MUST HEAR ENDING - Debate Meltdown | Shattering Truth About the Future of Peace
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I don't think we can keep living like this forever because it's destroying us from the inside, it's destroying our moral character, it's destroying so many innocent lives and it has to stop. Hello and welcome to State of a Nation, I'm Elon Levy. This episode is going to do something a little bit unusual. Sometimes on this podcast I bring guests I agree with. Other times on the internet you'll find podcasts where people who disagree shout at each other for clickbait.

But today we're going to do something different. A respectful but frank conversation between two friends. Two people who respect each other's intellect but have major misgivings about each other's visions for peace. Itai Fleischer has spent his life working for coexistence between Israelis and Palestinians.

He's the education director at Kids for Peace Jerusalem, an interfaith youth movement dedicated to ending conflict and inspiring hope. He's also an educator, journalist, peace activist. Born in Melbourne, Australia, he moved to Israel in 2018 and since then has been at the heart of efforts to build bridges in one of the world's most divided cities. He writes frequently about politics, religion and identity, and his work has been published in the Jerusalem Post, the Forward and the Times of Israel.

And now he's written a powerful, deeply personal book, The Holy and the Broken. It's part memoir, part reflection, and part manifesto. He grapples with the trauma of October 7th and still makes the case for hope, for dialogue, for reconciliation. He argues that despite the devastation, the only path forward is to double down on humanizing the other and build relationships from the ground up.

I disagree with Itai on many things, profoundly, especially now after the trauma of October 7th. But I also think this is a conversation that we need to have. And I want to put something on the table before we start. I think there's an asymmetry in the dynamic of this conversation because I want to believe that Itai is right. I want to be convinced.

But I also think, and we'll find out in a second, that he doesn't want to believe that I'm right. Because if I'm right, it is perhaps a gloomier, darker way of seeing the world. And peace, well, perhaps it seems a little more out of reach than in his vision. And who wants to believe that?

Itai Fleischer, welcome to the podcast. Saba'akher kher, bok'r tov. Saba'akher kher, bok'r tov, and good morning to you. Itai, October 7th changed everything. This is the subject of the book. It's changed the way that we understand our country, our region, each other, and ourselves as well. And I wonder how that meets you personally, as someone who is involved in, still involved in interfaith peace building. How has October 7th changed you? So...

On the morning of October 7th, I was in Jerusalem with my family, two children. I live in a building where everyone is Dati, except me. And so... Religious. Religious. Sorry, I'll just explain. Dati, modern Orthodox. There's also some Haredim in my building as well. This is, after all, an interfaith podcast. We have some people who are not Jews. Okay, so I'll explain those terms. And so I was on my phone from early in the morning. So I unfortunately knew what was going on very early.

And there were multiple sirens. And I was seeing pictures in Starot of the vans and people getting kidnapped, the Nova. And there were seven sirens in Jerusalem within a short space of time. And...

I had this dilemma of, you know, on one hand I'm a journalist, but before I'm a journalist, I'm a father as well. And, um, and so people in the, every time we were going to the Miklat, every 10 minutes, there was another rocket. Miklat is a shelter. Um, people in the building were used to speaking English, English, um, were, um, were asking me what's going on. And I was, I was, I explain this for a living. I teach courses on Israeli Palestinian history on, um,

the conflict. And I was also very aware that my children were there and very frightened. And, and I had this dilemma of what do I say? Because I want to tell the people in the building, don't go about your day regularly. This is not an ordinary day, but I also wanted my kids to feel safe and to feel that they can go back to their house and, you know, play their computer games and watch TV and not be worried that someone is coming to their house. But I also didn't know that that's the truth. I didn't know what, whether October 7th was going to happen in,

So I think that day was a lot of fear, a lot of confusion, a lot of shock. If you're asking me, did I go to sleep that night believing in peace? No, I didn't. I...

I didn't expect it. I didn't think such a thing would ever happen here for a whole range of reasons. And I was also very disappointed at how many people responded to it, people I knew. I'm very active in many left-wing spaces and I think the response to October 7th from people I considered friends and allies was shocking.

I still consider myself to be on the left. Maybe we'll talk about what that means later on. And I also felt that...

I'm not a pacifist. I did feel like Israel needed to respond to October 7th. Our borders weren't secure. I didn't know if my family was safe. I didn't... There was thousands of rockets were fired in that first week. But very quickly, I realised that there wasn't a plan. And that bothered me even more because...

I find it very hard to support wars where there's no plan. And then probably within, I'd say by the time the first ceasefire happened,

I didn't support the war anymore. I definitely don't support it continuing now, especially as there are still hostages in Gaza. So you start the war as a pro-war peace activist? Well, not pro-war. I believe in self-defense. I believe Israelis and Palestinians have the right to defend themselves. And I believe that we were under attack on October 7th and we had a right to defend.

There was 6,000 people in Israel kidnapping, killing, shooting people in the Nova Party. They had to be stopped. I support having an army. I'm very grateful that the army was there to defend and to stop those people reaching all the way to the rest of the country. But I think once the first ceasefire happened, I think that's when the war should have ended. In terms of... Sorry, just because I want to understand. You're saying...

