Fayez Abdullah Sayegh - Firing Line Appearance (1974)

William F. Buckley Jr.: It is the contention of some that nothing will happen until disposition is made of the demands of the Palestinian refugees. Prominent as an advocate of their cause is Dr. Fayez Sayegh. He is in fact a philosopher by training who did his doctorate on existentialism in Georgetown. He was born in Syria, the son of a Presbyterian minister, and was raised in Palestine attending the American University in Beirut. He has taught at Stanford University, at Yale, at Beirut, at Oxford. But in the past decade, he has served primarily as consultant to Arab states and the United Nations. He is now the principal consultant to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the state of Kuwait. He has, since 1970, served as rapporteur for the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Security. His books and pamphlets, written in Arabic and English, have appeared in many languages. I'd like to begin by asking Dr. Sayegh, why is it that the Palestinians resent so strongly the regime of King Hussein?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, in the first place, The Hashemite family, of which King Hussein is the present representative, appeared to the Palestinians to have been less identified with the cause of the Palestinians in their struggle with Zionism than any other Arab regime or government. But more directly, the events of 1970 followed by the events of 1971, in which King Hussein confronted the Palestinian Fida'een groups in 1970, and later on confronted the Palestinian refugees and civilians in his kingdom. These are the main reasons for the lack of trust now between the Palestinians and King Hussein.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, when people in America refer to the, quote, moderate stand of King Hussein, are they saying precisely that about him which antagonizes the Palestinians?

Fayez Sayegh: No, I think moderate is a relative term. It depends on what are the extremes you are talking about. There are many Arab leaders who are also referred to in Washington as moderate. And they are not resented in the same way by the Palestinians. It is not his moderation, whatever that might mean. It is his having taken hostile positions to the Palestinians as such that makes him a target of their hostility.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, now, is that hostile position something that is historic in force, or is it something that is intended to impede the Palestinians from achieving their tactical objectives?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, as I said, the Palestinians believe that even his grandfather, King Abdullah before him, was ready to make compromises with Zionism, which the Palestinians themselves were not prepared to make and other Arab leaders were not ready to make. And when Hussein came to the throne, he also appeared sometimes to be willing to make the kind of compromise that compromises the position of the Palestinians.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, would you say it would be a compromise in the sense that would be unacceptable to recognize the right of the State of Israel to survive? Would that be an example of the kind of compromise that antagonizes the Palestinians?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, as you know, Resolution 242 of the Security Council speaks about acknowledgement of the right of every state in the area to existence, political independence, and so on. And several Arab states have declared their acceptance of Resolution 242. So that is not the issue. It is what kind of Israel you are prepared to accept and to recognize as having legitimacy. The kind of Israel that evicted the Palestinians and keeps them out or the Israel that is prepared to permit them to go back to their homes to live along with the Jews in a state that is not as exclusive as the present state of Israel is. The recognition of an Israel that would completely rule out the return of the Palestinians is what is unacceptable to the Palestinians.

William F. Buckley Jr.: And is there any statement by King Hussein that seems to have come out for that kind of Israel?

Fayez Sayegh: And he seems to have made several statements that would indicate that he does not expect the return en masse of the Palestine refugees to what is now Israel.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Now, you say that there are several governments in the Mideast that accepted the Yarring Resolution. My impression was that all of them did. Is that incorrect? No, not all of them did. Which one did not?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, as you know, no Arab country was a member of the Security Council when the Security Council voted on it. So it was not a case of being able to tell by their vote who accepted and who didn't. But then immediately, during the same meeting in which that resolution was adopted, Egypt and Jordan announced that they were ready to accept the resolution. Syria announced that it was not prepared to accept it. In 1970, the question came before the General Assembly in a resolution which reaffirmed Security Council Resolution 242. At that time, there were 14 Arab states in the General Assembly. Seven voted for the resolution. Seven, announced their non-participation in the vote because they did not want to commit themselves to the acceptance of Resolution 242.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Is this because they read into 242 something, an inflection that was anti-Palestinian in their interpretation?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, I should perhaps, just for the sake of historical authenticity, add that in 71 and 72, the voting changed in the General Assembly. And some of those who had not participated in 70 voted for the resolution. making reservations only about how they interpret it with respect to the rights of the Palestinians. So I didn't want to leave the impression that the position was still seven versus seven.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Is it fair to say that between 1970 and 1971 or two, exegesis on that resolution was causing it to mean certain things to some people that it had meant to them two or three years earlier?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, there were supplementary pronouncements by the General Assembly that made it more palatable to the pro-Palestinian Arab, or non-Arab for that matter. For example, the pronouncements by the Assembly that recognizes the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. And then the pronouncements that there can be no peace in the Middle East that is just and durable, that does not meet the legitimate aspirations and rights of the Palestinian people. And then the most recent pronouncement that a just settlement of the refugee problem, which is a phrase contained in Resolution 242 of the Security Council, requires the exercise by the Palestinians of their right to return, recognized as early as 1948. Now, all these make, of course, 242 more acceptable and less offensive to pro-Palestinians.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Yes. Now, as I understand it, your position really has never been that a return even to the 1948 frontiers would be just. you having made it plain in your own pronouncements on the subject that the original subdivision, as authorized by the United Nations, at least temporarily, in 1947, itself violated the guarantees of the United Nations Charter. Have you revised your position on that?

