades me-plus an hour I had alone in Israel

not so long ago with Prime Minister Sharon, and much time that I've spent with former Prime Minister Peres-that the will

toward peace is absolute and genuine. Having said t hat , I also believe the wil l to peace by Abbas, and many of the

leaders of the Palest inian Authori ty, is genuine too. Thank God Israel has to make peace with the Palestinians, and not

with the professors.

BRIAN MANDELL: Ok. A comment f rom

NOAM CHOMSKY: Only a br ief question. For those of you

BRIAN MANDELL: br ief ly from Professor Chomsky.

NOAM CHOMSKY: For those of you who want to see the maps that l ie behind Meron Benvenisti 's and Sara Roy's and


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Human Rights Watch and the European Union and other comments I have them here. But there's a very simple test that

we can try. If that 's a valid approach to conti guit y for the Palest inian state in 22%of the former Palest ine, let 's propose

it for the Israeli state

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: It was

NOAM CHOMSKY: in 78%of t he for mer Palesti ne. Let 's ask who would dr eam of proposing that.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: It was pr oposed. The Peel Commission proposed exact ly that

NOAM CHOMSKY: Sorry. Now. Now.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: and Israel accept ed i t .

NOAM CHOMSKY: Yeah, in 1937. But in a relevant per iod

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Look you know, when, when

NOAM CHOMSKY: We're t alking about today.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: when thousands

NOAM CHOMSKY: Today

BRIAN MANDELL: Gent lemen, gent lemen

NOAM CHOMSKY: who would propose that for Israel?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: When thousands of people have been ki ll ed by terrori sm you don't expect a country to go back to a

proposal t hat was of fered and rejected many, many years ear lier. Opt ions change when rej ectionism sets in.

BRIAN MANDELL: Ok, let's go to our next questioner.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: (unintelligible, off mic shouting)

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Coming back to 2005, you mention t he connect ion bet weenI'm sorry, Professor Dershowitz, my

name is Theros Armon (sp?) by the way. You mention the connect ion between Gaza and West Bank

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Right .

AUDIENCE MEMBER: but I t hink to f ollow up on my coll eague, I'm not sure if this is what he meant, what about the

pieces of West Bank we're gonna end up with?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Ok.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Sett lements are continuing to be buil t inside t he West Bank, the wall is being buil t inside t he

borders of 1967. So now please t alk to me about peace, about pro-Palest ine when i t comes to buil ding walls and

actually separating the West Bank from east Jerusalem.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Ok, here i s what a Palestinian state would have looked li ke had Camp David and Taba been

accepted. It would be a completely cont iguous West Bank with an area that-- including Ma'ale Adumim and some of the


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other areas r ight side of Jerusalem--which would become part of Israel and would remain wit hin the wall . The ultimate

goal i s to have a separat ion fence that i s on the border, the accepted border. And I'll tell you what I t hink the real

options are t oday. The real opt ions are: if this new peace part y wins, if the Sharon-Peres peace part y wins, it wil l offer

the Palest inians a very good deal, a deal much like that what was rej ected at Camp David and Taba, and by the way, if

you think it was the Israelis who rejected it , j ust ask Bill Clinton. He has told me, Dennis Ross has told me, it was

completely in the f ault , completely in the hands of Arafat, and that's tr ue of Prince Bandar as well. But if it gets

accepted this time, and if the peace part y prevails again, t hey wil l be of fered something very, very close to that . It wi ll

be a viable Palest inian state, much more viable than anything Israel was offered and accepted i n '38 and in '47, and I

think every reasonable person today would urge the Palest inians not t o repeat the disastrous mistakes they made in '48,

they made in '67, they made in 2000, they made in 2001. This t ime say, 'yes', accept the Palest inian state, build it ,

create an economy, create a poli t ical system, and f inally peace can be achieved.

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you, Professor Chomsky.

NOAM CHOMSKY: For those who you would li ke t o see t he map, I have i t . It 's as I said, f rom Ron Pundak, the leading

Israeli scholar, the head of the Shimon Peres Peace Center. It shows-this is the Camp David map, which Clinton

recognized was impossible, which is why they went on to Taba. And i t cuts through the West Bank completely. (Refer ringto Alan Dershowitz's map) It 's not t hat. It 's

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: It is this.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Here it is. Here it is. This is Ron Pundak's map.

BRIAN MANDELL: Ok. Ok.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: That 'sthat 's the one t he Palestinians

BRIAN MANDELL: We know that everyone can see them clear ly.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Ron Pundak i s not a Palestinian. He's the head of the Shimon Peres Peace Center.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: This is Dennis Ross' map.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Yes, Dennis Ross was the US negot iator whose wor d is meaningless. Ron Pundak isRon Pundak is the

leading Israeli scholar, and if we want to go into why Ross' book is worthless I'll be happy to say it . It 's obvious to any

reader, it stops r ight be

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You know, i t 's obvi ous to you, i t 's not obvious to other people.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Well , I'll tell you why. It stopsnotice that his book stops immediately before Taba. Why? Because

Clinton's parameters, and what Cli nton said about the acceptance of them by both sides, and t he Taba negotiations,

completely undermines Dennis Ross' book. So he therefore t erminates it r ight before that , and can therefore make these

absurd claims. But i f you want t o learn something about i t , look at Israeli scholarship. It 's much more serious.

