Back to Ambassadorial Speeches - Ambassador Itamar Rabinovich

CNN International Hour Interview with Israeli Ambassador Itamar Rabinovich
(Interviewed by Hilary Bowker) Wednesday, April 6, 1994

MS. BOWKER: Ambassador Rabinovich, what is this going to do to the peace process? Do you think it's going to slow it down even more?

AMB. RABINOVICH: We hope it won't. We continue to negotiate in London with a view to reaching an agreement on implementing the Gaza Jericho plan. We have interrupted the discussions for a day and a half because of Holocaust Day that is marked in Israel.

But in the long range, I think in order to stabilize the peace process, in order to give it depth and strength, it is very important that our Arab counterparts, one, take very concrete measures in order to put an end to such attacks and, secondly, condemn this particular act in the most clear of terms.

MS. BOWKER: Ambassador Rabinovich, certainly the condemnation, I can understand you're waiting for that, but in terms of what do you think the PLO can do at this stage to stop this kind of attack happening; they have no police force. It's very difficult, don't you think, for them to control members of Hamas who are actually against the PLO and against -- very much against the peace process.

AMB. RABINOVICH: Well, indeed, I've not asked for any direct action by the PLO now because they are still not there. We would like to conduct the negotiations in order to enable the PLO to take charge in Gaza, which is the source of most of this violent activity, and then to impose law and order in Gaza and to prevent terrorism. But for the time being, I think that it's very important for the PLO and the chairman, who speak in the name of the Palestinian people, to send a very clear message that this particular act and any other similar act do not belong in the web of relations between Israelis and Palestinians.

MS. BOWKER: Ambassador Rabinovich, one complaint that the Palestinians have made recently is that there is a vacuum, if you will, a power vacuum being created in the occupied territories, specifically Gaza and -- where -- now because the Israeli army is pulling out they yet have not been able to put a police force on the ground, that this is creating a very dangerous power vacuum. What would you say to that?

AMB. RABINOVICH: We recognize that a vacuum need not be and must not be created. We are discussing with the PLO practical arrangements. We have allowed the early arrival of the nucleus of a Palestinian police force in Gaza and in Jericho precisely in order to prevent the emergence of such a vacuum.

MS. BOWKER: Ambassador Rabinovich, the other thing I would have to say is you -- your government right now is saying you want the peace process to go ahead, you want the Israeli withdrawal to go ahead. There are, nonetheless, people on the ground who are very, very upset by this attack, who were already against the peace process, who are now against it even more. What are you going to do to convince the people on the ground that this is the way to go? I'm talking about Israelis here.

AMB. RABINOVICH: There are two ways to proceed about it. One is to proceed in the peace process to reach agreements, to implement them, to produce results, to bring change about on the ground, and to persuade those who need to be persuaded that the peace -- or the road of peace is not a perfect road but it's the best, it's the only road.

Second is -- and this is an appeal directed to our Palestinian interlocutors and to our other Arab interlocutors -- Syrians, Jordanians and others -- that they can show no ambivalence about such acts, that they need to signal very clearly to their own constituencies and to the Israeli public at home that there's been a change of heart on the side of the Arab world; that the Arab governments, as distinct from Hamas and other such organizations, have made a strategic decision to pursue the peaceful road with Israel. This will help with Israeli public opinion, including the opponents of the peace process inside Israel.

MS. BOWKER: Ambassador Rabinovich, thank you for joining us.