Fayez Sayegh: Personally, no. I would say that the General Assembly, we all know, has only the powers to make recommendations. Therefore, it cannot create states. It cannot divide people's homelands. It cannot make decisions that would amount to a violation of the right to self-determination, point number eight.

William F. Buckley Jr.: This is what you say, and this is what the Charter says. But in fact, they proceed in that direction all the time, didn't they? The vote for Guinea-Bissau was precisely that, as far as I can understand it. It didn't give a juridical standing, but it gave a juridical standing insofar as the General Assembly was concerned.

Fayez Sayegh: All I will have to say is that the resolution recommending partition in 1947 called itself, in paragraph three, a recommendation. Yes. And a recommendation is non-binding. A recommendation is not a legal base for anything that is built upon it. Yes, my contention is that the problem is not one of borders, where the borders are within Palestine. One square mile of Palestine in which a state exclusively belonging to non-Palestinians, to the exclusion of Palestinians themselves, would be a denial of their right to self-determination. So it's not a matter of borders. It's a matter of the right of the Palestinians to self-determination. They are ready to live together with Jews in a state that would be a human state, that would be a Palestinian state that belongs to all its inhabitants. to which all its inhabitants would equally belong.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, as simply as a matter of simple arithmetic, this would mean a Palestinian-dominated state, wouldn't it, assuming that all of the refugees chose to return?

Fayez Sayegh: No, as a matter of fact, as a matter of simple arithmetic, this is an ideal period to speak of this kind of solution because it would be evenly divided. It would be about 3 million Palestinians, 3 million Israelis. If you deduct from the total number of Israelis the Arab population, citizens of Israel, you'll have an equal number of Palestinian Arabs and Jews who have come to settle in Palestine since the eviction of the Palestinians.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, this would not, in your projection, meet the essential requirements of a Jewish state. There would no longer be a Jewish state as such. It would simply be an area of land in which Jews and Palestinians live jointly, right?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, I don't know why I should meet the essential point.

William F. Buckley Jr.: No, no, I'm not saying we should, but the reason I'm taking so much time is, in the first place, because you're a very good historian, and in the second place, because of what's coming up now, really, is the question of whether Israel is going to survive in a sense understood by the Israelis. Now, most of the rhetoric one here is reassuring on this point, even from President Sadat, but it seems to me that it's not at all reassuring if one analyses it as, if I may say so ruthlessly, as he did.

Fayez Sayegh: Well, let me say that when the General Assembly in 1947 used the word Jewish state, it did not intend an exclusive Jewish state.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Because it said... Yeah, it made provisions for the protection of the minority.

Fayez Sayegh: It made provisions for the protection of the Arabs who were to continue to live in what was earmarked to be a Jewish state, who outnumbered the Jews. And also it said specifically, this is not a solution to the worldwide Jewish question. This is a solution to the Palestine question that we are recommending. So there was no intention of creating an exclusively Jewish state, even in the recommendation of the General Assembly.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, I think it's obvious from the fact that the United Nations began to censure Israel as early as 1948 that Israel took it and ran. This is certainly not unique in history and certainly not unique in the 20th century. The United Nations coexists with a whole series of anomalies. It coexists with East Europe, which you never hear criticized in the United Nations as a raw colonialist venture deal. Now, if the Israelis say, well, we got our original encouragement from Lord Balfour and the supplementary encouragement from the League of Nations in the 20s, and then we got the edge from 1947, and then all of a sudden the major powers began recognizing us, that had an effect, did it not, of conferring a juridical, if not a moral, status on the state of Israel, didn't it?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, first of all, the Balfour Declaration did not speak of a Jewish state. It spoke of a national home. Yes. Provided it does not prejudice the rights of Jews outside or the rights of non-Jews inside Palestine. The League of Nations men, and there was a Churchill white paper of 1922 interpreting this to say this does not mean subordination of Arab by Jew. And the Zionist organization was asked to declare its acceptance of this interpretation before Britain would go ahead and accept the mandate. And it did so in July of 1922. The League of Nations mandate also had Article 6 and Article 9, which made safeguards against the position and rights of the non-Jews in Palestine from being prejudiced by the creation of the national home. We're still not speaking of a state. There was no mention of a state. Then came the General Assembly recommendation, which, while speaking of a state, described it in such a way as to make it clear this will not be an exclusively Jewish state, nor a state for all the Jews of the world.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, but yes, this I'm aware of, but what I'm saying, what I'm discussing is the situation that then evolutionized. There then was born, then there was born something that we do all recognize as a Jewish state. It was something that was spawned as a result of a whole series of exertions, including military exertions, right? That state was then recognized by most of the countries of the world. Now, that was 25 years ago. And what I'm asking you now is whether your analysis, which takes into account the incompleteness of the various mandates, really sheds a lot of light on the current questions

Fayez Sayegh: Well, you say it was recognized by a number of states. But what do you do with the fact that as recently as last December, 97 states supported the resolution affirming the rights of the Palestinian people, including its right to self-determination?