The IDF had a right to respond to seal Israel's borders. Yes. But you think that the legitimate goal of the war should simply have been to block off...

a repeat Hamas invasion rather than to bring down the Hamas terror regime that was threatening to do October 7th again and again. You don't think that was legitimate for Israel to pursue the downfall of the jihadi regime that was threatening to burn people alive in their homes again? I don't know if you remember, I actually wrote to you a week after October 7th because you had started becoming a spokesperson. And I said...

What's the plan? Do you remember what you answered me? Yes, because you quoted me in the book. You said... I wondered who this friend of yours who started working in the prime minister's office was. You said... So I'll out myself. You said when...

when we fought World War II, you know, we didn't have a plan for what's happening in Germany. We were like, we've got to defeat Hitler, you know, and I understood that. And I wasn't expecting to have a detailed, you know, 10-year plan the day after October 7th when no one expected it. But by the time we were in November, and it wasn't just me calling for a plan, it was, I think, the

the vast majority of the security establishment and you have Galant and people were saying, what's the plan for Gaza? What's happening on the day after? And I don't think, I don't want Hamas to be there. I definitely don't want Hamas to rule Gaza. I don't think they're good for me. They're definitely not good for the Palestinians as well. But I think there's a much better way to defeat them than the way we went about the war.

How is that? I mean, we're jumping ahead several points and I do want to touch on that. But since you raise it now, I mean, what's your vision for making Hamas disappear? What's your plan? So I'll start with the end and then I'll go to the beginning. I support what's called a confederation. A confederation is...

two states with one homeland, meaning that there is a state of Israel and a state of Palestine, Pahot Yotel, on the 67 borders. More or less, for those who don't speak Hebrew. More or less on the 67 borders, and that there is a shared government for certain areas of interest to both peoples,

such as borders and taxation. There'd probably be one currency in both of those states, those sorts of things. Similar to, I guess, how you have a European Union and you have independent states within the European Union. And the idea of a confederation or what's called a land for all is that

people would be able to work and live in both those states. You could live in Israel and work in Palestine, work in Palestine, live in Israel. And also you could choose to... You can't have both citizenships. You can only have one citizenship. So you would choose...

either citizenship of Israel or citizenship of Palestine, and then you would vote only for the government that you're a citizenship of. But where you live, you can vote for the municipality of the area where you live. Sure, and we can unpack what that vision would mean. But right now, the Gaza Strip is governed by a jihadi regime that is threatening to cut your children's heads off again. So my question is, what's your plan for removing them from power? Okay, so I'll just say that's my end point. Okay, so in terms of what to do now, so...

I believe that the best way for there to be peace is for there to be freedom, justice and equality for all people, for all Israelis and Palestinians. I think Hamas is clearly an obstacle to peace. I also happen to think that our government, that I don't know if you voted for them, I certainly didn't vote for them, is also an obstacle to peace. So I believe there should be elections tomorrow.

where people should have the choice to vote for different governments. Sure, but elections in Israel are not going to remove the Hamas terror regime. And what I want to understand, and we have jumped ahead a few points, and I do want to go back to basics a little bit, but...

But when I asked, you know, how did October 7th change you? And you say that it shook a lot of your basic beliefs. But actually, after an initial response that I think you were surprised with yourself supporting IDF military action, you think, OK, time's up. Let's let's leave Hamas in power, basically. Right. Do I understand you correctly? I don't want to I don't want Hamas to be in power. But I don't either. So so like, how do we make it not be? I don't think military.

the military is the way to remove them from power. I think the best way to remove them from power is to create alternatives. Let me give you an example, a historic example. The Oslo Accords in 1993, when they happened, Hamas had 10% support.

They were polling done and only 10%. So the vast majority of Palestinians supported Fatah. And on the Israeli side, when Rabin and Meretz were in power, they had 55 seats, which would be unthinkable now for the Israeli left to have 55 seats in the Knesset. I think when you see a partner for peace on the other side, you're more likely to choose peace. I think Israelis chose Rabin.

and the path of the left because they saw a partner for peace on the Palestinian side and the Palestinians chose the path of Oslo because they saw a partner for peace on the Israeli side. But Hamas is there now. Yes. A jihadi regime governs a strip of territory

Yes.

triggers the immediate military necessity of removing it because no country should have to live next to it. So I'm trying to understand, first ceasefire ends and what are you going to do about this jihadi regime that governs Gaza through force of arms? The first obligation that a government has is

When it's on your watch, the 251 hostages are taken, is to return those hostages. That's the first obligation you have. You screwed up, you need to fix it. The first thing that should have been done at that ceasefire, where 105...

were returned is that should have been extended until all the hostages should have come back. But Itay, Hamas didn't want to extend it. Hamas was supposed to continue releasing the women and it didn't want to. I know. They tried to fob us off with bodies. I know Hamas

broke the ceasefires, but I've read many credible security sources that have said that that was possible. There were other ways to negotiate to extend that ceasefire in order to bring all the hostages home. And furthermore, and if you look at, like, there's many think tanks. But Hamas at that point stopped releasing. On the last day, they didn't release

the 10 hostages they were supposed to release. They stopped releasing the women. They stopped releasing... They didn't... They stopped releasing the women, okay? Now...

