shortly after he conquered power, someone asked him a question about the economy of Iran. And he made the famous remark, he said, "My revolution is not about melons, it's about Islam." And my answer is, "Everything is about melons." [laughter] And it really is about melons; it's about economics everywhere. And so yes, I mean, there is this fundamentalist fervor in some of these societies. But take a look 12 or 13 years after the eruption of the Iranian revolution. We haven't really seen the conquest of political power by Islamic groups in other countries.

Rather: Dr. Kissinger, do you agree that its more a question of Arab nationalism that Islamic fundamentalism?

Kissinger: I think that Fouad understands the internal dynamics of the Islamic world a lot better than I do. I agree with him that for the West to organize a pan-Arab consciousness, whether that's nationalism or fundamentalism, will produce forces that must be inimical to the West because it can only be organized on Islamic principles which on the whole reject at least certain Western democratic values. And I believe we are better off proceeding with individual governments on a practical basis rather than with all of them on an ideological basis. And this will become even more acute when the Central Asian republics of the Soviet Union enter the diplomatic game. But, to support one point that Fouad made, one of the presidents of the Central Asian republics had a conversation with me, and he said, "You keep recommending that we become a democracy. I know two parties we will surely have in a democracy: a communist party and a fundamentalist party. Do you have any idea where I'm going to get a democratic party from?" [laughter]

Rather: A telling anecdote. If any of you have questions now would be the time for you to move down to the microphones. As you see there are microphones on the aisles [unintelligible].

Fouad, I told you when I came back from, I guess it was the last trip to Baghdad before the air war started, the thing that struck me the most about Saddam Hussein, whom you knew and I do not, was everything in him, every millimeter in him, signalled one that he dreamed, that his dream was not Kuwait's oil fields, or even Saudi Arabia's oil fields -- his dream was to lead a victorious Arab army into Jerusalem. Question: we celebrate Jerusalem here tonight. We pray for Jerusalem's survival. But when I think of Jerusalem I think of those moments with Saddam Hussein -- he's still there, he's still dreaming, and he is not the only one who dreams of leading this victorious Arab army into Jerusalem, and there are those moments -- I share a role as an optimist with Dr. Kissinger -- but there are those moments you say, "Listen, given the figures, given the population explosion, given the depth of this dream, how, over the long haul, can this dream be denied?"

Ajami: Well that's, I mean that's a good, a good question, and that's why I felt that, you know, I couldn't really improve on what Henry Kissinger said about the narrow margin for Israel's security. I mean, look I'll tell you what I think about the security question here: I assume, I assume that Israeli sovereignty will always be from the Sea to the Jordan River. I mean, that's what I assume, I work with this assumption. And I work with this assumption for that facts that Henry Kissinger laid out and for the spirit of the question that you asked. And I think that it isn't only the Israeli-Palestinian issue that matters to the Israelis, but also the regional environment. It's interesting, it's important to remind ourselves that the Scuds that fell on Israel were not Palestinians Scuds, the were Iraqi Scuds, and so by the terms of engagement between the Israelis and the Palestinians, the Palestinians always say about themselves: they are the victims of the victims, this is a great rallying cry for them, this is very important to their psyche. And to the results in world politics. The facts of this region remain as you outline them.

Rather: [unintelligible] We have a question on the left, yes sir.

Question from audience: [unintelligible] for each Prof. Ajami and Dr. Kissinger. As you're coming, Prof. Ajami, to us with a note of real sobriety and sanity, a question comes to mind: Is there such a thing as a Palestinian people from the view point of an honest Arab historian? And, if the whole concept is overplayed, why is our media presentation so much portraying the romanticism of this poor, this dispossessed people?

That's my question for you and for Dr. Kissinger, as you're sounding a note of sanity and rationalism in your approach to the peace talks, you did mention the rise of fundamentalism -- hopefully Prof. Ajami is right in down

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playing that on the Islamic hand, but there is the great rise within Israel itself of religious Jewish fundamentalism and the idea of the sacredness of the possession of Jerusalem as a whole. Isn't that a factor that has to be dealt with that there is this great rise of religious fundamentalism from the Jewish perspective and it's not necessarily so possible to just sit down and separate religion from politics, as we all know. So those are my two questions.

Rather: Dr. Kissinger, why don't you take your question first.

**Kissinger:** First of all I believe that the Israeli situation is extremely dangerous, inherently dangerous, and therefore what I think that what we should try to avoid is a situation where Israel gambles everything on some change of mood, on some change of attitude in boarders that cannot possibly be defended if the assumption turns out to be wrong. And the other extreme of Israel, rightly or wrongly, so isolating itself that the whole international community begins to turn on it, as it did with better reason in the case of South Africa. Those are the two extremes between which Israel must navigate and a wise US policy will navigate. There's no question that if Iraq had fired all its Scuds on Israel and forgotten about Kuwait for the time being, Israel would already be in an extraordinarily difficult situation and the damage it could have done in retaliation might not have been significantly worse than what the United States did because the United States effort was so much larger than anything Israel could mount. So I believe the major problem now is to, it's often said they should trade land for peace, I think one should trade whatever is traded for time.

In time, we will see the impact of fundamentalism. The changes in the situation in Saudi Arabia, the change in Jordan when King Hussein disappears, the changes in Syria when Assad, who has been in power for a long time and who is getting older, when he leaves the scene, I think that is the best that can be achieved and that is already an enormous progress.

Certainly there are fundamentalist moods both in Israel and in the Arab world. But the primary requirement for the present situation, it seems to me, is to keep one's eye on what must be accomplished in the next year or two and to prevent a coalescence of all the forces that would create some wild explosion in the Middle East that I do not believe the West is capable of handling, because I do not believe the Gulf War situation can be repeated in Israel.

Rather: Fouad, how about your part of the question?

**Ajami:** Your question is a notion, I mean, it's very interesting. Look, the Arabs love the Palestinians, as you know, I mean they always loved the Palestinians, and it is just amazing — we have asked, and this is something whose irony should be appreciated, we asked in the multilateral negotiations, for example, we've asked the Kuwaitis to sit down to these multilateral negotiations. And, they have sat down to these multilateral negotiations, but it's interesting to note that 350,000 Palestinians have been expelled from Kuwait. Now you can argue the justice or the wisdom of this, and the Kuwaitis will tell you why they did it, but hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who made their home in Kuwait were expelled and, in a way, the Arabs looked the other way, they looked the other way.

It's just that the Palestinians, they were not the victims of intra-Arab politics, had they been the victims of intra-Arab politics, they would have been long forgotten. They were the victims of another kind of politics, they were the victims of, and their issue involved Israel and so therefore Arab historiography in a way never told the truth about all this, it never told the truth about all this, and it just simply wasn't capable of telling the truth about the Palestinians and there is a great thing about Zionism.