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good evening. I'd l ike to thank both professors for speaking so eloquently tonight. My name is Josh

Susquis, I'm a recent alum of Harvard College, and I'm really glad to be back. I have [ unintelligible] questi on for


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Professor Chomsky. It seems to me t hat you l eft out , in your analysis, the element of violence, psychological and

physical, against Israel, against Jews, and it seems to me also that t he history that Professor Dershowitz described, a

lot of that is dictated by what happened, the terr orism, the wars against Jews, especially consideri ng the immediate

history ri ght before the establishment of the state of Israel, the Holocaust and everything that has happened since. So I

would like you to address the effect of -- the psychological effect and the physical effect of war and terrorism on Israel.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Yeah. That's half of a very important quest ion. The other half of it is: What's the ef fect of war and

terr orism on the Palest inians?

Now, if you take a look at - - We're not supposed to t alk about that quest ion here, but i f you look at t hem both, you wil l

find that what Benny Morris described is, in fact, correct. The balance of terror and violence is overwhelmingly against

the Palest inians, not surpr isingly, given the balance of forces, and t hat 's even t rue -- that 's t rue r ight to the present. I

mean, for -- you know, for decades, Israel was able to run the West Bank virtually with no forces, as Morris and others

point out , because the population was so passive, while they were being humil iated, beaten, tortured, land stolen and

so on, j ust as I quoted.

Finally, there was a react ion, and it 's interest ing to see the U.S. reaction to it . In the first month of the Intif ada -- t his

one, October 2000 -- in the first month of the Intifada, seventy-four Palestinians were killed, four Israelis were killed.

It's all in t he Occupied Terr it ories. The Israeli army, according to it s own records, f ir ed a mil lion bullets in the fir st day,

which disgusted the generals when they learned about it .

Israel, in t he first few days of the Inti fada, was using U.S. helicopters - t hey don't make them - U.S. helicopters to

attack civil ian complexes, apartment houses and so on, kil ling and wounding dozens of people. And t he U.S. did

respond to that . Clinton responded by sending the biggest shipment of mil it ary helicopters in a decade to Israel. The

press responded, t oo, by not publishing it , I should add, r efusing to publish it , because it was repeatedly brought to

their attention. Well, while t he ratio was 20 to 1, which is pret ty much what it 's been for a long ti me, there was no

concern here. Then, over the next two, three years, the ratio reduced t o closer to 3 to 1, and t hen came enormousconcern. About the one, not the three. And this goes back for a long time. What I quoted from Morris is accurate.

BRIAN MANDELL: No fol low-ups; a ver y br ief response.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Well, you know, the idea that there is this vast conspiracy between the American media and both

Democrats l ike Cli nton and Republicans like Bush, t o hide the truth f rom the American public j ust does not bear r ealit y.

Israel is an open society. Any newspaper can come and cover it . Why would not the newspapers cover these stories? For

one reason, t hey are figments of Chomsky's imaginat ion and they j ust never happened.

NOAM CHOMSKY: For those of you

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Now, I want to talk about another figment of his imagination. Chomsky constantly quotes

NOAM CHOMSKY: Those that want to ver ify them

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: constant ly quotes Benny Morris, as if Benny Morr is supports his posit ion. What happened is: Benny

Morris was asked whether or not I accurately quote him in my book, The Case For Peace, and Benny Morris responded as

follows: he still holds the views that I attributed to him, that I am right about his views, and that someone could read

Morr is's books -- this is a quote f rom Morr is -- "and arr ive at exactly the same conclusions."


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And yet , Professor Chomsky, by selectively quoting and by picking t idbit s out of context, knowing that you're not going

to check up on him, tells you essent iall y that what you believe in the American media, whether it be the Washington

Post, the Boston Globe, or t he New York Times, is not t rue. In order to get the true meaning of t he world, you have to

move to Planet Chomsky, where the news reflects his perspective on reality. Well, I urge you to move to the real world.

Read the real news. Don't read the selective Israeli j ournalists that he talks about. Listen to Dennis Ross. Dennis Ross

actually helped to draw the maps.

BRIAN MANDELL: Professor Dershowi tz

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: He was there when I -

BRIAN MANDELL: Okay --

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I have t o f inish. I haven't done my two minutes. When he said -- when I asked Dennis Ross at lunch

today --

BRIAN MANDELL: Okay. It 's a long two minut es.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: -- about these maps and what appar ently Chomsky would say in response, Ross said, "Ask Prof essor

Chomsky one thing: Were you there?" Dennis Ross was there. He knows what maps were presented t o the Palesti nians

and what t hey rej ected.

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you. If we could j ust go --

NOAM CHOMSKY: The head of the Shimon Peres Peace Center, Ron Pundak, who i s the leading scholar on this and doesn't

cut it off right before --

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Whoever you quote is the leading scholar. How do we know that?