I agree. We have to bring the hostages home. And you know, we can have an argument about the ransom that you think would be appropriate to pay, whether we should have emptied the jails of all the Palestinian prisoners and given Hamas that win to bring back the hostages. Israeli society is having a very painful argument about the ransom we should pay. But I get back to the question. The Hamas terror regime is there. It murdered your colleagues on October 7th. It murdered peace activists on...

like Vivian Silva and Oded Lifshitz and people who dedicated their lives to peace and to driving Palestinian children to hospitals in Israel and it didn't save them because they were burned alive because they were abducted and the regime promised to do that again and again. Oded Lifshitz dedicated his life to peace. I visited Kfar Aza yesterday. I was in his house. They sent him back in a coffin that said on it "date of arrest"

So what are you going to do about this, Jihadi Reggie? I don't want to have peace with Hamas. I want Palestinian children... But Hamas is the government of Gaza. And Hamas is by far the most popular party within Palestinian society. Let me ask you a question. We've now had 15 months of war, over 520 days of war.

Hamas is still there. They still have military capabilities. They're still just as wicked as they were before. War has not brought us safety. War has not brought us security. War has not... I disagree. War has caused thousands of our soldiers to die. When was the last...

When was the last rockets attack that we had in Tel Aviv from Gaza? The fact is the rocket threat from Gaza has disappeared. We have a buffer zone inside the Gaza Strip, which means that Hamas cannot approach the border. These are all short-term things. But it's security. We're more secure than we were on the eve of October 7th when Hamas was still there in power. So, like...

I'll eventually get on to the next question if you don't want to answer it, but what's your path for removing Hamas from power? I'm not a politician, okay? I'm not the prime minister of Israel. But the easiest thing for left-wing peace activists to do

is to paint a rosy utopian vision and say, I have no useful ideas for how we get there. I don't know what to do. I know what we shouldn't be doing. But he's like, we live in the real world. We live in the real world where Israel has to make these impossible dilemmas and decisions. So...

what are you going to do about the jihadi regime that is next door? If you're asking for political, this is not a political book. No, leave the book. I will say that if you want political solutions, you can interview Yair Lapid, Yair Golan, you can interview Gilad Kariev, you can interview Naamal Azimi, there's many people you can interview. But I want to have a conversation with you. But I want to have a

conversation with you because you're a friend who's a peace activist and I respect your opinion and you're telling me that what Israel is doing is wrong and so I'm asking well what's right and if there's nothing useful that you can say instead okay I'll say what's right I'll say three things that we should do now that will build peace okay do I have an answer how to remove Hamas tomorrow no

I'm admitting I do not have an answer on how to remove Hamas tomorrow and I don't think you do either. This is what I think should happen. Quite a supposition. I think that we should work on building education systems and building a culture where we both...

feel that we want the other person to be here and we strive for them to have freedom and equality both Palestinians and Israelis when when we live under places when I look at Israel today I look at where are places where Israelis and Palestinians live in peace where is their peace already and I think how can I expand that for example I live in Jerusalem I go to Hadassah hospital

Unfortunately, two years ago, my gallbladder decided it didn't want to be in my body anymore. So I spent many days in Hadassah Hospital. You know what happens there that's amazing? You have people there. Probably there's Palestinians there who support Hamas. I wouldn't be surprised. There's Haredim there. There's settlers there. There's left-wing people there. There's right-wing people. There's LGBT people. There's straight people. Everyone gets along well in Hadassah Hospital. No one's trying to knife anyone. If someone's putting a knife in my stomach, it's to save my life.

Why does Hadassah Hospital, why is Hadassah Hospital a place of peace? It's a place of peace because the regime or the governing system of Hadassah Hospital is everyone's going to be treated equally on the basis of their medical need. We're not going to favour one person... Under the framework of the democratic state of Israel. Yes, and so... Which treats its minorities as equal citizens. Exactly, and so what I'm saying is if we can create a framework, and again, I don't have a solution to do this tomorrow...

But if we can say within 10 years, we want to create a framework where all people who live in this entire territory are living under a regime that treats all people equally, no one will want to kill each other.

Equality is far more effective than any wall or checkpoint in securing our freedom. And I think that's what we need to strive for, ensuring that we have systems of equality where no one is given more rights or less rights than any other person. And it works in Haifa, it works in Hadassah Hospital, and it can work in the whole territory if we strive for that goal.

It works in Haifa because Haifa is a city within the democratic state of Israel, which is a Jewish and democratic state that gives Arab minorities full civil rights as individual citizens. It works in Hadassah because it's in Jerusalem.