A wise man once said of it, he said, "This is a movement that created not only one nationalism, but two, for it gave birth to the Palestinian." Ponder this, ponder this: for inspiration and for plagiarism, the Palestinians have always turned to Zionism. For example, the Palestinians now speak of their diaspora, [laughter] that there are West Bank Palestinians, and diaspora Palestinians. [laughter] You are called the Jerusalem Foundation, right? Well, I received solicitations from the Jerusalem Fund -- that's a Palestinian group. The United Palestine Appeal, [laughter]

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for the United Jewish Appeal, and on and on. When Mahmoud Darwish, the Palestinian national poet, wrote the hollow declaration of an independent Palestinian state in 1988, guess what he had in front of him? Israel's Declaration of Independence. That was his inspiration. When the Palestinians seeking a publicity stunt at some point wanted to challenge Israel, remember the ship they leased, and they called it, lo and behold, "Exodus II," [laughter] you know, it's plenty, it's plenty. I never tire of saying that this is a national movement, the Palestinians, blessed by, the accident of its enemy, and it remains in play.

[tape unclear]

Rather: Let me put a footnote at the bottom of that, because if I understand the thrust [unintelligible] of your question: "All this being true, why isn't it part of what we read in the press, and why isn't it part of what we see on television?" Two points, and I see this as doing honor and respect to your question and I hope that you will take it in that spirit. Because I want to speak directly with you. First of all, Israel is held to a higher standard, and it will be. One is kidding one's self to believe it will be otherwise. Part of this has to do with Israel's history, part of it has to do with the standard Israel has set for itself, part of it has to do with what Israel has allowed...

There is, there has been, there is and there always will be a higher price to pay in terms of the world's perception - in terms, if you will, of sort of first draft of history, which is one definition of journalism - when you try to operate a democracy. Now, this has been true of the United States itself, there was a period not so long ago, and indeed, it continues to this day where you hear people say, "Well why is it that the United States and the British press or the French press or the Chinese press or what have you gets such a bum rap?" Look it's part of the price paid for democracy.

I'm not suggesting to you that it's fair, it is not. I am not suggesting to you that it's balanced - not one of my favorite words - it is not. And Fouad makes a telling point, and he's, one of the reasons, one of the millions of reasons it's always good to have Fouad around is because Fouad is a - he speaks truth to power, even when it's the minuscule power of the press if you will, to remind us when tear gas is used in the West Bank, we have the pictures, we have the pictures because Israel believes in freedom of the press, Israel is trying to operate a representative democracy. When poison gas was used against the Kurds, it took years to get the pictures out.

We, in this case, and I mean it in no self serving way, when CBS News finally got the pictures, it was years after the fact. This is the difference, it's always going to be there. I don't expect that it will make you happy to hear it but this is the reality, it isn't going to change. Now having said that, and this will end this, I'm frequently wrong about such things, my friends Fouad and Secretary Kissinger know better than most how often I am wrong, but I believe there's been at least a small shift in this since the Persian Gulf War. When the first Scuds hit Israel things changed at least a bit, at least a bit in the public perception.

I'll give you a specific. For years journalists reporting out of the Middle East, some with a lot of experience, some with no experience and some like myself with some experience, but not considering one as an expert, were never able, I never got the sense we were able to convey Dr. Kissinger's point of how fragile Israel's security is. We did report after report, and even a brilliant correspondent, perhaps the best foreign correspondent operating in print or broadcasting today, Bob Simon, was never able to convey this sense as did those pictures of Israel under Scud attack.

Now I don't want to overstate this, this doesn't mean nirvana, alright, open up, all of the sudden the coverage is going to be more equal in closed societies and those in open societies, but there was at least, at least, a slight change which I think exist to this day. Now I don't expect it to last all that long because memories are short, this will fade. But for at least what Fouad called a "plastic moment," things changed at least a bit.

Kissinger: Can I make one observation, and maybe Fouad can correct me because it's based on observation or interpretation of observation, I don't study it. Well, one problem the press has or the media have is they report literally what is being told to them and what they see, which is quite proper. But in dealing with the Arabs, at

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least, I always felt, you have to understand how to deal with intangibles. When you deal with Israelis you're dealing with a Talmudic society that can drive you crazy [laughter] -- in the words, in the meanings of words that they can find but it is really quite concrete.

Rather: It's literal.

Kissinger: I tend to agree with Fouad, you can't really believe anything an Arab says. But you can believe the mood he creates, but that is an intangible quality.

What it said, I've written it in my memoirs, I had a conversation with King Fahad who was a very remarkable man, who made endless speeches, Faisal, not Fahad, Faisal, who made endless speeches about Zionism and America and Communism and I kept saying it would never work and he kept going on [unintelligible] when we were finished the note taker had closed his book which was going to be sent to the PLO in Beirut, he took me to the door and he said, in English, "I pray to the Lord Almighty for the success of your noble efforts based on your proven abilities."

In other words, pay no attention to what I've just said [laughter] and go ahead with what you've more or less described and don't make me say that in anything that's being written down in notes. [laughter] Now that's very difficult for journalists to handle, it's also very difficult for diplomats, especially American diplomats, to handle. So they will report what your Kuwaiti friend said, but not really what your Kuwaiti friends think in their heart of hearts, which is not so hard to find out if you, is that a fair statement?

Ajami: Oh quite. And see actually, somewhat related to all the above; that's why I say, give me a King Abdullah of Jordan who negotiated with the Jews ever since the beginning of the Yishuv until his death in 1951. I mean, looking at the record of what passes for public politics in the Arab world and what passes for republican politics in the Arab world verses what someone like King Abdullah was able to do, or even the record of King Hussein. I now describe myself in Arab politics as a born again monarchist, I take the Kings over these thugs who are around and so it is, and so it is.

And that's why one doesn't have, you know people are saying for example, "What we need is, we need democracies in the Arab world as well" and I have no such fondness of the cause of democracy in the Arab world. Not so long ago there was a Kuwaiti parliament and this Kuwaiti parliament, which is going to be re-elected and reconvened in October, this Kuwaiti parliament passed a resolution declaring one Sleiman Hatta [unknown name] a hero of the Kuwaiti and Arab nation. And you know who this Sleiman Hatta was? He was a loony who went on a rampage and killed seven Israeli tourists in Sinai and this man was declared a hero. So it's always, in the Arab world I always like to go for the sly saving bargain, I like to go for the behind the scenes act because I don't trust public diplomacy there and I don't trust the mood of the public.

[unintelligible]

Question from the audience: I hope you gentlemen will indulge the naivete of this question. Given that you've already expressed some doubts about the future of Arab democracy. But, given that we were quite successful in installing democracy in Germany and Japan after World War II where no previous, or limited previous experiences with democracy had occurred, don't you think, given that "plastic moment" that you had spoken of earlier, it would have been worth some sort of a try in Iraq? Or what do you think the correct first stage of future Arab democracy would be currently and how could we encourage it?

Rather: Well, Fouad, since you are the one who is pessimistic about the possibility for democracies --

Ajami: Well this will give me a chance to reiterate one of my, I mean, forget it! [laughter and applause] See, like, look, look, people have spent a lot of time trying to explain, you know, the incidence, if you take a look at democracy and you take a look at non-democratic forms of government in the world, it's democracy that's special,

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you see, it's democracy that's special. It's Europe, it's North America, it's Israel, few such societies. Everywhere else, it isn't, it's malignant nationalism, it's authoritarianism. In the Arab world, look at what you have: you have the officers and the Kings, right? The Arab world is ruled by officers and kings, that's about it. And so it's the dinas [unknown word] or the despots.

