& A: Tzipi Livni, Israeli Foreign Minister
'There Will Be Two States'
Sunday, January 22, 2006; B01
I srael's new foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, is a rising star in Israel's centrist Kadima party. Although she grew up in a right-wing Likud family, Livni, 47, strongly supported Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's decision to withdraw Israeli troops and settlements from the Gaza Strip as well as his formation of a new party -- which is favored to win the most votes in elections set for March. In an interview in English on Friday with Newsweek-Washington Post's Lally Weymouth, Livni described her relationship with Sharon, her feelings about the role of Hamas in Palestinian elections and her commitment to finding a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Excerpts:
Is it true that you were the first person Prime Minister Sharon asked to join his new party?
Even before he decided, we had some consultations. He hesitated [to form the party]. The morning I knew he was thinking about it, I entered his office and told him that I thought this was the right thing to do. It was a gamble. But I said I'm willing to take my chances and wait for his call.
What made you make up your mind?
I entered Israel's political life and joined Likud because I thought it should lead Israel in terms of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict . . . But in the last two years, most of Likud leaders couldn't decide. There was the disengagement plan. Some of them voted against it. At the beginning, I thought that the day after the disengagement plan, we could all be united and lead the country again. Then I understood that there is no chance to get the Likud to be a united party because most Likud leaders couldn't make clear statements about the need for Israel to support a process for a two-state solution. Mostly they were arguing about the past, not the future. Until now, every Likud platform starts with the word "no" to a Palestinian state, "no" to the disengagement plan, "no" to this and "no" to that. I believe it's important that a party that wants to lead Israel should have a platform that is about values or ideas and accept the understanding that, at the end of the day, there's going to be two states.
You need a party that puts forward values?
My need as an Israeli and a Jew is to keep a Jewish homeland for the Jewish people, a sovereign, Jewish and democratic state with a Jewish majority. So how do we [do that]? The idea is to divide the land, to give up some of our rights on the land of Israel and to establish a two-state solution.
It is important to understand the real meaning of a two-state solution. Israel was established as a homeland for the Jewish people and embraced all the Jews who had to leave Arab states. This should be also the true meaning of the future Palestinian state. It should be the answer for the Palestinians wherever they are -- those who live in the territories and those who are being kept as political cards in refugee camps. This is the hard core of the conflict. In other words, the establishment of a Palestinian state takes [care of] what the Palestinians call "the right of return."
How are you going to get there? Are you going to evacuate West Bank settlements?
This government adopted the road map to give the Palestinians a political horizon . . . to define from the beginning that at the end of the process, Israel will negotiate with the Palestinians all the final status issues. The road map to get two states was cut into phases. In the first phase there are also some Israeli obligations but mostly it is the Palestinians' obligation to dismantle terrorist organizations, to reform, to democratize. The idea is that Israel will not accept a Palestinian state that hosts terrorist organizations or is a base for terror against Israeli civilians.
So what do you do about the fact that after the Palestinian elections next week, Hamas may become a large part of the Palestinian government ?
Israel made clear in the last few months that the participation of Hamas in the Palestinian Authority elections is totally against any kind of democratic values.
What's Israel going to do when Hamas becomes a part of the Palestinians' government?
First, I believe that it is the role of the international community to speak right now, even before the elections, and to say in a very clear voice that elections are only meant to achieve the goals that terrorist organizations cannot be part of any parliament.
Will you communicate with the Hamas-Palestinian government?
Israel cannot communicate with terrorist organizations . . . They are using terror because they cannot accept the existence of Israel. This is part of the Hamas charter. It is totally unacceptable.
So the international community must say it's unacceptable.
It's unacceptable, and now we accept it. We, the international community, accepted the idea of elections before, but the only reason for these elections is to give you the legitimacy to dismantle the terrorist organizations. I know what the Palestinians will do. They will try to differentiate between the parliament and the government. They'll try to say that they are weak. They will try to say there are two arms to the Hamas -- one is the legitimate political side and the other is the terrorist side -- and we cannot accept it.
Can you go ahead with your unilateral plans to disengage if Hamas is in the government?
As I said before, Israel adopted the road map.
It seemed as if the strategy of Sharon was to decide on the borders without any Palestinian partner.
