in broadcasting live or direct from moscow this is r t i'm sean thomas let's get a look at your morning's headlines and a dolphin forces continue their onslaught on the loyalist towns but as our two discovers in tripoli some are living in fear of those who supposedly liberated the country. other big news stories of the week of u.s. launches its european missile defense plans as three countries signed up to host parts of the system russia strongly objects to the proposed deployment calling it a threat to national security. agreeing to disagree london the moscow put aside their political differences to focus on business during the first visit by

a british prime minister to russia in six years. and coming up in a few moments some heated debate as peter lavelle and his guests discuss the prospect of a palestinian state crosstalk that's coming up next. live to. remind you of the latest in science technology from around the world. we've got the future covered. live. live. live. to take a. stand. alone

and welcome to cross talk i'm peter all about meaningless symbolism or a game changer in the absence of a peace process the palestinians will ask the united nations to upgrade their current observer status to that a full member state world opinion backs this but will it change anything on the ground. can. start. to crossed out the prospects for a palestinian state i'm joined by the end of the two in colorado she's a dubai initiative research fellow palestinian human rights lawyer and a former legal advisor to the palestinian negotiating team and and bet shemesh we have benny morris he's a professor at ben gurion university and his most recent book is one state two states resolving the israel palestine conflict all right crosstalk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want and i very much encourage it but first

marcia many people are calling this a diplomatic tsunami tell us why that's right peter despite months of desperate efforts by the u.s. and israel to head off a move that could become the next tipping point in the middle east the palestinian leadership is heading to the united nations for the firm commitment a secret. admission as a state we are going to you and all options open we're going to the security council we've got some of the critics are more than certain the general assembly will vote in favor of palestinian statehood but president obama has been struggling to keep israeli palestinian negotiations afloat has been clear about his opposition to the did and has warned they do any such request of the security council. for the palestinians that first it illegitimate israel will end in failure symbolic actions to isolate israel of united nations in september would create an independent state obama's fears are not unwarranted the general assembly vote would leave only the u.s. israel and a handful of other countries and

a startling already on the issue sending a message regarding the legitimacy of the palestinian position in the conflict but above all the vote could cause significant backlash in the middle east already in turmoil from the arab spring the stages being set the calamity the high risk of palestinian riots to fully claim a state followed by a very tough israeli crackdowns adding five to the unexpected and unpredictable popular upheavals in the middle east although initially the palestinians decision to go to the un became a fallback option after the negotiations hit a dead end last year israeli government has warned that the un move would hope peace efforts i don't think that they will it would get them any closer to their desired other country the meaning of such a step is that they are they prefer to go up for provocations out of then sitting to the. table it is also possible however that fears of

a fellow are overblown and that the vote could even inject momentum into the stall talks predictions about whether the bed or even the notion of palestinian statehood can tangibly transform things on the ground remains to be seen in the upcoming months but thanks very much for that first i'd like to go to diana in toronto it's being called a symbolic vote and even worse it's a you know a lot unilateral act on the part of the palestinians how do you respond to that after twenty years after oslo. well it is in fact a unilateral act which is what israel has been doing for the past twenty years of negotiations it's been you know laterally creating facts on the ground and while i'm not somebody who believes that this is going to change anything in any respect i do believe that it's about time that the united nations be used as a tool and that this palestine or p.l.o. or whoever it is that's making that it begin to put into place measures to actually

isolate israel for its ongoing violations of human rights and its ongoing violations of the fourth geneva convention international law you know many i mean who can blame the palestinians and they say they haven't really gotten anything out of what's called the peace process i mean this is kind of like a last resort how do you feel about i mean they feel like they've got nothing out of the last twenty years since are slow and this is the last card they can play well there is something in the except for one forgets history in the year two thousand the palestinians were offered a two state solution in almost all the west bank or gaza strip east jerusalem by in the american president bill clinton and they would barak israeli prime minister and they said no the problem with what they're doing now not only is it unilateral but it also involves not only recognition of israel as a jewish state in other words they're declaring their statehood it but not accepting israel as their neighbor and it's not clear whether the even will accept