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, what you really do is say this is UN politics, because I don't think there's any reason at all, I suppose, that the United Nations has become a reliable distillery of negotiable morals.

Fayez Sayegh: Yes, but the recognition you are speaking of, of Israel by a number of states, is by the same states who compose the United Nations. I mean, it can't be important in one context and unimportant in another.

William F. Buckley Jr.: No, I said the major states. I don't think that you would find any state that is opposed to seeking some form of justice for the Palestinians. But I think that most of the important countries in the world, I mean the powerful countries in the world, would say that to simply repeal the existence of Israel is a price that nobody seems to be prepared to pay. When I say nobody, I mean England does and France, the United States.

Fayez Sayegh: Well, when you speak of powerful countries, I suppose you mean England, France, the United States, the Soviet Union, China.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, the Soviet Union, as you know, hasn't got much concern for juridical questions. Their objectives, I don't have to instruct you on the subject, really have to do with turmoil rather than stability of peace.

Fayez Sayegh: Well, we'll leave that aside whether I agree with you on that point or not. But take the United States, France, and England. Every year since 1948, they have supported, and in fact the United States has brought before the assembly every year since 1948, up to 73, the resolution that says the Palestinians must be permitted to return to their homes and property. This is a recognition that is overwhelming, almost unanimous in the United Nations. It is voted on with all but one of the countries voting in its favor, large and small, every year up to December 1973. Now this to me is as important as the recognition of Israel because the recognition of Israel as a reality in the world of international politics is not exclusive of a recognition by the components of the international system that this Israel constitutes, as it now is, an infringement on the rights of another people, and that some rectification of the situation is required in order for stability and peace in the Middle East to take place.

William F. Buckley Jr.: I think you're correct, and I've never seen it said otherwise. the limitation of the term rectification is what they tend to concentrate on. And I don't think the United States ever has suggested that the reincorporation of the Palestinians into the borders of what we now know of as Israel, even if it's suggested overwhelming the resident Israeli or the Jewish population there, is something that we have urged, is it?

Fayez Sayegh: Yes. Your government has submitted every year the draft resolution that is voted upon regarding the refugees. And every year, it says, expresses its regret that Resolution 194, Roman 3, has not been implemented, calls for the implementation of it, reaffirms it. And Resolution 194, Roman 3, said in paragraph 11 that the refugees willing to return to their homes and to live at peace with their neighbors should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Now, why practicable? What is the meaning of practical? Meaning that it is not practical for so long as the Israelis have reason to suppose that the reincorporation of the Palestinians might cause a civil war situation? Is that what you mean by practical?

Fayez Sayegh: No, no. The wording has to be taken in the context of The Arab-Israeli war of May and June had barely ended. The Security Council had called for discussions towards an armistice. These discussions were to take place in the following month, and they were envisaging a quick arrangement between the Arab states and Israel. And they did not, therefore, say, let these hundreds of thousands of refugees come back tomorrow. It's at the earliest practicable date. But I think they did not have in mind either a 25-year delay.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, if... No, I don't think they did either. If you were concerned with the defense of Israel as a professional matter... Would you raise as legitimate the question whether the reincorporation of 3 million people would in fact cause an untenable situation for so long as you were uncertain about the disposition of the surrounding countries to allow the state to survive?

Fayez Sayegh: I'm sure you want me to answer you as honestly as I can.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Sure, sure.

Fayez Sayegh: I would believe if I were an Israeli entrusted with advising the Israelis as to how to conduct their foreign policy, I would believe that there is far more long-range security for Israel in being based on justice than there is in being based on power and injustice. And therefore, I would believe there would be far greater security for Israel through the return of the Palestinians. And incidentally, I would want to say here, when I speak of the three million Palestinians, that is a return to all of Palestine. And therefore, you can then speak of an expansion of Israel a territorial expansion. You are talking of a readjustment in the whole situation where all of Palestine, that which became Israel and that which did not, would be the home for the Jews and the Palestinians that are in Palestine or that are from Palestine. If I were in charge of the future of Israel, I'd see that there is far greater security to be gained by restituting the rights of the Palestinians than by continuing to deny them and thereby creating continuing hostility by the Arab states to Israel. Because one is a cause and one is an effect. The hostility of the Arab states to Israel is the result of what Israel has done to the Palestinians.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, now, you say it very persuasively, which leads me to ask you the question, Why has the leadership of Israel taken an opposite position? It isn't presumably because there's any ancient antagonism towards the Arabs. On the contrary, they got along very well with the Arabs for centuries. It isn't surely as a result of their coveting the wealth of the Palestinians, who are among the poorest people in the world. It isn't because of their worry that they'll be... No, they're among the poorest people in the world.