It's not going to work if you have some federation between us and the people who still think that October 7th is a good idea because poll after poll shows. And you know this from personal experience. We'll talk about this in a little bit. The Palestinians think that October 7th was a good idea. In Gaza, they stopped thinking it was a good idea, according to polls, a year into the war because of everything they'd suffered. But, you know, you write in the book that there's this clash of conceptions. The clash of conceptions is this.

Palestinians believe that Israelis are foreign colonizers and interlopers. You are a colonizer. And that if they use enough violence and enough terrorism, they will drive us out of this land. Hey, it worked in Algeria, and they think that that Algerian model will work. And you say that too many Israelis believe that Palestinians can be subdued or pacified or bribed into accepting something less than freedom and equality. Hmm.

But I think that we're in this mess because we thought these were mirrored identities. We're in this mess because we thought that all the other side wants, all the Palestinians want, is to live lives of freedom and dignity like ordinary people. I mean, that was the assumption that drove the vision of the two-state solution when most Israelis still believed in it. We just want to live in peace. They just want to live in peace. Let's draw a line down the middle of the map and they can have what we have.

But I think that too many Israelis, you included, still believe that what the Palestinians ultimately want is freedom or equality next to us. And what I think they want is supremacy over us. Because when I hear the chants of from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free. And the Arab version is min maya al maya, Palestine arabaya. From water to water, Palestine will be Arab.

I don't see a vision on the other side that says we want to create a liberal democratic state, certainly not one that is friendly towards LGBT population. I see a deeply patriarchal, oppressive democracy.

Arab nationalist society that wants to reclaim this whole land for Islam, for the Arab world, and doesn't see a role for Jews as national minorities, as individual citizens. And in this one effective one state solution that you have, in which we're going to be living under the same government, and I'm ceding sovereignty to people who think October 7th was a good idea. I'm not going to be a free citizen. What do you think, Tel Aviv?

it's going to look like in a country that has part of its government is voted on by the people who think that Hamas is a good thing. So I think part of the problem here is that I don't want to use the word naive, but okay, you think I'm callous. I think you're naive.

That we think that what they want is freedom and equality. And that if we give them freedom and equality, all things will be good. If we wanted freedom and equality, we could have had a two-state solution and they can have as much freedom and equality as they want in their country. And we'll have freedom and equality in our country. And we'll be different countries. But I don't think they want that. Because they don't want us here. Because the misconception that you point to is that they think we're foreign colonizers and if they use enough barbaric violence and murder enough children, then eventually we'll pack up and leave.

I'm Imogen Folks, the host of Inside Geneva, a podcast where we tackle the big questions facing our planet. Can UN investigations bring more criminals to justice? Does the world need a pandemic treaty? What about climate change or refugees? Should we ban autonomous weapons? Some call them killer robots.

Get the answers you need with me and our expert guests twice a month on Inside Geneva, free with your usual podcast app. I think when you become a partner for peace, you create partners for peace on the other side. Let me give you an example. We had, before the peace agreement with Egypt, four wars with Egypt.

Those wars with Egypt killed more Israelis than October 7th. In 48, in 56, in 67, in 73. My father fought both in the Six-Day War and the 73 War. Those wars were brutal. Those wars, we almost lost the country in those wars. They were horrific. And then at a certain point, Menachem Begin, Prime Minister on the right, and Anwar Sadat decided they didn't want to fight anymore. And Israel made a huge compromise...

a large amount of territory, the entire Sinai Peninsula. And...

And because of that compromise and there were settlements removed in Yamit, we now have a peace agreement with Egypt and we haven't had a single war with Egypt since that peace agreement. Amazing, but it's not comparable. But Itay, it's not comparable. It is comparable. No, it's not comparable. Go on, tell me why it is and then I'll tell you why it's not. Okay, I'm just saying. That means for fun. I think when I look at the borders of Israel today that are safest, they are the borders with Egypt and Jordan.

And I look at the borders that are not safe or not secure. They're the borders with Gaza, with Syria and with Lebanon. I think the security that you get from peace agreements is far more superior than any other security that you can get. And that's why I think we should strive for peace agreements, not with Hamas. And I don't think Netanyahu is a partner for peace either. I think there are moderate...

and Palestinians that I talk to all the time. And unfortunately, they're not the prime minister in Jerusalem and they're definitely not the prime minister in Gaza. But I think we need to build the community of people that wants to share this land and expand peace. And that is something that will take a very, very long time because we very much

understandably from what's happened in the past year. But I think the first step to doing that is to acknowledge, to both sides to acknowledge that the other side has a right to be here and we need to build movements that say that together, led by Israelis and Palestinians, so that we can one day share this land in justice and equality for all.

Okay. I listened respectfully. Thank you. Now let me tell you. Now let me tell you. The Israeli-Palestinian situation is not comparable to peace between Israel and Egypt. Peace between Israel and Egypt was achieved when Egypt decided that it would accept the existence of a sovereign state of Israel next door. In 1967, they tried to destroy us. They failed.