NOAM CHOMSKY: -- r ight before he is refuted, the way Dennis Ross did, presents - he was involved in negotiations since

before Oslo, r ight through Camp David up to the present, got a long histor ical account of i t . You can read it , if you can

read Hebrew; some of it's in English. The one -- all this smoke that was blown had to do with one fact that I mentioned,

one, and you can check it, and please do.

In the fi rst month of the Int if ada -- I'm now using Israeli sources -- seventy-four Palest inians were ki lled, four Jews in

the Occupied Terr it ories. The f ir st few days, this is report ed in the press here, Boston Globe, Israel was using U.S.

helicopters to at tack apartment complexes. Clinton reacted wit h the biggest deal in a decade -- check i t out . It's in the

public record, not quest ioned by anyone -- to send mil it ary helicopters to Israel. There has been a database search of

the U.S. -- it was report ed in Europe. It was report ed by Amnesty International. It 's reported in Jane's Defence Weekly,

the main mili tary magazine in the world. There was a database search of t he U.S. press, and they found nothing. I know

of expl icit cases, and I wi ll be glad to tell them to you, where t he press was approached and asked j ust to r eport the

facts.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Why didn't they? Chomsky, why didn't they repor t it ? Are they bad reporters? What 's their mot ive?

Explain why the Times or the Post wouldn't r eport this great story f rom Planet Chomsky?

BRIAN MANDELL: Gentlemen, i f I could, as --


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NOAM CHOMSKY: It 's fr om Jane's Defence Weekly, f rom the i nternat ional press, and so on. Yeah. They wouldn't -- you

have to ask them why they didn't report it . I'll give you my opinion. In fact , I've wr it ten about i t .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Let 's hear it .

BRIAN MANDELL: Given that the JFK Forum is here for the purpose of creati ng educated cit izens and part icipants in a

very important debate, I would ask each of you to exercise a bit of r estraint so that we can have more of our quest ions

from the audience. Please, and identify yourself.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Nancy Murray, and if you want the answer why didn't they repor t it , see Peace, Propaganda and t he

Promised Land. Now, my quest ion, gett ing back to t oday, and your functi onal contiguit y, I would l ike to know, have you

seen not j ust the wall, but t he eight terminals that are being buil t?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Yes.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Under your vision, under your compromise, wil l the terminals be dismant led, wi ll the wall be

dismantl ed, wil l Jerusalem, East Jerusalem be under the sovereignty of Palesti nians, not j ust under their control, and

wi ll the Palest inians have their water r esources back, will they have freedom of movement? I mean, is this the kind of

vision you have?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Yes.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Is it a genuine one, or are you talking about Sharon's plan f or a so-called Palestinian state?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Well, I can only t ell you what my pr oposal is, and I think i t 's a proposal that is t oday widely

supported within Israel, that is, that the ultimate security fence -- I have been through not only the terminals, but the

most r ecent high-t ech terminal t hat was j ust buil t . I pr oposed, actuall y, t hat the secur it y fence be placed on wheels and

constantly be able to be moved consistent wi th Israeli secur it y needs.

The Israeli Supreme Court ruled last year, and Chomsky misstated it, no Israeli Justice has ever said, and I challenge you

to f ind a statement that Barak has ever said that Israeli law t rumps international law. That i s simply not tr ue. What he

said is that Israeli law enforces international law, but i nternational law is not determined by a body, the International

Court of Just ice, which excludes Israelis f rom serving on it , and which wil l not allow an Israeli ever to be a member of

that court . It would be as if a Southern black in the 1930s accepted, as the correct statement of American const it utional

law, a decision by an all-white court in a case involving a black and a white man.

No, Israel accepts internat ional law, enforces internat ional law, and t he goal, of course, of my peace proposal i s that

the securit y fence will eventually be dismantl ed when terrorism ends, but before that , it would be on the border, theway the Gaza fence is now on the border, and that water rights would be respected. There would be complete and total

freedom of movement within the contiguous West Bank and between the West Bank and Gaza.

Even today, Israel has given up contr ol over the Rafah crossing. It now has a video, which it can watch to see as

Palest inians, monit or exit and entry through the Rafah gateway. That's going to be t he future. And if there i s a wil l to

peace, if there is a desir e to make sure that there are two states, not simply one state, a Palest inian state, then all of

these issues can be resolved and wi ll be resolved. Israel has shown the wil l to resolve these issues. Cert ainly, I support

a resolution that gives dignity, gives economic viabilit y, gives polit ical fr eedom and fr eedom of movement to the


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Palesti nian people. Yes.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: And sovereignty over East Jerusalem?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: And sover eignty over East Jerusalem.


NOAM CHOMSKY: Let me quote, once again -- I purposely quoted Just ice Buergenthal, because I know of Mr.Dershowit z's opposit ion to the World Court . I t herefore quoted the U.S. Just ice, not the World Court , who stated that

the segments of the wall being built to protect the settlements are ipso facto in violation of international humanitarian

law. That's 80%of t he wall . Two months later, Israel's high court stated, in contrast, that the separat ion wall must take

into account the need t o provide securi ty for Israelis living in the West Bank, including their propert y ri ghts. That's in

direct contradiction to Justice Buergenthal's separate declaration, unanimously by the World Court.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: That 's right .