Fayez Sayegh: They are not, when they were at home. Now they are among the poorest people.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Now, yeah. And certainly it isn't because they are afraid that there will be massive Israeli unemployment because the Palestinians are better educated, because they are among the least educated people in the area. So what is it that motivates Israel other than its desire for sort of a totally Israeli state?

Fayez Sayegh: That's it. I think the answer there is not security, but... security within the framework of maintaining an exclusively Jewish state. And I would say that the establishment in Israel is still made up principally of the former disciples of the early ranks of Zionism. And because of that, they are still more ideologically motivated than motivated in terms of an understanding of national interest in a much broader sense than within the strictures of an ideological school of thought.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, obviously it's not fair to ask you whether you should feel any sympathy for this sort of national desire, but it is not unreasonable to ask you whether you don't understand that other people feel a sympathy. for their wanting this. Their territorial demands certainly haven't been egregious, measured in terms of the area of that part of the world, and their devotion to the project has been total. Are you simply saying the fact of the matter is that their dream runs a thought your postulates of justice there and under the circumstances is not to be incorrect.

Fayez Sayegh: I think you've asked me a number of questions in one sentence. I would say first that I consider it unreasonable that there should be a Jewish state. Because why is there no Catholic state? Why is there no Protestant state? Why is there no Islamic state as such? Why don't the Catholics want a Catholic state and the Protestants covet a Protestant state and so on? Are we speaking about Judaism?

William F. Buckley Jr.: Can Judaism not be fulfilled without a Jewish state? We're speaking about a vision. The Catholic vision was never of a Catholic state. It was of a Catholic world, in a sense. But it was never one that was wedded to the notion of occupying a piece of territory. But this certainly has been the case at least for a hundred years among the Israels and by tradition, cultural tradition, two thousand years.

Fayez Sayegh: Well, there are many Jews who would disagree with you, who would say that the teachings of Judaism The prophetic streak in Judaism does not envisage a statehood tied to a piece of land as essential to the fulfillment of Judaism. Whereas there is another streak, the pharisaic streak, that does, and that Zionism is a child of one of these two trends and not of the other.

William F. Buckley Jr.: But I'm not a... Well, I know there were lots of Jews who were opposed to the formation of Israel. Yes. But the fact of the matter is that those who politically dominated were at least Zionists to that extent.

Fayez Sayegh: But if you suppose that the Zionists had found a piece of land in which they could have formed a Jewish state without inflicting damage on the rights of others... I would say if they want a state of their own, they can have it, as long as it does not interfere with the aspirations of another people to continue to lead a normal life. In fact, Herzl in his memoir speaks of one of his greatest colleagues and friends who told him one day, I understand people are going to be able to go to Mars. Wouldn't you wait for your dream to be fulfilled until that happens? And then you can have a Jewish state in Mars without doing injustice to anybody. But when they come to Palestine, a land already settled, inhabited by people who want to be left alone, who want to lead a normal life, who want to have the same kind of freedom that the people of Ghana or the people of Chad or the people of Indonesia have coveted and attained. and then Zionism becomes the obstacle to that, then I would say, in order to fulfill the ideological aspirations of some Jews, it is not just to do so by denying the natural aspirations of all Palestinians.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, that is, of course, correct. But historically, it really becomes irrelevant, doesn't it? Because as much could be said to question the credentials of anybody who lives anywhere unless he was a part of the original people who inhabited that area. The Indians in North America, as a case in point, the Spanish and Mexico and the whites in parts of Africa. But you are not merely a historical moralist. You are somebody who's engaged in diplomacy. And are you simply saying, because my Dr. Saig's convictions are so firm on the original injustice, I declare that Israel may not be permitted and will not be permitted to survive?

Fayez Sayegh: Yeah. I'm saying neither of the two. I'm saying because 3 million Palestinians are so firm in their determination not to acquiesce in being dispossessed.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Half a million live in Israel right now, 487,000.

Fayez Sayegh: 300,000, 330,000.

William F. Buckley Jr.: 330,000. Well, why have they been... how have they managed to coexist if they're so fanatically opposed, as you suggest?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, they're in their homes to begin with. They have not been dispossessed, although some of them, like the people in Bir'am and Iqrit, have been. But secondly, they have not managed to survive in the sense of having equality of treatment with the Jew in Israel. The Palestinian under Israeli jurisdiction does not have equality with the Jew under Israeli jurisdiction. No fair-minded observer of the internal conditions in Israel would deny that statement. Even the Israelis themselves do not deny that statement. There are discrepancies in the treatment of the Palestinian who is in Israel and under its jurisdiction and the treatment of the Jew who is in it. And, in fact, even among the Jews there are discrepancies between the Ashkenazi white European Jew and the Oriental Jew. So the three million Palestinians, I started by saying, are determined that they will not acquiesce in their arbitrary disposition by someone else. No amount of cajolery has succeeded in the past 25 years. Bribery has not succeeded. Hammershield once offered something like $9 billion to help resettle the refugees outside their homes. The Arab governments, some of them were ready to accept. It was the Palestinians who said no. No amount of cajolery or bribery or intimidation has succeeded in sweeping them under the carpet, in making them disappear, in making them abandon their aspirations. And therefore, as a realist, I say, You cannot plan for a peaceful settlement in the Middle East that ignores the legitimate aspirations and rights of the Palestinians.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Was legitimate an ornate word as you phrased that? Because, for instance, you can say there's not going to be any settlement in East Europe unless you recognize the illegitimate aspirations of the Soviet Union.