And that's what I said at the beginning, I said give me the kings, give me the kings. And the Arabs have a very honest way of now looking at Saddam and Havez Assad, and anyway, Havez Assad is grooming his son for succession, right, so it's already a monarchy. And Saddam is grooming his son for succession, so it's already a monarchy. So you say "Well, is it worth while to pursue the cause of democracy in the Arab world?" and the answer is, it's really none of our business, because it won't work, we can't succeed. There is no democratic political culture, there is no democratic history, there is no democratic household, there is no democratic education. So, if you open up the electoral life of the country without opening up the culture of the land and changing the ways of the people, you will get what you've gotten, in every election you will get the triumph of the Islamisist at the ballot box and then you have the states calling.

Same Questioner: How do you open up that culture?

[audience grumbling]

Ajami: Well, oh, it's --

Rather: I think he said it: "Forget it!"

Kissinger: Can I make a point here? I think Americans have a tendency to believe that almost everybody in the world is a misunderstood American. [laughter and clapping]

Let me say two things about Japan, one a personal experience. First of all, if you look at the Japanese political system in which no opposition party has ever come close to winning an election, it is much more similar to the Mexican one-party system than it is to a multi-party Western system.

And I was at a lunch in Japan with a number of very leading personalities and I'm very interested in this phenomena of factions within the Liberal Democratic Party in Japan because the Liberal Democratic Party is organized into three or four factions that have leaders that are appointed by their predecessors, not elected, and in which the followers vote exactly as their leader tells them. And therefore most Westerners who deal with individual ministers and don't understand they ought to deal with faction leaders are wasting a lot of time.

I asked at that meeting, at that lunch, I said, "Has it ever happened that a member of a faction voted against his leader?" Now they thought that was an interesting question. [laughter] And they began to work it back through cabinet after cabinet after cabinet and before I knew it we were in the 1930's! [laughter] Which suggested that in the Japanese mind the political change after 1945 is not the same as in the American mind. It's an adaptation of the traditional Japanese system. It's not that until [sic] one day they were non-democratic and the other they were democratic, it is an evolution. And we don't often look at the preconditions to democracy that made possible the separation of powers, the checks and balances, the legally enforced individual rights which are the essence of Western democracy and which have never really developed anywhere else.

Question from audience: [unintelligible] A brief question, in the past 25 years, the Middle East has been the center of the conflict in the world, particularly with the competition of Moscow and Washington. Things have changed dramatically, especially since 1989. And my question is as we see what is happening in our situation in America particularly with our economical situation, and the political situation, the presidential election where it seems the candidates hardly ever refer to the conflict in the Middle East. With the changes in the political condition in Europe where a major civil war going on in Yugoslavia hardly brings the concern of a world conflict and in Asia today, there are major problems, but yet no one speak about this causing a major world conflagration. Is it possible that

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Transcript from the Jerusalem Foundation fundraiser of June 3, 1992

The event was described in the New York Times (May 31, 1992; section 9, paragraph 14; column 1), under the heading "Israel Benefit" as such: "Henry Kissinger and Fouad Ajami, a professor of Mideast studies at Johns Hopkins University, will be the main speakers at a benefit for the Jerusalem Foundation, which raises money to create jobs in Jerusalem for immigrants. The benefit opens with a 6 P.M. buffet at the Equitable Center, Seventh Avenue at 52d Street. Dan Rather will moderate the forum, which will be followed by dessert and music. Tickets: $250, from (212) 697-4188."

Introduction: Martin Peretz, Editor-in-Chief of the New Republic
Moderator/Chairman: Dan Rather, Managing Editor of the CBS Evening News
Speakers: Henry Kissinger, Former Secretary of State and CBS board member
Fouad Ajami, Consultant CBS News
Concluding Remarks: Mort Zuckerman, Editor-in-Chief of US News and World Report

Peretz: Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the Jerusalem Foundation I want to welcome you to this evening, which marks the 25th year since the Six Day War. It is not hard to remember the exhilaration and relief which we felt in mid-June 1967 when the soldiers of the State of Israel once again, and not for the last time, were able to insure, at least for a spell, the security of the Jewish state.

But remembering that exhilaration and relief, it is nonetheless hard to remember the tremendous anxieties, the tremendous fears which we had from the end of April all through the tense May into the month of June when it became clear that Israel would have to fight with its back to the sea. And when all the commitments which the United States had made to Israel turned out, alas, to be not commitments at all.

And thinking about that, I thought how fortunate it was for the history of the Jews, and for the United States, that when six years later another war was fought, the steward of American foreign policy immediately understood that Israel could not be left alone. We are honored to have that steward with us here tonight, and I would say that, with Fouad Ajami, no two men have taught us more clearly the harsh realities of world politics and particularly the unflinching hard realities of the Middle East than our two speakers today.

In June 1967, the city of Jerusalem was reunited with its past and reunited with its future. It's also difficult to remember that before June 1967, when East Jerusalem was under Jordanian control -- actually the Jordanians annexed it, and I wonder whether President Bush ever commented upon that -- that Christians were not allowed to repair their churches, Muslims from Israel were not allowed to worship at the site that we're always told is the third holiest in Islam, and of course the Jews simply were not to be found in the entire West Bank or in the alleys and streets of Jerusalem, in which the grandest days of Jewish history were written.

These facts of course are no longer true and one reason they are no longer true is not simply because of a particularly humane administration of the city of Jerusalem, but the Jerusalem Foundation itself. You are all friends of this foundation and it is good that we come together simply to reflect on the past and on the future. But even though Teddy [Kolleck, Mayor of Jerusalem] is not here, we do think about the work of the Foundation, and I want to call to your attention something that Mort Zuckerman will tell you more about at the end of the evening, that one of our projects to which we are now paying great attention is a project to subsidize the work of, to subsidize the employment, in the voluntary sector, of Soviet and Ethiopian immigrants. A Jewish immigrant to Israel is always an asset to Israel, but a Jewish immigrant to Jerusalem is sort of like a double whammy. Let me read you a letter from Teddy Kolleck:

> The laws of physics are most unkind, particularly when they preclude one's being in two different places at the same time. But while I could not personally be with you, I did not want to miss the opportunity to send warmest greetings from Jerusalem.

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both sides. -- However, I believe that when that is done it is possible within a measurable time, say a year after the two elections, to achieve a settlement that enables the Arabs on the West Bank and those territories not essential to Israeli security to achieve a much greater control, almost total control over their internal affairs, as well as in much of Gaza, and Israel not jeopardize its own security. And if this were achieved, a period of coexistence could begin that after of period of several years could open vistas that we cannot now imagine.

