MY FIRST reaction, as I said, was: Good morning, Ehud.
I am reminded of my late friend, the poet who went by the name of Yebi. Some 32years ago, after dozens of Arab Israeli citizens were killed demonstratingagainst the expropriation of their lands, he came to me in utter turmoil andexclaimed: we must do something. So we decided to lay wreaths on the graves ofthe killed. There were three of us: Yebi, I and the painter Dan Kedar, who diedlast week. The gesture aroused a storm of hatred against us, the like of which Ihave not experienced before or since.
Since then, whenever someone in Israel said something in favor of peace, Yebiwould burst out: "Where was he when we laid the wreaths?"
That is a natural question, but really quite irrelevant. Olmert, who fought allhis life against our views, is apparently adopting them now. That is the mainthing. Not "Good morning, Ehud" but "Welcome, Ehud".
True, we said this 40 years ago. But we were not an incumbent Prime Minister.
True, too, that these things were said and spelled out in detail by many goodpeople, like those who wrote the Gush Shalom Draft Peace Treaty, theNusseibeh-Ayalon document or the Geneva initiative. But none of them was anincumbent Prime Minister.
And that is the main thing.
IT SHOULD not be forgotten: In the period in which these ideas werecrystallizing in Olmert's mind, he was allowing the settlements to expand,especially in East Jerusalem.
That gives rise to an unavoidable question: Does he really mean what he says?Isn't he cheating, as is his wont? Isn't this some sort of manipulation, asusual?
This time I tend to believe him. One can say: the words sound truthful. Not onlythe words themselves are important, but also the music. The whole thing soundslike the political testament of a person who is resigned to the end of hispolitical career. It has a philosophical ring - the confession of a person whohas spent two and a half years in the highest decision-making office in theland, has absorbed the lessons and drawn conclusions.
One can ask: Why do such people reach their conclusions only on finishing theirterm of office, when they can no longer do much about the wise things they areproposing? Why did Bill Clinton come to formulate his proposals forIsraeli-Palestinian peace during his last days in office, after wasting eightyears on irresponsible games in this arena? And why, for that matter, did LyndonJohnson admit that the Vietnam War has been a terrible mistake right from thebeginning only after he himself had brought about the deaths of tens ofthousands of Americans and millions of Vietnamese?
The superficial answer lies in the character of political life. A Prime Ministerrushes from problem to problem, from crisis to crisis. He is exposed totemptations and pressures from the outside and stress from the inside, coalitionsquabbling and inner-party intrigues. He has neither the time nor the detachmentto draw conclusions.
The two and a half years of Olmert's term were full of crises, from the SecondLebanon War, for which he was responsible, to the corruption investigationswhich dogged him throughout. Only now has he got the time, and perhaps thephilosophical composure, to draw conclusions.
That is the importance of this interview: the speaker is a person who stood fortwo and a half years at the center of national and international decisionmaking, a person who was exposed to the pressures and the calculations, who hadpersonal contact with the leaders of the world and of the Palestinians. A normalperson, not brilliant, not a profound thinker by any means, a man of politicalpractice, who "saw things from there that cannot be seen from here".
He has delivered a kind of State of the Nation report to the public, a summaryof the reality of Israel after 60 years of the state and 120 years of theZionist enterprise.
ONE CAN point out the huge gaps in this summary. There is no criticism ofZionist policy over five generations - but that is something that one cannotreally expect from him. There is no empathy with the feelings, the aspirationsand the traumas of the Palestinian people. There is no mention of the refugeeproblem (it is known that he is ready to take back just a few thousand in theframework of "family reunion"). There is no admission of guilt for thedisastrous enlargement of the settlements. And the list is long.
The primitive basis of his world view has not changed. That is made clear by thefollowing amazing statement: "Every grain of the area from the Jordan tothe sea that we will give up will burn our hearts … When we dig in theseareas, what do we find? Speeches by Arafat's grandfather, or Arafat's greatgreat great grandfather? We find there the historical memories of the people ofIsrael!"
That is utter nonsense. It is totally unsupported by historical andarcheological research. The man is just repeating things he picked up in hisearly youth, he is simply expressing his gut feelings. Anyone sticking to thisideology will find it hard to dismantle settlements and make peace.
All the same, what is in this testament?
It is an unequivocal and final divorce from "All of Eretz Israel" froma person who grew up in a home over which hovered the Irgun emblem: the map ofEretz Israel on both sides of the Jordan. For him, the Irgun slogan "OnlyThus" has turned into "Anything But Thus".
It gives unequivocal support to the partition of the country. This time, hisadherence to the principle of "Two States for Two Peoples" appearsmuch more genuine, not lip service or sleight of hand. His demand for"fixing the final borders of the State of Israel" represents arevolution in Zionist thought.
Olmert has already said in the past that the State of Israel is"finished" if it does not agree to partition, because of the"demographic danger". This time he does not invoke that demon. Now hespeaks as an Israeli who is thinking about the future of Israel as aprogressive, constructive, peaceful state.
All this is put forward not as a vision for the remote future, but as a plan forthe present. He demands that a decision be taken now. It almost sounds like: Letme continue for another few months, and I shall do it. The unstated assumptionis that the Palestinians are ready for this historic turning point.
And he has fixed an Israeli position from which there can be no going back inany future negotiations.
THIS IS the testament of the Prime Minister, and it is obviously intended forthe next Prime Minister.
We don't know whether Tzipi Livni is ready to implement such a plan, or what shethinks about this testament. True, she has lately voiced rather similar ideas,but she is now entering the cauldron of the Prime Minister's office. One cannotknow what she will do.
I wish her one thing above all: that at the end of her days as Prime Ministershe will not have to sit down and give an interview, in which she, too, willapologize for missing the historic opportunity for making peace.