Fayez Sayegh: I use legitimate, not illegitimate.

William F. Buckley Jr.: I know, but I'm showing you an instance of the word illegitimate. Is it the fact that it's legitimate aspirations or the fact that they are simply irreducible aspirations that makes this... that is the salient datum here?

Fayez Sayegh: The reason I use the word legitimate is to distinguish between some aspirations which may not be justified as a matter of conjecture or plain possibility It is possible for three million people to be persuaded of having some aspirations which have no grounds in justice. I would not be as zealous in defending their case as I would be when I'm focusing on their legitimate aspirations. And that's why I used the word in the connection with... I could rephrase it to say, their aspiration to return to their homes and to exercise self-determination on the soil of their country.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, why self-determination? I mean, given the fact that self-determination is an oddity in the world, why would you say that all of a sudden you require for them a democratic tradition? Or do you mean something else by self-determination?

Fayez Sayegh: No, I mean self-determination to rule themselves, to set up their own governmental institutions in the creation of which they have a say and not to have it imposed on them by someone else. And this is not an oddity in the world of today.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, it certainly is not an oddity in the Middle East. Take, say, Egypt. When last did they have an election that is in any sense provably a reflection of what the people want?

Fayez Sayegh: We differ there. I think that if the elections that they had under Nasser and now under Sadat had taken place, I cannot see a different result than the selection of Nasser by the average Egyptian or the selection of Sadat.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, that's reassuring, but I do think that you should be careful in the use of the word self-determination, given the way it's used in that part of the world. Can you say that King Faisal is, in a sense, the anointed leader of the democratic legions of Saudi Arabia?

Fayez Sayegh: Are you speaking now of self-determination and the civil rights of the individual vis-à-vis his government?

William F. Buckley Jr.: I think you're making a racial point, really. You're simply saying, I agree to accept that it is self-determination if the racial stock that desires this country is in fact physically in charge of it, never mind the instruments by which they are governed.

Fayez Sayegh: If you're trying to get me to say that I consider imperialism and colonialism essentially incompatible with basic human rights. Yes, I do say so, and I mean it. An Englishman in my hometown telling me what I can do and what I cannot do is more obnoxious to me than a countryman of mine doing that.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Even if the Englishman grants you rights and your countryman doesn't, would you rather be ruled by Winston Churchill or General Amin?

Fayez Sayegh: Well, I happen to...

William F. Buckley Jr.: If you were a Ugandese.

Fayez Sayegh: I have not been to Uganda. I don't know the answer of the Ugandese. But I would definitely feel that I have better chances of correcting the situation when all I have to contend with is one of my own countrymen or a clique of my own countrymen. than when I have to contend with foreign legions and foreign powers that are far beyond my ability to correct or to get my voice to them.

William F. Buckley Jr.: But it is nevertheless a part of the lessons of history. And I'm trying here to get the dialectic between you as a moralist and you as a practical man. It is one of the lessons of history, right, that... Different people occupy different parts of the world. Sometimes they do so with evangelistic imperatives, as in the case of many of the Spanish in parts of the world. Sometimes they do this simply by sheer brute force of conquest, as the Soviet Union, for instance, dominates East Europe. are irrespective of what the combination of these qualities was that caused the Jewish homeland to appear. We have a situation in which they are determined to hang on to it. We have a situation in which the United States has, in effect, promised that they will help them to retain their identity. And we have a situation in which every bit is much disposed to die of the Palestinians rather than yield. So under the circumstances, Wouldn't it be inventive, at least of you, to try to come up with a situation that takes into account the status quo, grants Israel hegemony over a part of what is now thought of as Israel, and attempt some other solution for the Palestinians?

Fayez Sayegh: Or is your answer as simple as that they won't do it? I have been attempting a solution. The original thesis is the Zionist point of view that says Palestine is our land. We have to set up an exclusively Jewish state, what Herzl called a Judenstaat in Palestine, which is ours, and in which we will be nobody else's land. On the other hand, you have the position of the Palestinian radicals who say the Jews who are now in Palestine came against our will. The British opened the door to them and then later on they evicted us and came by their own will. They have no place there. If this is thesis and antithesis, I'm providing the synthesis. The synthesis being that the Palestinians and the Jews live together in a state which will respect both, which will respect the rights of each, and to the good of which both would compete in who is going to contribute more.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, but this is schematically exquisite. But in point of fact, the notion of an Arabia all of a sudden cropping up in that part of the world is anti-historical. You just finished a moment ago hesitating over whether you as a Ugandan wouldn't prefer, I mean perhaps even to Churchill, under the circumstances, can we really conceive of a state as torn by recent history as Palestine now is, actually coexisting with a single government? when any Jewish leader of a particular unit would be considered abhorrent to the Arab, to the Palestinian, and vice versa?