I do not think it is helpful to draw absolute plans or to assert that if Israel only would go back to the '67 borders that then suddenly harmony would reign in relations in which it is not clear-cut, because we have to remember that the Arab-Israeli dispute is only one of the many conflicts in the area. There is the rise of fundamentalism, there's the struggle between radical and moderate Arabs. And that process must be permitted to proceed for some side-by-side [unintelligible] what I have described the negotiating possibilities to be.

I'm actually quite optimistic, if the United States is not too doctrinaire, if, after the Israeli election enough of a consensus can be formed to deal with middle-term objectives and not just with the immediate pressures and if the Arab side is brought to understand that they can make progress, but they cannot achieve the collapse of Israel by indirection, under those conditions, all of which I think are achievable, I would expect that significant progress can be made in the next year and that one should not wait for the magic word "peace" till every last Arab country has agreed to every last frontier demarcation to achieve this, and I believe that this would be something worthy of the suffering that so many people have put into this extraordinary area. Thank you very much. [applause]

Rather: Fouad Ajami. Fouad, we want to give you an opportunity to respond with your own vision, version of context and perspective, but I'd be especially interested somewhere along the way to see if you share Dr. Kissinger's, may I describe it as guarded optimism -- if you were still in the State Department you'd have it described that way, I know [laughter] - guarded optimism about what could be accomplished in such a short time frame.

Ajami: Thank you. Well first I should say I'm utterly surprised I'm on this panel. This is really amazing to me, and if you are thinking what I'm thinking, "How did Ajami get on a panel with Henry Kissinger and Dan Rather, " you are forgiven this thought. I was simply drafted for this assignment by two people I can never say "no" to, and that's Marty Peretz and Mort Zuckerman. And had I had some of Alan Dershowitz's chutzpa, [laughter] I would have at some point turned to them and said "Look, I can't do this, I'm overmatched here," but I'm delighted to be here, I'm honored to be here.

And I should tell you that some of what I did to prepare for being here included, at some point, I actually, two weeks ago, I decided to go to Jerusalem. I thought this would prepare me for meeting the Jerusalem Foundation. [laughter] And by the luck of the draw, as a traveler making his own luck, I happened to be in Jerusalem for the Jerusalem Day on Sunday and here I am amongst you. So I suppose there was some preparation and in some way I have tried to understand what is going on in Jerusalem and maybe I could meet with these people with some pride and with some faith in what I know.

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settlements, I insisted only one thing: that I be spared the ceremony of eating with a Bedouin. [laughter] And you know, Clinton Bailey was kind enough to say that I was very ill and that I wasn't feeling well, [laughter] so I was survived that ordeal. And I sat through this discussion.

On our way back to I think Beersheba, we picked up a young man a young, modernized Bedouin I should say and he was a remarkable character. And I suppose at that time I was completely Bedouined-out and so I threw some questions at him and I asked him, I said, "Are you an Israeli citizen" and he said "Yes, I am." "Do you intend to vote in this election?" He said, "No, I don't really have no [sic] such intention." I said, "Why not? Why not vote for the Arab parties?" He said "The Arab parties, they're just like the Arab world, their divided, they're terrible, I'll never vote for them." I say "OK, fine, why not vote for the peace, for the doves in Israel?" He said, "Oh no, they're nothing, I can't trust them, I'm not going to vote for them." So finally I said, "What about Mihrath — What about Labor?" And his answer — "Why not?" I said, "Labor?" and he answered, "Why yes?" And then he added with a little sly grin, he said: "like the Jews, I answer a question with a question." [laughter] And I thought, touche for my friend, my Israeli partner who'd been looking for the Bedouin, they'd been changed. And they've been touched by the Israeli social and political system. And there is some wisdom in this, I'll elaborate on it in a little while.

The next day, having talked to every politician on both sides of the aisle, both to the Israelis and the Palestinians, and I emerged with an incredible splitting headache. [laughter] I decided I'd walk to the Old City and there is an old man, a merchant whom I have known for a long time and he's never let me down, he's never failed me, he's always told me the truth, right when everyone in this country, here, particularly in America, was enamored of the shabab, remember the word? The young men of the intifada, the children of the stones, I went to this old man and he said, "Look, I lived through the Arab rebellion of 1936 to '39 and this will end, this will end in a long night of terror, it will end with the night of the long knives and the Arabs will begin to kill Arabs in large numbers." This was quite a while ago. And I learned to trust this man's wisdom so I went to [unintelligible] and have [sic] coffee with him. And there were these young men, again, the shabab, you know these young boys, you know 15, 16 years old. They are children of the occupation, they are formed by Israel and this is the irony of this occupation, there we think of it as this hideous occupation, but its also given some of its own self confidence, you know the confidence of Israeli society and the liberalism and the openness has seeped into the Palestinians.

We know this. There can't be no [sic] intifada in Syria, right? ask the people of Hama. There can't be no [sic] intifada in Iraq, ask the Shiite and the Kurds. But there could be and intifada in Israel because such are the rules of the engagement between the Israelis and the Palestinians. I always say about this conflict, this is a remarkable conflict, the Israelis and the Palestinians, because tear gas on the West Bank receives more coverage than nerve gas in the hills in Kurdistan, and that too is part of this conflict. [applause]

This is the nature of this thing. And this man selling coffee looked at this young shabab and they were being rowdy and they were being wild and they were disturbing the peace in his street in the Old City and he turned around and he said, "Look our people have been spoiled." He said, "Under Jordan, none of this would have been happening." So that too, I suppose, is part of the record of this occupation. We don't know, I mean there is a lot to this relationship between the Israelis and the Palestinians that escapes our attention. I mean if you take a look at it and you say alright now. A lot of Palestinians and this addresses some of the good questions that Dan opened with about Jerusalem.

Arabs now lament the fate of Jerusalem, and they speak and mourn for Jerusalem. But there are some interesting facts, and they're just facts, no one really can deny them: Between 1948 and 1967 Jerusalem's population grew, East Jerusalem's population, forgive me, grew by 50 percent. Amman grew by 300 percent! And the bulk of the political life and the industry of Jordan was never in the city of Arab Jerusalem, it was in Amman. Jerusalem was being punished you may recall, for the fact that the grandfather of King Hussein, King Abdullah, was murdered on the grounds of the Al Aksa Mosque in Jerusalem. And Jerusalem was always on the outs with the regime. So some of the affection for Jerusalem now, in a way, is really about Jerusalem has been ennobled by the loss. And people look at Jerusalem and it has become what it has become and you know, such is the nature of things. We know

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things are what they are and we accept this. So there is a bit, if you will now, in looking back on Jerusalem this history is being rewritten and revised.

The rules of engagement, as I said, keep you eyes on the rules of engagement between the Israelis and the Palestinians, these are special rules. And these rules keep the Palestinians in the game. No national movement could have made as many wrong turns, as many wrong choices as the Palestinians did, from 1920 onward, from 1920 to 1990 and still be in the game. But they've been in the game and they've been in the game in large measure because of Israel's own liberal system, because of Israel's own conscience and because of Israel's own constituencies and that's the way it is -- that is the way it is.