In 1973, they tried to destroy us. They failed. And they realized that the military strategy of pouring everything into trying to destroy Israel failed. As a result, they accepted the permanent existence of Israel and the demilitarization of the Sinai Peninsula. Let's put to one side...

the fact that Egypt is now in violation of the peace agreement, moving tanks into the Sinai desert. And that means that actually, I think one of our safest borders is the one with Syria, because we've managed to establish a buffer zone inside Syria. But that's another question.

That's not comparable to the situation where Palestinians still believe that they have a historic and inalienable right to the whole of the land of Israel. If we reach a situation where the Palestinians say, Israel has a right to exist and we accept that miles and miles and miles away from the Israeli border should be totally demilitarized and we will pose no military threat to them, we could have had a two-state solution ages ago. But we don't because the core of the conflict is that they still believe that the entire land is theirs from the river.

But so do most Israelis. That's why I support a confederation. The vast majority of Israelis also believe that the entire land from the river to the sea belongs to us because that's what was written in the Torah and that's where we've lived. But most Israelis were willing to compromise. But most Israelis are now not willing to compromise. Most Israelis are not willing to compromise for good reason, Itay. Because...

for years after the 2005 withdrawal from Gaza and the rockets started coming from the Gaza Strip, Israelis said, if we repeat this, what happens from Gaza will happen in the West Bank. Don't talk to me about, well, that was unilateral. This will be in the context of a peace agreement because a peace agreement can be ripped up as soon as a jihadi regime comes to power. And you know that a two-state solution would absorb all the jihadi detritus from the rest of the world who would be

be attracted to Jerusalem like a magnet to try to liberate quote-unquote the rest of Palestine. You would have the risk of rocket fire from the West Bank and never, never in the years between the 2005 disengagement from Gaza and October 7th did anyone in the international community engage seriously with Israelis' concerns

legitimate and real concerns that a withdrawal from the mountains over Tel Aviv and surrounding Jerusalem would lead to a rocket threat from Gaza times 20. And then came October 7th. And then came October 7th and Israelis are saying, how can you guarantee to me that what happened in Kfar Aza is not going to happen in Kfar Saba?

How do we know that what's going to happen if we withdraw from that territory is not going to be a Palestinian threat on a much, much, much bigger scale? Because suddenly, you know, I opened this podcast by asking, how has October 7th changed you? It's changed me by making me more hawkish. Yes. Okay. I used to believe in the two-state solution. I used to, like, we were on the same side, but I don't think it would solve it. I think it's going to make it worse. I think anything that encourages the Palestinians to believe that Israel's existence is temporary is,

that one day enough violence is going to push us out is something that is only going to entrench the conflict and that peace usually follows the end of conflicts. Very, very rare for conflicts to end with peace where both sides decide that they're simply fed up of fighting. They end, you spoke before about the situation in Europe, you say you want to have an EU.

In the middle of the Second World War, Nazi Germany and France didn't say, you know what? Let's pause the war for now. Let's educate each other to accept each other. One day the Nazis will disappear because we're going to propose a vision for peace. And then when we propose an alternative for what peace in Europe will look like without the Nazis, then the German people are going to get rid of the Nazis. No, the war ended when peace.

The Allies defeated Nazi Germany. You spoke before about your friend from the Prime Minister's office. Okay, you quoted me without my permission in the book. I think anyone can tell who it was, but we'll put that to one side. You know, the Marshall Plan came after the destruction of Nazi Germany. Not before.

First, there was an immediate military necessity to eliminate Nazi Germany because it was threatening to overrun the rest of Europe. And then it was replaced. But look, let's put that to one side because I want to drill on something you just said. When you build Partners for Peace, you've been trying to do that for ages through the Kids for Peace program, an interfaith youth movement. We've spoken about this before over coffee in Jerusalem before the war. I thought, you know, really impressive and important work. Tell me how your Partners for Peace responded to October 7th.

Can I just, before I deal with that question, I just want to raise something else you said. Sure. I want to acknowledge that the path for peace is not simple. I don't have answers to many of the questions you answered and I want to acknowledge that many of the concerns you raised are legitimate and I'm not dismissing them. And I think peace activists need to be honest that the vision that we're talking got much more complicated after October 7th and the destruction of Gaza because the...

of goodwill and hope that exists on both sides is frankly zero. So I'm not naive. I'm not sort of sitting here singing John Lennon songs, singing, you know, this will be all right. I understand that the path of peace is going to be very painful and very messy. You know, Amos Oz once talked about the fact that this can end like a Shakespearean tragedy with lots of dead bodies all over the stage or it can end like a Chekhovian strategy ending

We know that lots of dead bodies on the stage is the end of Act 1 in this region. With a lot of disappointed people. So, yeah, peace will mean a lot of disappointed people won't live out their dreams of having this as entirely a state of Israel or entirely a state of Palestine.

But what I'm saying is the alternative, which is what I'm living now, where you and I are going to funerals of our friends, where my Palestinian friends are looking at Jabalia, at Beit Lachia, at cities that look like an earthquake hit them in Gaza and thinking, is this the way we have to live? And I think war is so terrible and so horrific that I want to give an alternative.

a chance because I don't think we can keep living like this forever because it's destroying us from the inside. It's destroying our moral character. It's destroying so many innocent lives and it has to stop. And I think, you know, Israel once almost got a rocket to the moon. You know, we're incredibly... We got a rocket to the moon. We just crash landed on the moon. We just crash landed it.