Fayez Sayegh: Sometimes I wonder who is being more practical and who is being more... The fact of the matter remains this. For millennia, for centuries at least, Jews, when they were being persecuted in Europe, discriminated against in Christian countries, had no place in the world to go to in which they felt they would be welcomed and given the opportunity to lead normal life, except the Arab world. They were coming to our part of the world to live among us. and living among us, enjoying whatever we had, be it big or small, and our enjoying whatever they had to offer, to the point where they became indistinguishable in their dress, in their eating habits, in their talking, except that in their faith they prayed on Saturday and the Muslim among us prayed on Friday and the Christian on Sunday. Until Zionism came, it was perfectly normal for Jews and Arabs to live together in our part of the world. So I'm not presenting a vision that is against the nature of things. I'm presenting a vision that would be a return to the nature of things once the aberrations of the last few decades are removed from the world.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Yes, I understand that, but isn't it also possible to look forward to a situation in which a secure Israel would begin to grant some of those rights it has denied Arabs for fear of the civil rights situation, just as we denied the whole South its rights after the war? are leading to a gradual reconciliation. You are really asking for much more radical departure than I am suggesting in terms of reincorporation with the Palestinians.

Fayez Sayegh: It is possible that in greater security, Israel would give the Arabs within it under its jurisdiction, more rights. But it is less acceptable to me to envisage a situation to come in which Israel is going to allow the Palestinians who are outside its borders to return to their homes. Therefore, what you are speaking about is a possibility of some justice to some Palestinians. but not justice to all the Palestinians.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, the West Bank is in what historical sense Palestinian?

Fayez Sayegh: The West Bank is in the sense that it was part of Palestine any time the word Palestine was used.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, therefore, the 650,000 Palestinians who are there now, you consider homeless or not homeless?

Fayez Sayegh: I consider they are living in occupied territories under alien military domination.

William F. Buckley Jr.: But if they were given the authority exercised before 1967, would that be a huge step in the right direction?

Fayez Sayegh: as a substitute for or as a step.

William F. Buckley Jr.: No, no. If the West Bank were to become Palestine-governed, would this hugely assuage your fears?

Fayez Sayegh: It would be an improvement over the present situation. It would be an improvement over the return of the West Bank to Jordanian authority, but it would not be a substitute for full satisfaction of all the aspirations of the Palestinians.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Dr. William Orbach is with the Religious Studies Program at the University of Louisville. Dr. Orbach?

William Orbach: Yes, I have two points, actually, which are interconnected, which I'd like to ask you. First of all, your statement about an Arab democratic secular state in the area of what is now Palestine is most interesting. I've looked at the map, and for some reason, I can't find a single democratic secular Arab state in the region. In Egypt, Morocco, Oman, Saudi Arabia... is Sudan, Tunisia, and Yemen. Islam is a state religion. On the other hand, in Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Saudi Arabia, southern Yemen, and Syria, all these states can hardly be considered democratic unless you want to define democracy as that great paragon of liberalism and freedom. The Soviet Union defines democracy. If you want to respond that there is need for such a state because of the great diversity in population of such a state, may I point out that Sudan, which has 30% blacks, is not democratic nor secular. Even in Kuwait. by the way, Kuwait does have a degree of representative government, though through a national assembly, but it is still ruled by a distinct aristocracy. In addition, while native Kuwaitis are a minority in Kuwait themselves, foreigners, which is including Palestinians, who are the majority, are neither given the right to own property nor the right to vote. Therefore, the Arabs have never established a democratic secular state in any of the area. Why would it work now?

William F. Buckley Jr.: That's one point I'd like to... Well, let's just wait with that one point.

Fayez Sayegh: First of all, I want to correct you regarding what you said about Kuwait. In Kuwait, the residents of Kuwait are 750,000. The natives of Kuwait, plus the naturalized residents under the law, are 350,000. Every naturalized Kuwaiti, that's to say every citizen of Kuwait, votes. Those who do not vote are the aliens, and I don't think there is any country in the world in which aliens vote in the national elections of that country. They are the ones who are residents, but alien. They have not been naturalized. For all I know, they have not applied to be naturalized, or the law of nationality does not apply to them because there is a certain length of residence requirement and so on. So let's know what we are talking about. In Kuwait, one can be very proud, and I, although I am not a Kuwaiti, I am proud of the fact that Kuwaitis share their wealth with not only the residents of Kuwait, but with Arabs throughout the Arab world, and more recently with non-Arab developing countries. There is a great deal of opportunity for welfare to the non-Kuwaiti resident of Kuwait that is given in Kuwait. Now, you ask me whether... the fact that in the other Arab countries there is no sufficient democracy to satisfy you, whether that does not cast doubt on my call for a democratic state in Palestine. I say, okay, let us try it and let Palestine then become a beacon of light to the rest of the Arab world. Is there any harm in giving other Arabs an opportunity to see democracy in a better way at work than it is experienced by them?