NOAM CHOMSKY: And i f you would li ke his comment about how internat ional law -- Israeli law supersedes internati onal

law in East Jerusalem because

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: That 's not what you said.

NOAM CHOMSKY: it was annexed to Israel illegally, I'll be happy to provide it to you. Just send me an email .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: But that's not what you said.

BRIAN MANDELL: Please hold, let 's go to t he next

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Michael Seviem, I'm a second year student at the law school. Professor Chomsky, i t seems li ke you've

done a lot of r emembering and very l it t le imagining, and Alan Dershowitz's ideas, if they seem funny to have a t rain orsome type of other high tech connecti on, at least they're creat ive and at least they're moving us forward. How do you

deal wi th the issues of refugees? How would you connect Gaza and the West Bank? Or is the only solut ion, i n your mind,

a one state solution? What would you do about Jerusalem?

NOAM CHOMSKY: Well , as you would know if you looked at anything I've wr it ten, instead ofif you would know, if you

look at anything that 's wr it ten I've been support ing a two state set t lement since the earl y 1970's, in pr int , and perhaps

you can show me some of Mr. Dershowitz's material in print support ing it . I haven't f ound i t . But yes, that's my posit ion

since the early 70's, all in print. As for connections, the issue, recall, at Camp David and at Taba and today, is territorial

in the West Bank. Okay? And the current proposals are exact ly as I described. Go through the sources I mentioned or

f ind any other ones that you think are serious. Those are t he major Israeli and western academic sources, and human

rights organizati ons and so on. Yes, they break up the West Bank into three bantustans as Benvenisti said, with vir tually

no organic connection to East Jerusalem, which is the center of Palest inian li fe. That's why the E.U.--the European Union

and Human Rights Watch and others flatl y rej ect them. Now, i t is possible-what Israel is in fact doing now, is developing

a huge infr astructure system in t he West Bank, with highways for Israelis, and paths for Palestinians, so that t hey don't

have to interact with one another, which means that this network around the West Bank, which will be annexed to Israel

roughly 40-50%. People can t ravel in it in great comfort f rom the suburbs around Tel Aviv including all the water

resources, including most arable land. They can get to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. The Palestinians will be following paths.


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Actually I can read to you if you li ke how Israeli j ournalists are describing that, and if you'd l ike t o check it out for

yourself , I'd suggest sometime that you take what's off icially called the Palest inian Road f rom Bethlehem to Ramallah,

which takes like 10 minutes on the Jewish highway. I've taken it . It's a lit t le winding road, a dir t road that goes ri ght

next to a wadi. If it 's not r aining you're lucky if you don't fall into i t. And off in t he hil l you can see the paths where

people are sort of moving. On the days when the sett lers are not traveling, the roads are empty 'cause there's no way to

get anywhere. I mean, you go in a broken down taxi cab up to a barr ier and then you t ransport someone who needs

dialysis, say, or a pregnant woman, carry them over a ditch and t hen as you go to another cab and so on. Yeah, that 's a

kind of contiguity. And again I say the same thing: if that's reasonable, then fine. Let's impose that kind of contiguity on

Israel.

BRIAN MANDELL: Hold, please. We have a very br ief response.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Let me respond. Fir st of all , listen to the words. There's an element of racism in one of t he phrases

we've heard today in describing this as a "Jewish highway". One point two mil li on Israelis are Arabs. Many of t hem are

Christ ians. There is no such thing as a Jewish highway in Israel. There are Muslim highways in Saudi Arabia. There are

Muslim-only roads in other parts of the world, but there is no road-there is nothing in Israel that is opened only to Jews,

even synagogues. Everything is open to Israeli Arabs, every r oad is opened to an Israeli Arab. When the peace solutionis finally proposed, had t he Camp David and Taba accords been accepted, the Palestinians would be free to build any

superhighways they choose. And indeed, Israel has offered now a superhighway and a super-roadway between Gaza and

Jerusalem-I'm sorr y, between Gaza and Hebron. And the idea of- it 's very dif f icult , I acknowledge, how to connect East

Jerusalem to Bethlehem to Ramallah and t o Jeri cho wi ll require a challenge, but people are working on it . There are

creative solutions being proposed. I am wait ing, along with the student who asked the quest ion, for some creative,

posit ive, imaginary, imaginat ive solutions f rom Professor Chomsky. All we're hearing is a recitation of the past and a

pessimistic notion of "as long as the American evil empire and Israel are involved, there will be no peace."

BRIAN MANDELL: Thanks. Let's go to the next

NOAM CHOMSKY: Well , I congratulate Mr. Dershowitz again f or one t rue statement. They are not Jewish roads. They are

Israeli roads. That is, they are roads of the sovereign-well, I'm quoting the High Court-the sovereign state of the Jewish

people in Israel and the diaspora. And that's correct.