But I think if we devoted the same energy to getting that rocket to the moon, to peace, and I say the same thing for the Palestinians, all the money that goes into building tunnels and whatever, if that is put into negotiation and to dialogue and to things that can expand peace where peace already exists, I think Israelis and Palestinians are better than what we are doing to each other today and that we can do this. We just have to decide...

that this is the path we want to go to. So I'm not naive that I believe this, because I think if we don't have peace, this whole area is going to be a giant graveyard. And I don't want that for my children or for your children, for any of my Palestinian friends' children. You're right that this is unsustainable. You're right that we cannot go on like this. You're right that we need peace. But what you need to be telling your Palestinian friends who are looking at the destruction of Gaza and Beit Lahiyya...

is that October 7th was a terrible mistake and a moral travesty. You need to tell them that the strategy of dedicating and marshalling their society's resources towards the destruction of Israel has led them into tragedy time and time again, and that they and their children will have no future unless they reconcile themselves with Israel's existence. Gaza's problem, you need to tell them, has never been about

It's been about priorities. In the four years after the 2014 war, Israel let into Gaza 16 times the amount of concrete that was needed to build the Burj Khalifa. Where is Gaza's Burj Khalifa? It's the necropolis of 650 miles of tunnels they built underneath Gaza with tunnel openings poking up inside UN facilities and hospitals and the rockets hidden under children's beds. Okay? So, like, you can't

both sides this and say, oh yeah, it's awful. You need to say, guys, you have to start taking responsibility at some point. What Einat Wilf calls the ideology of Palestinianism, the ideology that says from the river to the sea, and we're going to throw everything we've got into from the river to the sea. Instead of

saying, actually, no, we want to live next to Israel, not instead of it. That is what could make a major difference. But when their response to October 7th is to celebrate it and to refuse to take any responsibility for their own fate, it's always Israel's problem, Israel's problem. Then you are reinforcing the negative dynamic that is encouraging their rejection. I'm not reinforcing the negative dynamic. I am saying that there are nonviolent solutions to all of the issues that you raised, John Kerry...

in 2016 gave a speech after four years of shuttle diplomacy between Israelis and Palestinians. He flew back and forth 30 times between Washington and Jerusalem and he dealt with negotiations, dealt with everything.

with water, with refugees, with Jerusalem, with borders, with security, with economics, with taxation, with water. And he said at the end of this speech that he gave in 2016, he said, every single topic that we spoke about, we reached agreement on. And so someone said to him, so why didn't you sign an agreement? He goes, because there was no trust.

Because the Israelis felt that the Palestinians are not going to keep anything that they sign, and the Palestinians felt that Israel is not going to keep what we sign. There's a lack of trust because we believe... Can I just finish? Sorry. Go on. I think...

We all know what peace looks like. We all know that it's going to be more or less a two-state solution. No, no we don't. No we don't. I used to, we don't. I think when there is peace, when there's a partner for peace in Jerusalem and Gaza and Ramallah, when there is partners for peace, I think more or less it's going to look something like the two-state solution. I think what the issue is at the moment, that there is very little trust...

and a very little desire to build that because we don't see a partner from the other side. And I think it's the obligation of every single person to make themselves a partner for peace. Now, I, as much as I'd like to, I cannot influence...

...the people in Gaza. I don't know anyone in Gaza. I don't have any access to the Palestinian governments anywhere. I am a Jew. I'm an Israeli. I can speak to my people and my side... ...and I can educate for peace. I speak regularly all over the world. That's why I wrote this book...

about why peace is possible and why it's essential to struggle for and why every person should try and be a partner for peace. And I think that's our obligation. At the same time, as an Israeli, I also have to be reflective of...

and the role my government has played in also being an obstacle for peace in continued settlement construction, in not responding to settler violence, in not reacting to ministers that have called for horrific things to be done to Palestinians, in not arresting...

who were setting Palestinian villages on fire. I think every person that wants peace needs to look at themselves and their own governments and look in the mirror and say, what can I do to make myself a partner for peace? And then I want to ask you, and I understand your criticisms of the Palestinian side, is there anything you feel that Israel could be doing better to be a partner for peace? Sure. Hang on. Let's get on to that because you've said a lot and I do want to react to it.

John Kerry looks at the documents and thinks there are technical solutions. Here we can, you know, here there's a technical solution. And you say, well, the problem is a lack of trust. No, it's not a lack of trust. It's so much more fundamental because you say, you in the book, your book, that the common misconception across Palestinian society that isn't held by a few individuals, this is the baseline consensus. They believe that the entire land belongs to them.

They believe that if they use enough violence, enough barbaric violence, we will pack up and leave. And if that is what they believe, then the problem is not a lack of trust.