William F. Buckley Jr.: Under Jewish leadership? No, it will be under Palestinian leadership, Arab and Jewish. Well, but the Jews, they have an experience with democracy that manifestly the Arabs do not, right?

Fayez Sayegh: In Israel now.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Yeah, in the Palestine area.

Fayez Sayegh: But when the Palestinians return, I'm hoping... You see, this gentleman is commenting not on something I said on this program, but on something I said before I came on this program.

William F. Buckley Jr.: I was wondering, because I didn't remember you talking about the Secretary of State. It would be a little easier if you asked about things he says on this program. You have a second question. Excuse me, Dr. O'Brien.

William Orbach: Yes. I'd like to ask, and along the lines which you've established, I don't see the reason why Israel, the Jews in Israel, should not have the same right of national self-determination as any other state has. Now, if you want to argue that Jews are not a nation, well, that's a very debatable point. I have, for example, here a definition by Ernest Renan, which was set in Sorbonne in 1882, in which he defined a nation as follows. What constitutes a nation is not speaking the same tongue or belonging to the same ethnic group, but having accomplished great things in common in the past and the wish to accomplish them in the future. I think that could fit very well for the Jews. Practically any definition of a nation, I think the best one is simply a group of people that wishes to call itself a nation, is a nation. I don't see why the Jews should not have the right of self-determination, as well as the Palestinians. I have no objection to the Palestinians having self-determination. But first of all, till 1917, there was no separate state of Palestine. It was all part of Greater Syria. When it was made a separate state of Palestine, in 1922, King Emir Abdullah ran out of the kingdom. And therefore, Winston Churchill, then colonial secretary, divided Palestine, giving Jordan to Emir Abdullah. I see no reason why. that Jordan and perhaps the West Bank should not be a Palestinian state. After all, two-thirds of the population is Palestinian. That way you'd satisfy both demands. You'd have a Palestinian state and you'd have a Jewish state. And if they want to cooperate, and if we see that they can cooperate after a number of years, then we can create a federal state. But I see no reason why the Jews should be denied the right of self-determination when the Palestinians aren't.

Fayez Sayegh: I think the right to self-determination belongs to every people, barring none, excluding none, as long as it is on a land that rightfully belongs to it. The land of Palestine, the portion of it that has been purchased and rightfully acquired by the Jews is 5.6% of the total land area of Palestine. The remainder was never sold, never given away, never surrendered, never leased, never given up by the Palestinians. So I say that if the Jews want to have self-determination, if there is any piece of land in the world which they own rightfully, They are entitled to self-determination on it. Perhaps they are entitled to self-determination in New York. Perhaps in Florida. I don't know. But certainly in Palestine, they don't own the country. They don't own the land. The land, they took by force. And that certainly disqualifies them from exercising the right of self-determination on the land that they took by force.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Well, you'd have an awfully different atlas of the world if you were to apply that universally.

Fayez Sayegh: Sir, the Zionists tried to apply that retroactively going back 2,000 years. And the reason why many people supported them in their having a national home in Palestine was that they were there 2,000 years ago. The Palestinians were there 25 years ago. And in my arithmetic, 25 is much closer to the present than 2,000.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Ms. Linda Greenberg is a student at the University of Louisville. Ms. Greenberg?

Lynn Greenberg: Yes, in your discussion of the creation of a Palestinian state, I assume that you're implying that it's in the best interest of the United States to support the Arab cause in the Middle East. Am I right in assuming that?

Fayez Sayegh: No, I assume that it's the best interest of the United States to support United States interests in the Middle East.

Lynn Greenberg: All right. Well, even in that case, I wonder if one can even begin to comprehend such an association on a moral plane. The residents of our city are exceptionally thankful that the April 3 tornado, which devastated large sections of Louisville, did not strike during school hours, thus preventing the death of thousands of schoolchildren. On the other hand, the Arab terrorists who committed the recent atrocity in Kiryat Shmona, killing 18 civilians, men, women, and children, went first to the schools in order to massacre school children. And now, the news this morning tells us that another band of terrorists killed seven civilians, including a family, and were holding a school building at Ma'alat Mashov, a kibbutz five miles south of the Lebanese border. where approximately 90 children were being held hostage under the threat of death. And the latest news bulletins indicate that more than 16 children may have been killed and 70 wounded. Since Arab terrorist operations do not emanate from the minds of deranged extremists, but are in fact an organized activity that could not survive a single week without the support, material aid, and encouragement which it receives from the Arab governments, including your own, how can American support for Arab governments, which bear full responsibility for the organization of such terrorist activities, be viewed as in the best interests of the United States?