I always tell the Palestinians, and they don't really like to hear this, I say, "Look you were lucky in the enemy you drew, like the Kurds, you could have drawn the Iraqis, like the Kurds, you could have drawn the Iranians, you could have drawn many other enemies, but you drew the Israelis. Take a look at the story of the flight of the Palestinians in 1948. Who told this story? An Israeli historian by the name of Benny Morris told this story in a book entitled "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem." And my little retort to Arab students with whom I argue these matters, I say "Look, Israel will be like the neighborhood and will be like its neighbors when a Turk will write a book called "The Birth of the Armenian Refugee Problem." Well, this isn't going to happen, this isn't going to happen and it won't happen."

So that's sort of some of the rules of engagement between the Israelis and the Palestinians. These are rules we can't really understand. These are rules that Americans in particular don't really understand. And I think that there is a lot that could be said about the current American engagement and the current American assumptions and the current American impatience with forcing the pace of change in the region.

But I wish to leave you with one little thought. I picked up a magazine, an Arabic magazine on the West Bank, and on the cover of it was an old Palestinian woman holding a huge key, a huge key and underneath it was: "Haq al-Audeh -- The Right of Return!" And that was the response to the State Department of Mr. Baker talking to the Palestinians about the right of return, to Jaffa and Acre and Haifa and so on. And this was a slippery slope that we've ended up with.

And my little complaint and my little dissent from the current American push was that no sooner, the guns hadn't even fallen silent in the Gulf War, we had just let down the Shi'ite and the Kurds in the Gulf War. We had left Saddam where he was and we headed in the direction of the Mediterranean to force on the Arab world and on the Palestinians and on the Israelis a diplomatic process the material for which was lacking. I couldn't really understand, why do such a thing? But you see, we started on this slippery slope, we told the Israelis, "Alright, we want an Israeli-Palestinian delegation, sorry, we want a joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation." They acquiesced. Then we sliced off the Palestinian delegation from the Jordanians, again the Israelis acquiesced.

Now we brought the PLO into the process. Let's not kid ourselves; the people who are negotiating now are really the PLO, it's a distinction without a difference. I mean the people who are negotiating for the Palestinians are creatures, I mean they are either PLO people or the product of the rolodex, I mean, nothing against the rolodex, we all live off the rolodex, I mean there's nothing wrong with it, but these are people who've just simply been manufactured. And if you take a look, then, in effect, we said alright, we brought the PLO into the process and finally we ended up talking about the right of return. We have created appetites we cannot really satisfy.

And again, my other lament about this American initiative and this American push into the region is it does something which has been a pet grievance of mine. I have been studying and debunking Arab nationalism and pan-Arabism for a long time. No sooner had the guns fallen silent, we recreated Arab nationalism. The Arabs woke up on August 2nd 1990 and saw the hell of what that befell [sic] Kuwait, and they began to understand that this legend of Arab nationalism, mark this, really: After the fall of Communism, the most deadly ideology in the world, that may reflect my own bias in what I studied and what I deal with, is Arab nationalism. And we turned around and we recreated Arab nationalism, we recreated Arab nationalism. We created, in effect, the conditions. We told the

8

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Arabs -- they had just witnessed the ordeal in the Gulf. The northern Arabs had just finished betraying the Gulf Arabs. The Palestinians had just finished betraying the Kuwaitis. And the Arab world witnessed the collapse of the cherished myths of Arab nationalism. Then [tape unclear] there was the window of opportunity.

Well, in the last 25 years, since the Six Day War, there were really two major windows of opportunity in the Middle East for some peaceful accommodation, for some diplomatic change. Two "plastic moments," as I like to tell my students to impress them. Two plastic moments where statesmen could play with the material of history. One was after the '73 war -- that was Henry Kissinger's time and method -- and one was after the Gulf War.

I'm not really impressed with the change that the Gulf War ushered. And I think that it's not wise to go back and recreate a common Arab consensus. The genius, I thought of the method in 1973, was that we looked and we realized that the Egyptians wanted out of pan-Arab diplomacy. That Sadat wanted out -- he had tired of Arab nationalism and he tired of the Arab world and wanted to take a separate course. And the separate course materialized for him.

And I think this is the fault of the American diplomacy today, is to recreate the conditions for a pan-Arab consensus. And that diplomacy, mark this, is always the diplomacy of the lowest common denominator. We went to Madrid. I went as Dan's advisor to Madrid and we watched what happened in Madrid, a great spectacle, it was very interesting. The one speech in Madrid that intrigued me enormously, was the speech of the Egyptians. You would have never known, had you listened to Amr Musa, the Egyptian Foreign Minister, that Egypt and Israel are at peace. Because, suddenly, faced with the cameras and faced with the collective Arab agenda, and faced with the other Arab delegations, Amr Musa decided to give a speech which, in effect, paid homage to all the pieties of Arab nationalism. No words were said about the slain man, Anwar Sadat, by the man who was supposed to represent the Egyptian state. No homage was paid by Amr Musa to the legacy of Anwar Sadat.

[end of first side of tape]

I think that, as someone who was in the "Amen corner," to quote Mr. Patrick Buchanan, during the Gulf War, and really wanted the end of Saddam, I feel somewhat remorseful and somewhat disappointed with the outcome of this war. I never thought that the outcome of the Gulf War was, in effect, to go back to Israel and the Palestinians and push a new settlement and to bring the Palestinians to the table unrepentant. I asked several Palestinians -- I said, "Has there been any self-criticism, any self-criticism since 1990-91 of what the Palestinians and the Jordanians did in the Gulf War? Of how they sided with Saddam?" And the more honest of them said, there has been no such soul-searching among the Palestinians.

So we brought into the process people who had never understood the error of their ways during the Gulf War. And we promised them things we could never deliver. Like the woman on the cover of the magazine with a huge key to the vanished home -- with the key to the old imaginary house in the imaginary town. You know, we can't do any of this and we shouldn't try, and we shouldn't try. And that's why I think that, you know, one should be pessimistic about this American course and about the wisdom of this American course. I hope this at least gets some of my own position onto the table. [applause]

Rather: I want to make sure that I'm correct about this, I think we'll go to some questions from the audience, but Fousad, let me follow up on something that you suggested, and I'd be very interested to hear Dr. Kissinger respond to this. You said that you believed, and this is a paraphrase and I hope it's an accurate one, that in the post Communist era the most dangerous ideology, the most dangerous movement in the world, is Arab nationalism. Where does, what I consider to be, and if you differ, then say so, where does fundamental Mohammedanism fit into this? I myself have said, in the post Communist era, perhaps the most dangerous movement in the world, the most dangerous ideology, is the fundamental Islamic movement, which is something different, it melds into, apart from Arab nationalism. What do you think?

Ajami: Well, I actually, on Arab nationalism, I should own up to my own bias, having written "The Arab

9

[L]

Predicament" and "The End of Pan-Arabism," I have always been willing to bury Arab nationalism. And Arabs always said, "Ah, because his great grandfather came from Persia in the 19th century." [laughter] But it really isn't about this. It's just about the fact that this is an ideology which is infected, as far as I'm concerned, with Germanic notions of nationalism, which the sooner it's out of the life of the Arabs, the better it is for the Arab people themselves. And so forgive this rhetorical emphasis on Arab nationalism, it's really mostly just my own passion.