the sixty seven borders this is in contrast incidentally with one thousand nine hundred forty seven when the un decided on the partition of palestine into two states and israel at that time accepted a palestinian state next to a jewish state and palestinians of course turned down the true state all for one hundred forty seven as they did in the year two thousand ok again i mean this is this issue of recognizing israel's a jewish state but what would that negate the right of return for palestinians to power stein. absolutely and this is why houses will never recognize israel as a jewish state nor should we be asked to recognize israel as a jewish state in other words what morris and other individuals are saying is in demanding that palace that we call syrians recognize israel as a jewish state we're actually we're actually demanding that we accept the ethnic cleansing of our homeland and this is something that no palestinian leader including mahmoud abbas has as non-confrontational as he is going to accept but i

want to get back to some of the other issues that have also been mentioned which is that of the negotiations i was somebody who was actually at the negotiations and there was no palestinian state that was offered during any period of the negotiations there was always an end idea that israel's going to continue to control the palestinians control their lives control their air sprays their territory their water etc and there's never been this idea that palestinian should be allowed to be free this is what palestinians are seeking now whether it's going to come at the hands of the united nations or in another form what really needs to be cemented is this idea that israel has to relinquish control over our lives in order for us to be able to live then a lot of people would say bye bye with international recognition of a palestinian state is that it creates a level playing field instead of this hopeless peace process that we've seen which hasn't brought peace to israel hasn't given the state to the palestinians and of the of you know most amount of mistrust that's there why can't another state be

very and then you start to go shooting borders i mean maybe you should just do it the other way around well. well we could do that but hey i'm all for a palestinian state and i'm all for a two state solution the problem is the palestinians in this in this action and in their continuing demand for refugee return in effect saying we want all of palestine first we will take the west bank and receiver in the national recognition for that on the gaza strip and then from then from there we will use it as a springboard to conquer the rest of palestine and no israel no jewish state this unfortunately is the fear of most israelis myself included it both in terms of what the bus is doing and what is the majority party in palestine the hamas wants they say so clearly a bus doesn't say so clearly doing it in two stages but their ultimate leaning at the same goal and this is very unfortunate benefit cut do you respond to that because for twenty years the palestinians and the israelis have been working

together i mean the it hasn't been a peace process but they've worked together do you believe that the that there's that deep seated plan where we disperse to the west bank and we get gaza is recognized as a state and then the destruction of israel because i don't come across that argument very often but then again i don't live in israel now look i think it's really important to put this in perspective the first perspective is that the palestinians have repeatedly recognized israel they did it in eighty eight they did explicitly in one thousand nine hundred three in every single agreement there has been a recognition of israel every single palestinian under has not has a true and say that they recognize israel. let alone you're going to tell you that if you if if you may if you may allow me to continue i will answer your question now the problem is that israel has never recognized palestine there is not a single israeli political party in the knesset that has recognized how and

palestine is right to exist now going back to the issue of the jewish state the issue of the jewish state is something that was recently added to the negotiations and during the period that actually negotiations existed there was no demand for a church state and the reason that this demand is now cropping up is because israel wants to extinguish the rights of millions of palestinian refugees and wants to ensure that it has the right and the legitimacy to continue to carry out very discriminatory measures and racist measures against the palestinian refugees and against their own citizens who happen to have who happen not to be jewish this is why no palestinian leader will accept that but in terms of recognizing the actual state and the existence of a state every single political leader has come forward and recognized israel there has not been however a reciprocal recognition of palestinians right to exist by any israeli leader hamas hamas is correct hamas has recognized israel you see every political leader hamas

represents more than half of the palestinian people and they do not recognize israel under any conditions and when they seize this either. then in fact they have many in fact they have first appear in the ringleader of had just seen please if you will allow me to finish and not cut me off i've given you that luxury first shock media scene the spiritual leader of hamas before he was assassinated came out in an interview in haaretz which is an israeli newspaper and said that if israel withdraws completely to the one thousand sixty seven borders then in exchange for that withdrawal they will recognize israel and so too has every other leader of house including most recently khaled mashaal who equally said that palestinians want to establish a state on the sixty seven borders and this is exactly what he would been talking about is that instead of what is really nothing through reasons to actually an interesting is not true now it is true i you can actually go to the north side you

are historian and you can go now so this is the most open fact i can tell you what muscle says go he was willing to do or at least in the truce with israel. marshall is said that he's willing to reach a temporary a temporary truce with israel so this is really it is political he is willing to accept when all this is going to say no that's true that's true he says he hides in the only things that are really just a chance here in germany are we going to a break and after that short break we'll continue our discussion on the palestine coke state party. if you can. in the faraway land. where human life is ruled by nature. the