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you. OK.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Oh, that's like saying that British roads are roads of the sovereign Anglican people.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Fine, and that 's

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I mean, Britain is an Angli can countr y as well.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK. If we can have your question, please.

NOAM CHOMSKY: I agree to your quali f ication. They're Israeli roads.

BRIAN MANDELL: We cangent lemen

NOAM CHOMSKY: They're Israeli highways and Palestinian paths. If you want to create a solution, I mentioned one.

BRIAN MANDELL: Let 's go to the quest ioner.


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NOAM CHOMSKY I mentioned it . The Geneva Accords. The Taba agreements, which Israel canceled.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I accept

NOAM CHOMSKY: Those are creat ive solut ions.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I accept the Taba agr eements

BRIAN MANDELL: Professor Dershowi tz

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: and I think t hat many Israel is do as wel l.

BRIAN MANDELL: We're gonna focus on this next question.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Then you should explain to Mr. [ unintell igible] why they obj ected to them.

BRIAN MANDELL: Please. We're gonna focus on this next question.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hello?

BRIAN MANDELL: You are?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Yes. Hi. My name is Abraham Reeseman. I'm a Sophomore at the college. This is reall y a question for

both of you but I guess I'll ask Professor Chomsky j ust 'cause Professor Dershowitz j ust spoke. It 's sort of funny that

we're all here given that a lot of us have never been to Israel, never been to Palest ine, and i t 's long been one of t he sort

of strange paradoxes in world poli t ics that Americans and people t he world over can get so enraged about either side

when it 's a confl ict that many of us wil l never f ir sthand exper ience. Specif ically, how would both of you like to see

young people like me and a lot of us here, envisioning the conflict in t he future, because a lot of us have a tendency to

internalize it to a degree where it 's not about people anymore-on both sides. There are people I know who are ardent

Zionists, who never go to Israel, who believe in i t because they are very religiously Jewish, and all of a sudden it

becomes detached from the realities on the ground and there are people who are very pro-Palestinian who are strongly

in favor of social j ust ice and economic just ice.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK. Thank you.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: I'm sorry. Yeah, how do you. .?


NOAM CHOMSKY: Well , my feeling is you should approach it as an American. And as for an American, i t is one of the leadissues in t he world. Israel is able t o do these things, to dismant le and destr oy the West Bank, to disintegrate t he

communit y, because the United States gives it massive aid, unparalleled in internat ional affairs, not only mil it ary and

economic, but also diplomatic by, as I mentioned, for the last 30 years, unilaterally blocking the two-state set t lement,

which Israel also t otally rej ected, alone, the t wo of them, and as long as you, the American t axpayer, goes on

support ing this, yes, it wil l continue, and it 'll lead to exactly what the Bantustan-style solution that Benvenisti and

others describe, right on the ground and, yes, so therefore, it's of enormous importance to Americans.

As for soluti ons, prett y straightforward. They were coming close t o a soluti on at Taba unti l Israel called it off.


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Negotiations cont inued, leading to several proposals of which the most detai led were the Geneva Accords. You can f ind

out what I thought about all of t hose in pr int . You can ask Mr. Dershowit z where he supported them in pr int. The Geneva

Accords in December 2002 were accepted by essentially the whole world. Israel rejected them. The U.S. refused even

to send a message to the Geneva meetings. But they're sti ll potential ly al ive, and American cit izens can compel our own

government to reverse its program, to accept the international consensus for the first t ime, and t hen we'll be on the

way to a solution.

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you. Brief ly, Professor Dershowi tz.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I, too, have writ ten about the Geneva Accords in chapter six of my book, and I generally support

many elements of the Geneva Accords. I do not support the right of return, that is, the idea that 700,000 or now 4

mill ion Palest inians can demographically destroy Israel.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Which is rejected in the Geneva Accords.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: It is not rej ected in the Geneva Accords. It is not accepted or rej ected. It is l eft for future

negotiations.

NOAM CHOMSKY: It is lef t open, because the Palesti nians already --

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Now, see how you change your view. Fir st it 's accepted, then it 's lef t open. What is your next

position?

NOAM CHOMSKY: Fine. Let's be pr ecise. They did not say anything about that, because the Palesti nians had alr eady at

Camp David and at Taba accepted the so-called pragmatic settl ement, which would not affect the demographic

character of Israel.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: That is simply false.

NOAM CHOMSKY: If you want to learn about that, read the ser ious scholarship, li ke Ron Pundak, head of the Shimon

Perez Peace --

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: That is simply f alse. I can tell you that President Clinton t old me directly and personally that what

caused the fail ure of the Camp David-Taba accords was the refusal of the Palest inians and Arafat to give up t he right of

return. That was the st icking point. It wasn't Jerusalem. It wasn't borders. It was the ri ght of r eturn. Now if you believe

--

BRIAN MANDELL: Can we move on f rom there?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: If you beli eve that the United States has unil aterally rejected t he two-state solution -- that 's what

we heard f rom Professor Chomsky -- that it 's the United States that has rej ected the two-state solution, when every

modern American president has favored the two-state solution, I say, welcome to Planet Chomsky.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK, if we can hold there

NOAM CHOMSKY: Now, here's a simple exer cise. You can believe one of two t hings: the extensive publ ished diplomatic

record, which I gave you a sample of and you can f ind i n detail in books of mine and others, or what Mr. Dershowit z says

he heard from somebody. Which you can't check.