Because I trust them that when they say that, they really mean it. The problem isn't a lack of trust. The problem is two radically different visions. And what I'm concerned with is how do you wean them off the belief that one day the barbaric violence of October 7th is justified, that if you use enough of it, we're going to pack up and go, that Israel is illegitimate, that you, peace activists, are a white colonizer, because if you'd been living in Kfar Aza on October 7th, they would have slaughtered you.

The Hamas death squads would have come in... Again, I go back to Egypt. Egypt had exactly those beliefs. Egypt had... But Egypt accepted that Israel wasn't going anywhere. So the question is, how did Egypt... How do you get the Palestinians to accept that Israel isn't going anywhere? Let's just go into that Egypt example, for example. Okay, in 67, what is Nasser saying?

Sounds pretty similar to Hamas, right? Yes. His vision is he wants to go to Tel Aviv. He wants all of Israel to be part of Egypt. And you know what the Egyptians did different from the Palestinians? What? They took responsibility because they saw that their repeated wars to try to destroy Israel. And why did they take responsibility? Why did they take responsibility? I think it has something to do with the world overall.

not mollycoddling them and encouraging them to fall into the same trap. Because when the world keeps going to the Palestinians and saying, oh, we're going to do reconstruction and we're going to return to the world that existed before, the world is stopping them from taking responsibility. I think after 1967, Resolution 242 was passed. Israel agreed to resolution 242. The one that doesn't mention a Palestinian state anywhere. It talks about land for peace. That's what it talks about.

I think Resolution 242 and Resolution 338 and many resolutions afterward are a formula that can be used in the same way that it was used for peace with Egypt and Jordan. It can be used for peace with the Palestinians. And I think that needs to be our North Star. That's what we need to be working towards. But again, I know we said it would be a dialogue, so I really want to hear your point of view. Is there anything that you feel that Israel could be doing better to be a partner for peace? Or do you think Israel is already a perfect partner for peace?

It's a difficult question. Look, I'll be honest with you. Since October 7th, I'm still in a process of flux. I started with a question asking you how October 7th has changed you. And what I hear is there was an initial moment when you were...

shocked and it really shook the core assumptions, but then you reverted to type pretty much and your solution for what went wrong with October 7th is we didn't try hard enough, right? We just have to do more of what we were doing before from your perspective, but try even harder. I used to be one of the people who believed that

this is a conflict over real estate. We believe that we have a right to the whole land. They believe they have a right to the whole land. So we'll draw a line down the middle and we'll have two states and we'll live side by side in peace. I don't believe that anymore. I understand that, but my question is, is there anything... I heard your question and I'm talking you through my thinking. Yeah.

I don't believe that anymore because I genuinely believe them on the other side. Because I give them the dignity of believing what they say when they say that Israel is illegitimate, that October 7th was justified. So I'm left with a national movement that I think is committed to my destruction.

Now, if Olmert had managed to pull off a two-state solution in 2006, when the Israeli people voted for it, people forget that in 2006, the Israeli people were where you are. And Olmert won an election on the back of a promise to withdraw unilaterally if necessary from the West Bank. I think it would have been a disaster. Yeah.

I think it would have been a disaster because that power vacuum would have been filled by another jihadi group that is faithful to the core ideology of the Palestinian movement, which is there is no right for Israel to exist between the river and the sea. And we would have found ourselves with Gaza max 20. What should Israel do now for peace? I think that in order to create peace, I agree with a column that the prime minister wrote in the Wall Street Journal at the beginning of the war.

I have a lot of criticism about him. So do you. But he wrote a column about the three prerequisites for peace in Gaza. Called it the three Ds. Hamas must be destroyed. Gaza must be demilitarized. And Palestinian society must be de-radicalized. I also think there's a path to peace.

But I think that path to peace is not something the world is willing to countenance. And maybe it's not willing to countenance it because we haven't been making that demand loud enough. For years, we tried to basically buy quiet. We allowed Hamas to build up inside the Gaza Strip. We turned a blind eye to UNRWA, which was encouraging the Palestinian delusion that one day Israel will cease to exist and they will come and live here.

I think we should have been much firmer earlier on in saying UNRWA should have been banned a long time ago. I think that we need to be making a case clearly that the day after Hamas, because the day after means the day after Hamas, the world has to impose on Palestinians the sort of re-education and de-radicalization program that the world imposed on Nazi Germany after the Second World War.

I don't see a pathway to peace when the international community is subsidizing an education system

that is telling the Palestinians that Israel is temporary and if they use enough violence, Israel is going to be pushed back. So my criticism of our approach to peace is we actually didn't take the other side seriously. We didn't engage with them. When you look at the ministers of our government, Oritz Strzok, Bacal El-Smotrich, Itamar Ben-Gvir, do you see anything that they say or they do that you consider to be an obstacle to peace? Look, Itar, you know I'm not fans of this.