The idea of the disengagement plan was to open a new window of opportunity. Before, we were on the first phase of the road map. But the Palestinians didn't implement their part. There was no partner on the Palestinian side. Israel could wait on the first phase of the road map and do nothing. But we decided that we could take some risky steps and send a message to the world and to the Palestinians that we mean business -- that when needed, we are dismantling settlements. The message is that Israel is no longer the Palestinian excuse for not fighting terrorism.
We took our forces out of the Gaza Strip; we dismantled the settlements and now Israel is no longer the excuse. And now we are back on the track of the road map; we are not talking now about more unilateral steps. . . . Our expectation now is that the Palestinians will implement their word.
You grew up in a hard-line Likud household?
Today was the memorial for my father. I just came from the graveyard. On his gravestone is written, "Here lies the Head of Operations of the Irgun -- the underground that fought for the establishment of the State of Israel." And on his tombstone he left us the map of Greater Israel -- with both sides of the Jordan Valley being part of Israel.
Many ask if territorial compromise is against my father's ideology, and I say he taught me to believe in a democratic Israel as a homeland for the Jewish people where all people enjoy equal rights. I came to the conclusion that I cannot implement all of my ideology. I have to choose and my choice was to implement the ideology of a homeland for the Jewish people with equal rights to all the minorities in the land of Israel, but [the homeland will be ] only in part of the land of Israel.
You decided you can't rule over another people?
It's against my values.
Did you have an intellectual journey from right to left?
I decided to enter politics in 1995 and in my first TV interview I said I accept the idea of dividing the land, but I believe that it is important to do it the right way. . . . But I thought Labor did it the wrong way with Oslo and Camp David. I opposed Oslo because it postponed the hard core of the conflict -- final status issues. I believed from the beginning that the idea of a two-state solution provides an answer to those who live in Israel and those who live outside. The right of return is answered.
What is the legacy of Ariel Sharon?
Israelis believe that Sharon is doing the right thing for Israeli security. . . . When he made the disengagement decision, it was said that at the end of 2005 there would be no Jews in Gaza. It was a difficult operation to take these people out of their homes. I thought about it a few days ago and realized that we did it -- there are no Jews in Gaza.
We made the decision in June 2004 and by 2005, it was over. Yet it has affected Israeli society -- there are some wounds that we should heal. It was not simple to take this decision.
I arranged the first meeting between Ariel Sharon and the settlers. They sat with him and spoke only of their personal tragedies -- one spoke of his son who could not sleep at night; another spoke of his daughter and said she was supposed to get married in July, which was during the disengagement. Another spoke of his farm and his cows and where should he live. And we sat there, and Sharon sat there, and some cried and we all had tears in our eyes.
How was Sharon?
He knew this was the right thing to do. At the same time, he tried to give them possibilities for the future -- to give them more money. We had weekly meetings during this process of all the government ministries and he asked about the cows in one part, and how are these people managing, and are schools open to take in the kids . . . I think people cannot understand how many details were involved. We all knew we were making the right decision, but it was heartbreaking.
What was Sharon's most important political contribution to Israel?
The disengagement plan changed totally the terms of the conflict and the political map in Israel. It changed some of the right-wing understanding and should change the international community's attitude toward Israel. Until then, Israel was blamed as a country that wants to control the lives of the Palestinians and will not dismantle any settlements.
I entered politics because I wanted to influence the political situation -- to do something about the Israeli-Palestinian question. This is my drive to enter politics. I am a pretty good lawyer and I decided to close the office and to enter politics.
Sharon liked you.
I feel that I gained his trust and confidence in the last two or three years. We could speak and he could feel he would not read it in tomorrow's newspapers. . . . The day I was nominated [by acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert] to be foreign minister I missed his presence in the cabinet meeting.
What kind of gap will be left by his absence from politics?
It depends on us: There is Olmert, [Transportation Minister] Meir Sheetrit, Avi Dichter [former chief of the Israel internal security agency]. All of us are a group and I believe that we understand that we have the responsibility to work together.
Will the center hold without Sharon?
I believe so, yes. It was a question even before he got ill. Was it a one-man show, or a one-time party? I knew that [it would hold] if we sent the public a message that we care for Israel's future and are responsible and represent the ideas of the vast majority of the public.
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