Now on Islamic fundamentalism, see I happen to be a true revisionist and almost like, there aren't that many people who agree with me. Those of you who read, I'm sure you've seen the *New York Times Magazine* last Sunday, I think, I was away, and there was an article by a good friend, Judy Miller and Judy is a friend of many of us here and for whose work I have a tremendous amount of respect.

See I happen to be almost a dissident on the idea, on the strength of Islamic fundamentalism. I mean, I think the Islamic fundamentalist threat has been over stated. And my own cards on this one go like this: Now take a look at, if we were to choose the four worst regimes in the Middle East and we just, everyone could have their pick, let's say Iran, Iraq, Syria and Libya, that's not a bad choice, right? [laughter] You know, that's a good, in the memorable words of *Casablanca*, "Round up the usual list of suspects." [laughter] That's a good list, that's a good list. Now, of this list, of this list, three of these regimes, the Iraqis, the Syrians and the Libyans are quote "secular" regimes, right, secular regimes. The Iranian revolution, the Iranian state, is a fundamentalist state. So I think that I am somewhat dubious about the argument of Islamic fundamentalism.

I also was dubious in 1989, 1990 when I though much time was spent taking about Islamic fundamentalism and then the threat came from Saddam, who was mister secularist, who had a Christian Foreign Minister, and who actually said Islam, that religion and politics should be kept separate. So what is, what is behind and inside of Islamic Fundamentalism? A while ago the Joint Distribution Committee was kind enough to invite me to give a speech. The only people who invite me to give speeches are Jewish groups. [laughter] No, actually, some other people also invite me.

The Joint Distribution Committee asked me to give a speech on Islamic fundamentalism and some of them may be here, and it's a restatement of, you know, Islamic fundamentalism, what are we talking about here? We're talking about the young urban poor in the Muslim world, we're talking about the young urban poor. We're talking about the demographic explosion in the Muslim world. We're talking about countries growing by 3% or more. We're talking about a people who are awake at the destruction of secular nationalism and they have nothing, and so they latch on to Islamic fundamentalism.

We watch the spectacle in Algeria and the choice was between a despotic state, a despotic state claiming secularism, and protecting your cafe au lait and your baguettes and so on and your freedom, and Islamic movements, and Islamic movements.

And that's one among many reasons why I've been dubious about the cause of democracy in the Arab world. I've never really wanted elections in any Arab or Muslim country because the fact of the matter is, given that it's always you have the state on the one hand and the Muslim fundamentalists on the other, and if you open up the political life of these societies, suddenly young Muslim fundamentalists step into the breach, and they fill the void, and, in effect, we saw what we saw in Algeria: a state that, through open elections it could not abide by, an Islamic fundamentalist who won at a democratic process they loathed, and it ended in a draw between a terrible regime and a terrible opposition.

So, what then is behind this Islamic fundamentalism? I think it's really the cry of the aggrieved. And I think a lot of times regimes in the Muslim world themselves play up the threat of Islamic fundamentalism in order to blackmail Washington and others and say, "Well look, you don't like us, but it's either us or these bearded ones. And if you don't like us the bearded ones will come in." [laughter] And it's really about, I mean, I always assumed that, that in some way that when one is talking about Islamic fundamentalism, you're really talking about the failure of the alternatives. There is a quotation I've always loved from Ayatollah Khomeini. When Khomeini came to power,

10

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Kissinger: First of all I believe that the Israeli situation is extremely dangerous, inherently dangerous, and therefore what I think that what we should try to avoid is a situation where Israel gambles everything on some change of mood, on some change of attitude in boarders that cannot possibly be defended if the assumption turns out to be wrong. And the other extreme of Israel, rightly or wrongly, so isolating itself that the whole international community begins to turn on it, as it did with better reason in the case of South Africa. Those are the two extremes between which Israel must navigate and a wise US policy will navigate. There's no question that if Iraq had fired all its Scuds on Israel and forgotten about Kuwait for the time being, Israel would already be in an extraordinarily difficult situation and the damage it could have done in retaliation might not have been significantly worse than what the United States did because the United States effort was so much larger than anything Israel could mount. So I believe the major problem now is to, it's often said they should trade land for peace, I think one should trade whatever is traded for time.

Ajami: Your question is a notion, I mean, it's very interesting. Look, the Arabs love the Palestinians, as you know, I mean they always loved the Palestinians, and it is just amazing -- we have asked, and this is something whose irony should be appreciated, we asked in the multilateral negotiations, for example, we've asked the Kuwaitis to sit down to these multilateral negotiations. And, they have sat down to these multilateral negotiations, but it's interesting to note that 350,000 Palestinians have been expelled from Kuwait. Now you can argue the justice or the wisdom of this, and the Kuwaitis will tell you why they did it, but hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who made their home in Kuwait were expelled and, in a way, the Arabs looked the other way, they looked the other way.

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[tape unclear]

Rather: Let me put a footnote at the bottom of that, because if I understand the thrust [unintelligible] of your question: "All this being true, why isn't it part of what we read in the press, and why isn't it part of what we see in that spirit. Because I want to speak directly with you. First of all, Israel is held to a higher standard, and it will be. One is kidding one's self to believe it will be otherwise. Part of this has to do with Israel's history, part of it has to do with the standard Israel has set for itself, part of it has to do with what Israel has allowed...

There is, there has been, there is and there always will be a higher price to pay in terms of the world's perception - in terms, if you will, of sort of first draft of history, which is one definition of journalism -- when you try to operate a democracy. Now, this has been true of the United States itself, there was a period not so long ago, and indeed, it continues to this day where you hear people say, "Well why is it that the United States and the British press or the French press or the Chinese press or what have you gets such a bum rap?" Look it's part of the price paid for democracy.

I'm not suggesting to you that it's fair, it is not. I am not suggesting to you that it's balanced -- not one of my favorite words -- it is not. And Fouad makes a telling point, and he's, one of the reasons, one of the millions of reasons it's always good to have Fouad around is because Fouad is a - he speaks truth to power, even when it's the minuscule power of the press if you will, to remind us when tear gas is used in the West Bank, we have the pictures, we have the pictures because Israel believes in freedom of the press, Israel is trying to operate a representative democracy. When poison gas was used against the Kurds, it took years to get the pictures out.

13

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least, I always felt, you have to understand how to deal with intangibles. When you deal with Israelis you're dealing with a Talmudic society that can drive you crazy [laughter] - in the words, in the meanings of words that they can find but it is really quite concrete.

Rather: It's literal.

What it said, I've written it in my memoirs, I had a conversation with King Fahad who was a very remarkable man, who made endless speeches, Faisal, not Fahad, Faisal, who made endless speeches about Zionism and America and Communism and I kept saying it would never work and he keep going on [unintelligible] when we were finished the note taker had closed his book which was going to be sent to the PLO in Beirut, he took me to the door and he said, in English, "I pray to the Lord Almighty for the success of your noble efforts based on your proven abilities."

