Palestinian Said proposes binational state

By Wafa Amr

JERUSALEM (Reuters): Palestinian-American intellectual Edward Said believes the only long-term solution to the bloody Palestinian-Israeli conflict would be to form a federal union between a future Palestinian state and Israel.

"I don't think it's a viable solution now, but I think in the long run ... it's the only solution that seems to take into account the reality of the two peoples who basically claim the same land," Said told Reuters in an interview in Jerusalem.

He said that, before the union, a Palestinian state must be established on all lands occupied by Israel in the 1967 war.

"A binational state, a federal union seems to me the only reasonable solution for the Israelis, who cannot continue to live in this part of the world basically as an occupying, bullying, aggressive force which is the language of (Israeli Prime Minister Ariel) Sharon and all those who preceded him."

Nearly 600 people have been killed in fighting since the Palestinians erupted in revolt against Israeli occupation last September after overall peace talks stalled. Each side blames the other for the violence.

Said, a Palestinian refugee who lives in the United States, is professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. He is author of 17 political and cultural books.

Said said it was in Israel's interest to accept the binational state solution and live in the region with tolerance and understanding. In 10 years' time, he said, Palestinians would achieve demographic parity with Israelis, and Israelis were already a minority in a region of over 280 million Arabs.

"I mean they're not any more secure now than they were 53 years ago, in fact they're getting less secure, so I think they have to take the lead at some point in some way other than this military thing which destroys the prospects of a decent future for them and for us," he said.

Yossi Beilin, an Israeli negotiator and one of the architects of the 1993 PLO-Israel peace deals, told Israel's Ha'aretz newspaper in an interview he is genuinely worried about the time when the Jews become a minority on the West side of the Jordan River.

"We are just a few years from it, less than a decade -- that is what constantly preoccupies me," Beilin said.

"Because if that day comes and we don't have a border, if on that day there is no Palestinian state on the other side of a border, all hell will break lose here. So what I'm saying is that a Palestinian state is a lifebelt of the Jewish state," he added.

Said said Israel's use of excessive force and its tightening of blockades on Palestinian areas since the Intifada (uprising) began was suicidal and had to end.

"This is the kind of warfare that really disappeared in the 20th century ... This is much worse than South Africa under apartheid, much worse. They never had whole townships isolated and closed off, they never had air force attacks against villages and towns," he said.

Israel, citing security concerns, has tightened a blockade of Palestinian areas, severely restricting the movement of goods and people and crippling the already ailing Palestinian economy. Palestinians say closures are collective punishment.

For Said, violence was not the way to end the conflict. Instead Palestinians should adopt a strategy of making the Israelis understand how to live with them as equals, "not as a superior force, like Sharon".

Said believes that this Intifada (uprising) "should be thought of as an education for Israelis that they can't do what they want, and for the Palestinians that there's a limit to what they can do now.

"I think the next step is not more bombs but simply cultural confrontation, leaflets in the Israeli market place saying this is what your people do with facts and figures and pictures."

He said it was more effective to throw a leaflet at a tank, or go inside Israel and "instead of blowing up a civilian bus which is criminal, bring a barrel full of paper which says this is what you're doing and we are ready to talk peacefully and on the basis of equality".

Said, always critical of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat and the Palestine Liberation Organization's policies, said it was time the Palestinians had a new, moderate leadership that knows how the world works.

Said has been critical of the Oslo accords which he says were Palestinian capitulation to Israel. He said the Palestinian Authority did not have popular backing for Oslo.

"What did they (Palestinian leadership) do the last eight years after Oslo? They imprisoned us, that's what they did and they gave the Israelis the key. They want to do it again, so unfortunately we have to go through it one more time, twice more, three times, and in the end they'll give up," Said said.

The solution, he said, was to form an effective campaign to stop American blind financial aid to Israel.

Israel was committing atrocities against Palestinians with the permission of the United States and the American people, he said. "This is because of the absence of an Arab campaign, but it's not just Arabs now.

"Many different elements (in the U.S.) are now beginning to congregate around the issue of the Palestinians and Israelis, this campaign is beginning. It's now quite evident throughout the country."