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ALAN DERSHOWITZ: No, or -- and check the diplomatic record.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK. Professor Dershowitz, hold.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Check the maps.

BRIAN MANDELL: Sir, your quest ion.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: And read Dennis Ross' book, which contains appendices which have the diplomatic record.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: What Chomsky is telling you to do, is read the available record in Esperanto. He constantly tells you

to read sources he knows you can't read, because he knows if you check

BRIAN MANDELL: OK.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: his sources, they are false.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK, let 's go to t he next question.

NOAM CHOMSKY: How many of you are capable of reading

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: They are simply false.

NOAM CHOMSKY: How many of you are capable of reading Engli sh?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: He makes it up as he goes along. That's the reality.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK. Thank you.

NOAM CHOMSKY: How many of you are capable of reading Engli sh? Including

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: And i f he says youyou don't f ind it in the press, his answer is, "It's not in the press, it 's part of a

conspiracy to keep i t out of the press". He can't lose.

BRIAN MANDELL: Thanks ver y much. Hey can you guys hold for a sec?

NOAM CHOMSKY: It 's in the documentary record. It 's in the documentary record. Which happens to be quite di f ferent

from the press

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You can say t hat .

NOAM CHOMSKY: not only on this issue.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You can say it . But you know, you can cry wol f so many t imes.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK. It 's importantgent lemenI think it 's important that we take advantage of your expert ise, your

many years of wisdom by hearing a couple more quest ions. Please. You are?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hi. My name is Todd Silverstein. And I was campaign manager on NATO and special advi sor to Prime


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Minister Barak i n Camp David. So I t hink I know, at least know less than Ron Pundak my fr iend about what happened in

Camp David and in Taba. I am saying it only because I t hink t hat what Professor Chomsky said here, a lot of things are

inaccurate, even though

BRIAN MANDELL: Do you have a quest ion?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Yes. Even t hough

BRIAN MANDELL: Please give i t .

AUDIENCE MEMBER: I think, j ust before the question, because it 's very important

BRIAN MANDELL: Please go di rectly to your question.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thethe(pause)

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You know there was a quest ion befor e that had about a seven minute prerequisite. This is an expert

who was there, who was an eyewit ness. I t hink he should be permit ted to pr ecede his quest ion wi th a one minute point.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: I don't want to go into history and I'm a li t t le excit ed because you have to understand one thing. I

believe we have only one last opportunity to r each peace and this is this coming part y and this coming elect ion. Now, my

questi on to you, Professor Chomsky-and I agree wit h you Israel has done a lot of crazy and terr ible things t o

Palest inians, the Palest inians have done a lot of crazy and terr ible things to Israelis, but, let 's say that this new party,

after t he election, guided by Sharon, is to offer t he Palest inians a deal-doesn't matter which deal-a deal that wil l be

accepted by most Palest inians, would you support this deal even if it doesn't reflect your views or your ideological

views?

NOAM CHOMSKY: Well , I'm glad to see that you-I assume t hat you endorse Ron Pundak's expert knowledge. Corr ect? I

therefore recommend to all of you who read English that you read the summary of his review of all of this in the Journalof the Inst it ute of Strategic and Securit y Studies in England, and f or t hose of you who read Hebrew, li ke you, I presume,

you r ead the much longer study that Ron Pundak and Shaul Ar ieli wrote--i t 's on t he Ha'aretz Center websit e--which

describes in detail , if you like I can quote it for you. As to what I would accept

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Ron Pundak was not in Camp David, by the way.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Pardon?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Ron Pundak was not in Camp David.

NOAM CHOMSKY: He was one of the negotiators in t he backgr ound

AUDIENCE MEMBER: He was not.

NOAM CHOMSKY: He was one of t he negotiators in the background, and he was from

AUDIENCE MEMBER: He was not.

NOAM CHOMSKY: He was f rom Oslo, and his study

AUDIENCE MEMBER: He's f rom Oslo. He was never. He was not even close to Camp David, j ust f or the record.


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NOAM CHOMSKY: His study, he was one of the advisors, as you know

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Chomsky says so, i t must be t rue.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Read it --you're the one who told me you agree with him. If you think not, tell the Shimon Peres center

to f ir e his director. Those are the basic Israeli documents. Furthermore, they're support ed by plenty of others. If you

want to know more about Taba, you can read the European Union report , accepted by both sides, which says exactly

what I said. As to your quest ion, yes, I already told you the answer. There is a very good solut ion on the table. It 's the

solution that they came close to in Taba before Israel canceled it , and t hat was then carr ied f orward by high level

Israeli and Palest inian negotiators informally, leading to the Genevathat's what I'm tell ing you.

BRIAN MANDELL: Quiet , please.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Leading t o the December 2002 Geneva Accords, which are r ight there. You can read them in English,

you can read t hem in Hebrew, they're on the web, no problem, look up the [unintell igible] shalom websit e. That's a

pretty good solution. It's not perfect .