[unintelligible]

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ID=2125645359

08-03-92 15:33 WBAI Pacifica

[Lc]

And that's what I said at the beginning, I said give me the kings, give me the kings. And the Arabs have a very honest way of now looking at Saddam and Havez Assad, and anyway, Havez Assad is grooming his son for succession, right, so it's already a monarchy. And Saddam is grooming his son for succession, so it's already a monarchy. So you say "Well, is it worth while to pursue the cause of democracy in the Arab world?" and the answer is, it's really none of our business, because it won't work, we can't succeed. There is no democratic political culture, there is no democratic history, there is no democratic household, there is no democratic education. So, if you open up the electoral life of the country without opening up the culture of the land and changing the ways of the people, you will get what you've gotten, in every election you will get the triumph of the Islamist at the ballot box and then you have the states calling.

**Same Questioner:** How do you open up that culture?

[audience grumbling]

**Ajami:** Well, oh, it's --

**Rather:** I think he said it: "Forget it!"

**Kissinger:** Can I make a point here? I think Americans have a tendency to believe that almost everybody in the world is a misunderstood American. [laughter and clapping]

I asked at that meeting, at that lunch, I said, "Has it ever happened that a member of a faction voted against his leader?" Now they thought that was an interesting question. [laughter] And they began to work it back through the Japanese mind the political change after 1945 is not the same as in the American mind. It's an adaptation of the traditional Japanese system. It's not that until [sic] one day they were non-democratic and the other they were democratic, it is an evolution. And we don't often look at the preconditions to democracy that made possible the separation of powers, the checks and balances, the legally enforced individual rights which are the essence of Western democracy and which have never really developed anywhere else.

**Question from audience:** [unintelligible] A brief question, in the past 25 years, the Middle East has been the center of the conflict in the world, particularly with the competition of Moscow and Washington. Things have changed dramatically, especially since 1989. And my question is as we see what is happening in our situation in America particularly with our economical situation, and the political situation, the presidential election where it seems the candidates hardly ever refer to the conflict in the Middle East. With the changes in the political condition in Europe where a major civil war going on in Yugoslavia hardly brings the concern of a world conflict and in Asia today, there are major problems, but yet no one speak about this causing a major world conflagration. Is it possible that

15

AUG 07 1992

Anti-Defamation League
of Bhai Brith

August 6, 1992

Dr. Henry Kissinger
Kissinger Associates
350 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10022

Dear Henry:

I want to share with you ADL's reaction to the
recent stir regarding your comments at the Jerusalem
Foundation fund-raiser of June 3.

Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR) sent out
the enclosed press release on August 3. A reporter from
WBAI called us and asked for a response regarding your
comment, "I tend to agree with Fouad, you can't really
believe anything an Arab says."

We responded that given your preceding and following
comments, that statement was not an ethnic slur but
rather a comment on the political realities of the Middle
East where Arab leaders do not have the freedom to speak
their minds.

With best regards,

AHF:slh
Enc. 2

P. S. Note the enclosed story in The Village Voice.

OFFICERS OF THE
NATIONAL COMMISSION

National Chairman
MELVIN SALBERG

National Director
ABRAHAM H. FOXMAN

Chairman, National
Executive Committee
DAVID H. STRASSLER

Associate National Director
JUSTIN J. FINGER

Executive Associate National Director
PETER T. WILLNER

Honorary Chairmen
KENNETH J. BIALKIN
SEYMOUR GRAUBARD
MAXWELL E. GREENBERG
BURTON M. JOSEPH
BURTON S. LEVINSON

Honorary Vice Chairmen
LEONARD L. ABESS
DOROTHY BINSTOCK
RUDY BOSCHWITZ
EDGAR M. BRONMAN

MAXWELL DANE
MAX FISHER
BRUCE I. HOCHMAN
GERI M. JOSEPH
MAX M. KAMPELMAN

SAM KANE
PHILIP M. KLUTZNICK
PHILIP KRUPP

SAMUEL H. MILLER
BERNARD D. MINTZ
MILTON MOLLEN
BERNARD NATH
ROBERT R. NATHAN

ANITA PERLMAN
THEODORE H. SILBERT

SIDNEY R. YATES
Vice-Chairmen
SYDNEY JARKOW
NAT KAMENY
LUCILLE S. KANTOR
IRVING SHAPIRO
JOEL SPRAYREGEN
WILLIAM VEPRIN

Vice-Chairman
National Executive Committee
ROBERT G. SUGARMAN

Honorary Chairmen, National
Executive Committee
DAVID A. ROSE
RONALD B. SOBEL

Honorary Treasurers
CHARLES GOLDRING
BENJAMIN GREENBERG
MOE KUDLER

Treasurer
ROBERT H. NAFTALY
Assistant Treasurer
MICHAEL SCHULTZ

Secretary
MICHAEL NACHMAN
Assistant Secretary
MEYER EISENBERG

President, B'nai B'rith
KENT E. SCHINER

Executive Vice President
SIDNEY CLEARFIELD

President, B'nai B'rith Women
HARRIET HORWITZ
Executive Director
ELAINE BINDER

DIVISION DIRECTORS
Civil Rights
JEFFREY P. SINENSKY

Community Service
ANN TOURK

Development
SHELDON FLIEGELMAN

Finance and Administration
BOBBIE ARBEFELD

Intergroup Relations
CHARNEY V. BROMBERG

International Affairs
KENNETH JACOBSON

Leadership
Assistant to the National Director
MARVIN S. RAPPAPORT

Media and Marketing
MARK EDELMAN

Washington Representative
JESS N. HORDES

General Counsel
ARNOLD FORSTER

823 United Nations Plaza, New York, NY 10017 (212) 490-2525 Cable: ANTIDEFAME/Telex: 649278/FAX: (212) 867-0779

SENT BY!

08-03-92 01:55PM

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2125645359 # 1

FAIR
Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting

130 W. 25th St. • New York, NY 10001 • Tel: (212) 633-6700 • Fax: (212) 727-7668

PLEASE DELIVER ASAP TO:

Amy Goodman BA

Contact: Steven Rendall

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Monday, August 3, 1992

ISRAEL BENEFIT RAISES QUESTIONS: IS CBS TOO BIASED TOWARD ISRAEL AND AGAINST ARABS TO IMPARTIALLY COVER THE MIDDLE EAST?

Remarks made by top CBS personnel at a benefit for Israel raise questions about the impartiality of that network in covering the Israeli-Arab conflict. The June 3 benefit, which solicited funds for the Jerusalem Foundation, featured a panel discussion with CBS anchor Dan Rather, CBS Middle East consultant Fouad Ajami, and Henry Kissinger (who is a CBS boardmember). FAIR has obtained a tape of the event.

During the panel discussion led by Rather, Henry Kissinger stated that "you can't really believe anything an Arab says." Neither Rather nor anyone else on the program objected to the comment.