You know I'm not fans of this. You know I didn't vote for them and you know that before this war I was one of the many people protesting in Tel Aviv against this government, specifically because of these individuals whose opinions I thought were odious. But we have this government now. Israeli society has shifted to the right because of the failure of the peace process. Because every time we withdrew from territory it ended up exploding in our faces and no one around the world, no one in the international community addressed seriously

The international community did everything possible to reinforce Israelis' belief that they're on their own, that if anything bad happens, they have only themselves to count on, that they can't trust the international community, they can't trust security arrangements because they've never worked for us. International security guarantees have never worked for us. So I think we're in this position where Israeli society was willing to give a chance to what you were saying. And we're not there anymore. I don't think we're not there anymore. At the moment, if you look at the Knesset right now... Okay, so let's...

You say we're not there anymore. I want to go back to a question I've been trying to ask since the beginning. You're the education director for Kids for Peace, interfaith youth movement in Jerusalem. You talk about Partners for Peace. How did your Partners for Peace respond to October 7th? We are not a political organization. The purpose of our organization is not to have the discussion that we're having right now. Yeah, but I'm curious. Your Partners for Peace, you're trying to build the next generation of moderates. Yeah.

What were the responses to October 7th? I imagine that on October 7th, you must have been inundated with text messages from the Arab parents saying, this is so horrific. I'm so sorry.

No. No? No. But these are the moderates. These are your partners for peace. The people... October 7th wasn't an attack of Muslims against Jews. On October 7th, there were Muslims and Jews killed, and there were also Muslims and Bedouins who saved Jews on October 7th. October 7th wasn't some sort of religious sort of binary. On October 7th, everyone was afraid.

Palestinians were afraid, Jews were afraid, Haredim were afraid, secular people were afraid. Everyone was terrified of what was going to happen there and everyone wanted...

And the vibe of the people that I was speaking to was, I hope there isn't a very long war and I hope that Hamas doesn't continue and do this. That was the general vibe after that. But I would say beyond that, what we're trying to do, and not just in Kids for Peace, but I think there's an organization... But I'm not asking what you're trying to do. I want to know the people you're working with. You've identified in Jerusalem... Yeah.

the communities that you think are most receptive to peace-building efforts, to being moderates, they're not Hamas. How did they respond to October 7th? They had a range of responses, but ultimately they didn't want any war to happen as a result of October 7th. October 7th was an act of war. How did they respond to...

Look, I can quote you examples from your own book. I'm giving you an opportunity here on mic because you say that October 7th shook a lot of your beliefs because of the way that you saw your peace partners reacting. So you're right, some of your peace partners openly celebrated the attacks of October 7th. If you're listening on an audio platform, then you didn't catch what those watching on YouTube just saw. My guest pushed away the microphone.

Eventually we got back to the conversation, but he kept pushing it away until finally he stood up and walked out of the studio. The conversation, I guess, had gotten too intense. In his book, Itai writes that the response to October 7th by some of the Arabs in his peace movement made him question his whole life's work. I wanted to know more about that.

He describes how the response of some Palestinian partners for peace shook him. Some of the Arab children from Kids for Peace posted celebratory messages after October 7th. An acquaintance from another Israeli-Palestinian peacebuilding organization changed his WhatsApp profile picture to a paraglider, the symbol of the Hamas death squads that swooped in from the skies.

One of his supposed partners for peace told him that he only works in a peace-building organization because it's a job, and quote, "Really, it's all bullshit." This is all in his book. Itai describes this as a shock, a moment that made him wonder whether the organization that he worked for and was helping to build, Kids for Peace, was an illusion. Whether his whole theory of change, the belief that humanizing the other builds bridges of tolerance and understanding, whether that was all wrong.

I wanted to know how that made him feel. How the betrayal of some of his Palestinian partners for peace forced him to re-evaluate his thinking about peace, about them, about himself. He didn't want to engage and kept pushing the microphone away. Itai's behavior was petulant and pathetic. After the interview, we sat and talked. I told him he was full of shit.

I told him he'd built a career dunking on Israel while claiming to have an enlightened alternative and then he crumbled under pressure in the first interview that asked him challenging questions. He asked for the meltdown to be cut from the final episode. We offered him the chance to come back and re-record that section to clarify his ideas, to stand behind his arguments. He declined. He just wanted it cut. We're not looking for clickbait here. We genuinely want to take you to the bottom of the issues.

And that's why we had a hard discussion within the State of a Nation team about what to do next. It was an ethical dilemma between integrity and kindness. Some of us thought we should air the whole interview unedited. If a guest can't handle the scrutiny, you, the viewers, should see it. You deserve to see it.

If someone who's written a book outlining a vision for peace can't defend it, you deserve to know that one side of the argument can't stand up to basic questioning. Yes, it makes him look bad, but that's part of being an adult and taking responsibility. Others thought we should be kind and cut it. Frankly, because airing such a catastrophic interview would just be mean. So balancing integrity and kindness, we've decided to do something in between. We're cutting the interview here.

But we're telling you why you're not hearing the second half of the conversation. We're not going to air it, but we're not going to pretend that it just never happened. So that's it for this episode of State of a Nation. Subscribe wherever you're listening and follow us on social media at State of a Pod. I'm Elon Beevy, and thanks for joining.