AUDIENCE MEMBER: I didn't get an answer, sorry.

NOAM CHOMSKY: That 's the answer to your quest ion. Yes.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: No, the answer was, even if it wasn't your plan


AUDIENCE MEMBER: and most Palestinians


AUDIENCE MEMBER: Even if it wasn't the plan that you think is optimal, or I

NOAM CHOMSKY: What are you asking?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: and most Palesti nians, because I know most Israelis probably would vote for it , if most

Palest inians would vote for i t , even if it 's not optimal--and it 's not gonna be optimal, let me tell you--if most Palest inians

would vote for it, would you accept it as a [unintelligible]?

NOAM CHOMSKY: It 's not up to me to accept . You asked what I t hought.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK.

NOAM CHOMSKY: What I t hought iswhat I t hink is, there's a very simple, creati ve solution, which happens to be very

close to the int ernational consensus, that I've been support ing for over 30 years, and that the United States and Israel

have been unilaterally blocking. It was reached by high level Israeli and Palest inian negotiators, and though there hasn't

been a vote about i t , my guess is that i f there was a poll on both sides, the majori ty on both sides would probably

accept it . But that 's totally dif ferent f rom the proposals of the Sharon-Peres party, the Kadimah, or incidentally of

Ha'artez's Labour part y so far. So far he simply endorsed the expansionist program that breaks up the West Bank into

cantons.


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ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Perfect select ive

BRIAN MANDELL: Thirty second response.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Perfect select ive use of Shimon Peres. You know, the Shimon Peres Peace Center. I want to read you

a quote f rom Noam Chomsky. He described Shimon Peres, he described Ronald Reagan at one point , as the semi-di vine

Reagan, as one of the iconic group of mass murderers f rom Hit ler to Idi Amin t o Peres. So, on one day of the week you

f ind Noam Chomsky describing Peres, this great man of peace, as an iconic mass murderer, and on another day he's

quoting the authori ty of Shimon Peres to make peace. I mean

NOAM CHOMSKY: Excuse me.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: where do you stand on Shimon Peres? Is he a man of peace or is he an iconic mass murder er?

NOAM CHOMSKY: He is an iconic mass murderer, and I've given plenty of evidence for it , and he is not a man of peace. I

did not refer to Shimon Peres. I r efer red to the director of the Shimon Peres Peace Center.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: So you

NOAM CHOMSKY: That 's not Shimon Peres.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: But you st ick t o the argument that Shimon Peres, the man who j ust j oined in to make peace is an

iconic mass murderer

NOAM CHOMSKY: You want me to read

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: and not a man of peace. I think that says it all.

BRIAN MANDELL: OK.

NOAM CHOMSKY: You want me to run through his record?

BRIAN MANDELL No, I t hink we

NOAM CHOMSKY: Including the fact that as late as 1996, he informed the press that a Palest inian state wil l never

happen? And in 1997 he said, "Maybe we can ult imately tolerate it somewhere, but we're not saying where"? That 's not a

man of peace.

BRIAN MANDELL: Thank you. You are?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is Amy Levinne, I'm a f irst year at the Kennedy School. My quest ion is for Professor

Dershowitz. You had said t hat one of the steps in your plan for peace in the future was for the Palest inians to stop their

terr orism acti vit ies.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: That 's right .

AUDIENCE MEMBER: So my quest ion would be, if you were advising the Israeli government, is there anything about t heir

curr ent str ategy and how they respond t o these t errorism t acti cs that you would advise them to change to move

forward?


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ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Yes. I would. I do not favor, for example, house destructions. On the other hand, I do think that

targeted ki ll ings of "ticking bomb" t errorist leaders and terr orists has been quite eff ective. Hundreds, perhaps

thousands of terrorist acts have been prevented, including an att empt to blow up a gas tank outside of Tel Aviv,

including an attempt to blow up a port in Ashdod. Tens of thousands of Israelis probably would have been killed but for

the intell igence activit ies and the preventive act ivi t ies of the Israeli government. I have a book coming out in January

called Preemption, where I set out all the parameters of where I t hink preemptive acts are j usti fied, where I t hink

they're not j ust if ied. I think Israel gets a C+ or a B- in it s compliance with human rights in f ighting terrorism, which is

higher than any country ever has gotten, comparably f acing any external threats, and I challenge, in fact, anybody in

this room, or Professor Chomsky, to name me any other country which has faced comparable threats of ter ror ism--

comparable external threats--which has ever had a supreme court and an academy which has been more sensitive to the

human rights and civil ri ghts of those who would destroy i t . I say, C+ / B-. If I were an Israeli I would demand much

more. I would demand t hat it get up to the B+ range, but surely, a much bett er standard than the United States has

followed in Iraq, surely a much higher standard than Egypt or Jordan, surely a much higher standard than France,

followed when f aced wi th terr orist threats, and at least comparable and probably bett er than England when i t was

facing terrorist t hreats f rom Nort hern Ireland. So, when you make comparisons and you argue that Israel is the worst

human rights violator in the world, which is t he mantra on Planet Chomsky, one always has to look at comparable

factors and comparable countr ies. It 's not enough to single out Israel and say Israel i sn't perf ect. If in fact, you wanted

to have divest it ure, which Chomsky before he opposed it , favored i t , if you wanted to have divest it ure, I'd favor it if

you listed all the countries in the world in terms of their compliance with human rights and did divestiture in order of

their compliance, you would never even get to Israel on that list.