Lebanese-born CBS News consultant Fouad Ajami, who was introduced by Rather as "one of our in-house wise men," made a series of comments disparaging Arab people. Recounting a reluctant trip to a Bedouin encampment, Ajami commented: "I insisted on only one thing -- that I be spared the ceremony of eating with a Bedouin." Ajami repeatedly insisted that Arabs were not capable of practicing democracy: "I've never really wanted elections in any Arab or Muslim country," he declared.

Presiding over the partisan pro-Israel discussion, Rather opened the event by saying that "many of us celebrate 25 years after the city [Jerusalem] was united under Israeli rule." Speaking of how "we celebrate Jerusalem here tonight, we pray for Jerusalem's survival," the CBS anchor warned that Saddam Hussein and others still dream of leading "a victorious Arab army into Jerusalem." He also warned about an Arab "population explosion" threatening Jerusalem. Despite his own unveiled sympathies and biases, Rather went on to suggest that U.S. mass media are biased against Israel. (A full transcript of the discussion is available from FAIR.)

The event raises questions of journalistic ethics:

** Is it appropriate for a network TV anchor to participate in a partisan fundraiser on a matter of great controversy and conflict?

Continued --

08-03-92 01:56PM

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SENT BY:

— Continued, CBS

Helping to raise funds for the absorption of new immigrants into Jerusalem is not solely a humanitarian endeavor. It is surrounded by controversy -- the kind that network TV news outlets are not suppose to take sides on. The current status of Jerusalem is a subject of major conflict; the U.N. Security Council has repeatedly declared Israel's annexation of east Jerusalem illegal. The U.S. does not recognize the annexation. Would a CBS News anchor have taken part in a fundraiser for aid projects linked to, for example, the Sandinista government of Nicaragua, or the government of Jordan?

** What is the responsibility of a network anchor when an ethnic slur is made during a public panel discussion he or she is leading?

If Rather had led a panel in which one of the speakers asserted "you can't really believe anything a Jew says," or "a black says," one suspects he would have challenged such a remark. Indeed, the failure to challenge such a remark -- when it became public -- might well have led to his dismissal. But in response to Kissinger's comment about Arabs, Rather was silent. When CBS consultant Ajami stated that democracy was impossible (and not desirable) for Arabs, Rather did not point out how demeaning it is to dismiss an entire ethnic group as not ready for self-rule.

The story of the June 3 fundraiser (and Kissinger's comment there) was broken this weekend in the syndicated column of Jeff Cohen and Norman Solomon. The columnists are associated with FAIR; their syndicated feature is distributed weekly by Creators Syndicate based in Los Angeles.

Research into the participation of CBS personnel in the Jerusalem Foundation benefit was conducted by FAIR associate Sam Hussein. According to Hussein: "The Kissinger remark, and the failure of Dan Rather and other leading media figures to object, illustrates that racism against Arabs is still widely acceptable in mainstream discourse and mainstream media."

The June 3 fundraiser, termed an "Israel benefit" in the New York Times notice of the event, was a $250-a-plate affair that took place at the Equitable Center. Introductory remarks were made by Martin Peretz (The New Republic). A concluding appeal for support for the Jerusalem Foundation was made by Mortimer Zuckerman (U.S. News and World Report).

FAIR's 17-page transcript of the event is available by calling (212) 633-6700. (Audio tapes of the event were obtained from the Jerusalem Foundation.)

08-07-92 09:56AM

TO KAI

P002

C6 FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 1992

THE WASHINGTON POST

# The TV Column

By John Carmody

Washington Post Staff Writer

Some 20 persons representing the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee rallied for about an hour yesterday in front of the CBS News Washington bureau to demand an apology from anchor Dan Rather, CBS Inc. board member Henry Kissinger and CBS News Middle East consultant Fouad Ajami...

The committee claims that the three made "racist comments" during a panel discussion on June 3 in New York held in conjunction with a Jerusalem Foundation dinner that raised funds for Israeli immigrants...

The charges of bias surfaced after Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), a liberal watchdog group, obtained a tape of the discussion during which Kissinger reportedly said, "You can't really believe anything an Arab says"...

Ajami, a professor of Middle East studies at Johns Hopkins University, at one point commented that when he visited the Bedouin Arabs, "I insisted on only one thing: that I be spared the ceremony of eating with a Bedouin ... so I was spared that ordeal." He also expressed doubt "about the cause of democracy in the Arab world"...

FAIR complained that Rather failed to challenge the statements and had also warned about an "Arab population explosion." The group questioned the news anchor's participation in a fundraising event for the settlement of Jews in East Jerusalem...

Rather is on vacation. Sam Husseini of FAIR said a protest may be staged in New York next week after the anchor has returned, claiming "a lot of people are angry and want to do something"...

The Arab American committee, meanwhile, has written CBS calling for an investigation. Albert Mokhiber, president of the committee, said the remarks of the three panelists were "repugnant forms of anti-Arab racism and outrageous ethnic slurs"...

Donna Dees, a spokeswoman for CBS News, called the allegations "ridiculous and outrageous." She said the Kissinger remarks were taken out of context, and that "Dan Rather has an exemplary record on fair and unbiased coverage of the Middle East"...

## FRIDAY, AUGUST 7
BROADCAST

14 NBC 5 WTTA 7 ABC

According to the transcript, the former secretary of state, commenting on coverage of Middle stories, said: "Well, one problem the press has or the media have is they report literally what is being told to them and what they see, which is quite proper. But in dealing with the Arabs, at least, I always felt, you have to understand how to deal with intangibles. When you deal with Israelis you're dealing with a Talmudic society that can drive you crazy—in the meaning of words that they can find—but it is really quite concrete"...

He continued: "I tend to agree with Fouad, you can't really believe anything an Arab says. But you can believe the mood he creates, but that is an intangible quality"...

Kissinger then recounted his dealings with King Faisal during which the Saudi ruler "made endless speeches" about Zionism, America and communism. "When we were finished, the note taker had closed his book, which was going to be sent to the PLO in Beirut. [Faisal] took me to the door and he said, in English, 'I pray to the Lord. Almighty for the success of your noble efforts based on your proven abilities'... in other words, pay no attention to what I've just said... and don't make me say that in anything that's being written down in notes"...

Yesterday, the protesters at 2020 M St. NW, led by a young man with a bullhorn, chanted "Shame, shame, shame on you, Dan Rather, shame on you" and "Shame, shame, shame on you, Henry Kissinger, shame on you," as noon-time lunch-goers pressed past. Some protesters carried signs accusing CBS News of violating "human rights" and being "anti-Christian" and "anti-Muslim"...

Leila Gorchev, a spokeswoman for the committee, said the organization plans to return today to the CBS News bureau for another demonstration at noon or 12:30. She said the Washington-based American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee is the largest grass-roots pro-Arab organization in the country, with about 70 chapters and an average membership of 20,000. She estimated that 2.5 million Arabs are in the United States...

Gorchev called yesterday's demonstration "a success, in the sense we managed to spread the word, we distributed a lot of fliers. But our real success will depend on CBS's response"...