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we dump the future of coverage. if you can. welcome back to cross talk on peter go to mind you were talking about what the future holds for the palestinian. kids. ok benny and i to go to you let's do a hypothetical here you know the general assembly the vast majority the country the general assembly support the palestinian bid for a changing of status of the united nations we know that the united states will veto it but in a hypothetical case how would this change once the united nations takes a vote it will be in favor of the palestinians how will this change israel's position or will it not change it at all. ok let me say something first about what

was said until now all right if the hamas says clearly it wants to destroy israel that's what it says in its founding charter that is still the constitution of that organization and mahmoud abbas the head of the p.l.o. says he will not recognize israel as a jewish state these are facts hey you can say whatever you like people can try and sell you propaganda but these are the facts as to what's going to happen on the ground i don't know i don't know how any thought by the united nations general assembly. will change the situation on the ground what it probably will do is it will incite the masses masses of palestinians the violence and masses of arabs outside of palestine to support what they see as the palestinian cause and a we've seen some of that already in the streets of cairo when the vandalized israeli embassy i assume these sort of things are going to happen in the arab world and in this in and palestine itself in the west bank in the gaza strip it will be massive

demonstrations attempts to breach israeli settlements all of this will lead to violence and where that goes where we go from there i have no idea well i think the violence will has already started i mean when we look at the arab spring here then it's very interesting here really the u.s. position because the united states again is going to look very lonely on the international stage when you look at world opinion and if we look at the arab spring what's going on i mean you know the united states will come out and say it supports the freedom of some people but it will not do that for the palestinians apparently and it doesn't good for the people of bahrain also by the way i mean how is this change the dynamic or does it at all because there to be position of the united states in the greater middle east the arab world is so poor anyway. well this is where i think the palestinian leadership needs to take a good hard look at itself and take to learn some lessons which is that for the past twenty years the focus has been entirely on changing opinion in washington and

changing somehow getting american president to support palestinian statehood and support palestinian freedom that's not going to happen and i think that they should begin to recognize that that's not going to happen and instead i think that the palestinian leadership should start turning its direction to a completely different direction and start looking towards other countries around the world to isolate israel for its ongoing human rights abuses its ongoing violations of international law and the fact that israel continues to build settlements in the west bank these are considered war crimes under the statute of the international criminal court so one thing that i think that might be positive and come out of this is that if palestine gets to sign on to the international criminal court then i think it's important for college so i didn't start taking israel to court for the fact that these settlements continue for as much as an israeli leader and they say that they support a palestinian state one thing that they're not willing to do is to actually hold the establishment of colonies settlements and they're not willing to to evacuate

the settlers who have been residing there illegally on palestinian land for more than four decades really what what can be. told. moving forward their policy in recognizing a second state as you write about i mean what does that have to do i mean when the international community is saying that the occupation must come to an end a lot of israelis want to end the calculation as well how can it be done in light of this vote reduces symbolism so many people in israel and washington say. i believe that the occupation shouldn't and i think you are being unfair to the americans the americans have supported palestinian statehood and continue to support palestinian state the problem for the palestinians is that the americans also support this really statehood and this they find enough them a one perhaps advantage which might arise from a declaration of palestinian statehood an acceptance by the united nations of palestinian statehood would be that the palestinians could also be taken to court

in the international court in the hague see for the promotion of terror for the promotion of terrorism and orchestration of terrorism by people in the gaza strip and maybe in the west bank as well so i have a feeling this may be a two edged sword well it's interesting to. see that israel's also taken to the international criminal court for particularly for its actions over gaza and the killing of over fourteen hundred palestinians in the gaza strip half of which were children so i certainly hope that we begin to take this to an international arena and i can assure the israelis that on this level the palestinians will win because international law is on the side of the palestinian cause it's israel that has been and i love this notion arsenal are not the palestinians go ahead ben i know i'm not so sure i had i'm not so sure that you're his and your issue and the israelis have been. yes but i know a little more about the past apparently i don't think the palace israelis have been in violation of international law nor more than the palestinians. but their history