NOAM CHOMSKY: Well, if you would li ke t o, here's an exercise for the reader. I won't waste your t ime on it . Wri te a

let ter t o Alan Dershowit z, ask him to cite the source where I described Israel as the worst human rights violator i n the

world, or even anything remotely like it . If he had ever, if he would ever look at a word that's wri tt en, so he would

know, for example, that I was supporting the two state settlement in the early 70's when he was saying nothing about it

and hasn't unt il recently, he would also know that I described in detail how the US-Israeli record was considerably

better than the US record. But to answer his challenge, there are certainly cases that are much better than Israel's

record. Countries that have suffered far worse terrorism and have not done anything like

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: For example?

NOAM CHOMSKY: Well , take an obvious case: Nicaragua. Uncontr oversial case. Uncontr oversial, because much as you

hate the World Court , the World Court ruled that the United States was carrying out what it called "unlawful use of

force" against Nicaragua. That's internati onal t err orism in lay language. The case was run by one of your dist inguished

colleagues, and ordered t he US to stop the terror ist acts and t o pay massive reparati ons. The US rejected the court

j udgment, vetoed two securit y council resolutions support ing the court j udgments, went on to pr actically destroy the

country. The number of people ki lled in that terrorist attack, t ranslat ing to per capit a equivalents here, would be about

2.25 mill ion. That's more than the total in all US wars ever. There were no targeted assassinat ions, and unlike Israel,

Nicaragua didn't even close the newspapers. I mean, Israel has repeatedly closed newspapers-even in Israel, but most ly

in the occupied terr it ories-'cause it claims that they have some connection wit h terrorists. The leading newspaper in

Nicaragua right to the end was owned by a supporter of the US terr orist army and was openly on it s front pages calling


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for the overthrow of the government. Occasionally they reduced some of its newsprint. They never closed it. That's one

case, an obvious one.

Take and even more obvious case: Cuba. The Unit ed States launched-since we're at the Kennedy Center, I can point out

that John F. Kennedy launched a major t err orist attack against Cuba in 1961, r ight aft er t he failure at the Bay of Pigs. It

was a very serious terrorist war, plenty of documentation about it f rom the best sources you l ike, Art hur Schlesinger,

Raymond Garthof f, all of you can read that . Major t errorist war, it 's going on right t o the present, based in Flori da.

Cuba has not carried out terrorist actions in the United States. So

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: So Cuba has a bet ter human r ights record t han Israel on Planet Chomsky

NOAM CHOMSKY: No, on the issue of

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: but no where else in the world.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Sorr y, on t he issue of preempt ion, which is the one you r aised. Yes, you raised a challenge about

preemption, and I told you that there are many much bett er cases.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: No, I didn't say that. Let me be ver y clear

NOAM CHOMSKY: In f act, now, I'll give you

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Let me be very clear what I said

NOAM CHOMSKY: right now. Israel and the Unit ed States are both threatening Iran wi th destruction. Well , you know,

preempt ion, according to Dershowitz, would requir e that Iran be carrying out targeted assassinations in Israel and the

United States. That's outrageous.

BRIAN MANDELL: I think we need to hold there. We're gonna go-this is gonna be our last question of the evening here.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is Lori Chrisbuelik, I'm a second year MPP student. Thank you f or this l ively debat e. I have

a quest ion kind of dir ected at both of you, but Professor Dershowit z, in your book, you said you hoped to have a

win-win situat ion, where everyone had to give something up. And what 's clear to me af ter this debate and j ust looking

at history, that no one is able to come to a resolution where they're wi ll ing to give up enough to the other person. So, i t

seems to me that the only way to win is to have everybody lose. So I'd li ke you to comment on a proposal where maybe,

if you all lost, we'd actually come out winning?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Well , I t hink t here is a win-win possible sit uat ion. Israel has been giving up much. It gave up the

Gaza. It, by the way, offered to give up t he Gaza to Egypt way back i n the early 1980s. Egypt wouldn't take i t back.

There was no international outcry over the occupation of the Gaza by Egypt for 20 years, nor was there any

international -- and I'm sure there must be a long record. Check Chomsky's wr it ing. He must have in print large

opposit ion to the occupation of Gaza by Egypt and strong opposit ion to the occupation of t he West Bank by Jordan.

Funny, I never came across it in my research, but I'm sure i t must be there, if you check at least the Czechoslovakian

version of one of his writings, and -- so, I do think there's a win-win solution.

The win-win solution is the one I pr oposed, start ing in 1967, and t hat is, Israel make terr it orial adj ustments necessary

to secure its b

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Israel and Palestine After Disengagement, Noam Chomsky Debates With Alan Dershowitz

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