Fayez Sayegh: First of all, all the figures you gave of school children killed by Arab terrorists do not amount to the number of Egyptian children killed in one Egyptian school by an Israeli air raid. And that was in 1970. If you want to speak about atrocities, atrocities unfortunately in that part of the world have been coming from both sides. I deplore terrorism, whether it is the terrorism that was perpetrated by Begin, who is now the leader of the opposition in Israel, as in the massacre of Deir Yassin, or the terrorism perpetrated by Palestinians. I deplore them both because in both instances innocent human beings are losing their lives in the mistaken belief that a political cause justifies that loss of life. And I've made these deplorations not in Louisville, Kentucky, but I've made them where they can be heard by the people directly concerned. I've made them in Kuwait, in Egypt, in Jordan, in Syria, in Lebanon, in statements and interviews that were published in the press of those countries. But having said this, I must tell you that in my conviction, terrorism perpetrated by individuals and terrorism perpetrated by governments must be equally condemned. We cannot condemn terrorism by individuals and condone it when it's perpetrated by governments. Only a month ago, the Israeli army, on instructions from its government, entered Lebanon. kidnapped 13 civilians and said, we'll hold them hostages until Lebanon returns two pilots who had parachuted into Lebanese territory when their plane was hit by Syrian fire. Now, that is an act of kidnapping for ransom that is as abhorrent when it's committed by a government as it is when it's committed by individual terrorists. When the Israeli Air Force shot down a Libyan civilian unarmed plane and killed 108 people, Was that terrorism or was that not terrorism? I'm just unable to accept the one-sidedness in which when an individual commits a crime, we call him a terrorist, but when a government which is supposed to act more responsibly and which has more means for creating bad crime at its disposal, when it commits that crime, we call it warfare or we call it something else. Terrorism was brought into the Middle East by the Zionist Irgun and Stern and Polmah 25 years before there was Palestinian terrorism. There were hundreds of mistaken Palestinians who apparently believe if the Zionists traveled the path of terror and got away with it, then this is our shortcut to get our rights. I believe this is mistaken. But the greater mistake is that of the pioneer in terrorism in the area, namely Zionism, and not of those who are reacting a quarter of a century later.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Mr. Salah al-Mazani is a foreign student from Kuwait at the University of Louisville.

Salah Almazani: Dr. Saig, do you think there will be a settlement in the Middle East in the future?

Fayez Sayegh: If this is a question for a prophecy, I would say that barring unforeseen events such as either a radical breakthrough by Mr. Kissinger in these few days or a radical breakdown in the discussions he is holding, They're barring such extreme unforeseen eventualities. The likelihood is there that a Geneva conference will be resumed in which some progress towards settlement will be reached, but it will be a settlement of the interstate question, the question between the Arab states and Israel, the question which revolves around the two problems of territorial integrity of the Arab states and recognition of Israel. There will be a settlement of that. But I don't see Geneva going to grapple with the problem of the Palestinians. If for no other reason than that the framework of the Geneva Conference is Resolution 242 of the Security Council, which does not mention the Palestinians and does not address itself to their problem. Resolution 242 addressed itself to the legacy of the war of 1967. The problem of the Palestinians is the legacy of the events of 1947.

William F. Buckley Jr.: You wrote quite recently, a couple of years ago, wishful thinking aside, between the rights of the people and the claims of Israel, between the rights of the Palestinian people and the claims of Israel, there can be no compromise. They are mutually exclusive. The search for a compromise has proved to be a futile pastime. Procedural formulas such as direct negotiations are infantile and deceptive. The melancholy conclusion is that only continued belligerent confrontation lies ahead until either Israel destroys the whole Arab world or the Arabs destroy Israel. Now, with that as a backdrop, or that there's a world war, you said, yeah.

Fayez Sayegh: No, sir. I must interfere here. That was a preface to what comes immediately. To your solution, yeah. That a compromise has proved impossible. Therefore, either war or a vision that does what a compromise cannot do, transcends the two extreme positions.

William F. Buckley Jr.: But then a more direct answer to Mr. Al-Mazani's question is that Kissinger cannot, in the nature of the situation, succeed, right? Because you are only talking interstate relations rather than relations having to do with the Palestinian people.

Fayez Sayegh: That's what I said. I said Kissinger...

William F. Buckley Jr.: Cannot succeed.

Fayez Sayegh: The conference... at Geneva is predicated on 242, which deals with the rights of states but not with the rights of peoples, and does not mention the problem of the Palestinians. Therefore, I do not envisage, out of the Geneva conference, a solution to the Palestine problem. There may be a pacific settlement of the conflict between the Arab states and Israel, as I said, over withdrawal, over recognition, but no settlement of the underlying problem which created the conflict between the Arab states and Israel, namely the problem of the destiny and aspirations and rights of the people of Palestine.

William F. Buckley Jr.: In which event, what is happening now is purely cosmetic in prospect. That is to say, the root causes will continue to be with us.

Fayez Sayegh: Well, there is an attempt taking place now

William F. Buckley Jr.: I'm sorry, I have to interrupt you. Thank you, Dr. Sayegh, very much. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen of the panel. Thank you all.