history tells a different story the problem the problem is that the palestinians have been offered a three state solution a compromise since one thousand nine hundred thirty seven one thousand nine hundred thirty seven one nine hundred forty seven one thousand nine hundred seventy eight two thousand and two thousand and eight when it would all merkel for it again a two state solution to the palestinians on the right bus and the palestinians have always said no the problem is that this action of going to the united nations at the paper is not this or more just than just that the palestine papers say nothing their selection of documents from god knows where they're not important we don't really know where where the palestinian stand what we do know is when olmert put a package on the table said no the same as when a bill clinton and barak put the package on the table a yasser arafat said no that we know ok give me the so i'm glad i don't kid somebody said morris in a conversation go ahead. so i'm sure that under that package will first i want to i want to put it because

a question to mr morris which is that let's assume we can go back to the partition plan now would you accept the partition plan now in other words would you accept that that your state be comprised of less than fifty five percent of what it is now are you talking about the one nine hundred forty seven parties from around of the night of the two thousand yes i'm asking you i wasn't i didn't play masculinity scientists when he said oh i'm asking about the nine hundred. eighty you now let me recall back. to your school and actually our school is. let me respond i don't think i would grow back no because i think history doesn't allow peoples to renege on their mistakes in other words the palestinians in forty seven should have resisted the partition plan as the jews did they said no and you lose when you go to war against an international p am an internationally sponsored sacrament and you lose the war then you can say well now i want to go back to the status quo ante

that doesn't happen in history the facts is the celebration is a mr morris you know no surprise you know how i'm going to give up more now diminish i had a mission go ahead benny finish up godhead. you know you're so you're what happened after forty eight is that israel retains seventy eight percent of palestine and the arabs not the palestinians we're in of about twenty two percent and that essentially is the sixty seven border so that there is let me go now before which the international community that's the internet what the international community selects necessarily a and most is very easy to assume really support this really support the sixty seven border not my point my point in all of this my point in all of this peter is that it's very well and good for people to now in the year two thousand and eleven talk about what the palestinians should have done in one nine hundred forty seven but if we actually look back to what has done what happened in history if now benny

morris is in that very same position he would not agree to give up any more of his of the territory that israel controls even already he's not willing to give up the territory that israel controls in terms of the sixty seven borders so i think it's fictitious to start talking about the offers that palestinians turn down and i think we should instead start looking towards the future and the future is if the israelis want to have peace they have to begin to recognize the palestinians as equals and this is something that no israeli leader has committed himself to whether it's under the guise of two states or one state all that i want is to be treated as an equal and all that benny morris and all of the other israeli establishment line is to continue to subjugate me their heritage here in lies the problem benny i mean i don't really i don't belong to this i don't belong i don't belong to this really establishment my historical works show that quite well. what i see is that the palestinians should ask for their minds. and accept equal rights

and have a state solution so long as they refuse a complete solution and want all of palestine there will be no settlement no peace only violence. i think that our houses have already accepted the two state solution and say israel has an example they have in the fact that no one has no no no no there are more of them. actually housing units being established just last month alone we saw more than six thousand two hundred housing units being established in in the west bank this is clear indication that israel doesn't want to have a two state solution but instead it wants to create bantu stands for the palestinians and this is something that no palestinian leader including the likes of us is going to accept unfortunately but me i have always i've always opposed to the settlement enterprise i continue to oppose the settlement settlement enterprise as an obstacle to peace it is an obstacle to peace but it's not the major obstacle to peace the major obstacle to peace is the palestinian desire to

wipe israel off the map this is the problem ok i got to give you the out. for you. what this is going to do this is just going to isolate israel more and if it isolates more it doesn't make israel just put its back up against the wall we don't go anywhere here. i certainly hope it does isolate israel and i certainly hope that spawning from this we begin to see boycotts of israel we begin to see sanctions imposed on israel and we begin to see more and more international activity in an international legal arena rather than through this farcical negotiations that have taken place it's time for israel to be held accountable and i hope it certainly is after this after this u.n. session ok very and we really realize we're twenty seconds go. i really wish that the palestinians would return to the negotiating table to which they've been invited repeatedly and actually do so seriously in good faith and negotiated some

state solution they don't want to do that there won't be any settlements the palestinians will continue to suffer all right we'll see what happens next week many thanks to my guests today in toronto and in back and thanks to our viewers for watching us here r.t. see you next time and remember prostitutes will. kick. start. the. missions free credit stations free. for charges free. range month free. free. free. downloads free broadcast live video for your media projects

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