Posted on 03/24/2004 1:35:07 AM PST by KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle
IMRA interviewed Gaza Hamas leader Abdel Aziz Rantisi, in English, on 8 October, 1997. The entire interview follows.
IMRA: We have heard the comments of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin regarding the occupied territories. When he says 'occupied territories' does he mean the area occupied after 1967 or does he mean all of Palestine?
Rantisi: Occupied territories? Who says occupied territories?
IMRA: He appeared on television saying that there can only be peace when Israel is out of the occupied territory.
Rantisi: Surely those were not the words of Sheik Ahmed Yassin but rather the translator.
IMRA: What did he say?
Rantisi: Sheikh Yassin says "the occupation" not territories - the West Bank and Gaza. When he says the occupation this means the occupation of all of Palestine.
IMRA: Can there be any peace with the Jews as long as there is a state?
Rantisi: The Jews are occupiers. Now, let's say that you make peace with Jews as Jews but they are still occupiers. It is impossible to make peace with them when they are occupying your home.
IMRA: That's anywhere in Palestine.
Rantisi: I am speaking about my country. The majority of Palestinians are out of their homes. We have now in exile around four million Palestinians who are living very tragic lives. They should return home.
IMRA: So Israelis -- the Left, who say they you can make peace if you make a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza are living a fantasy?
Rantisi: With the withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza?
IMRA: Yes. The Israelis from the Left say that if Israel withdraws from the West Bank and Gaza that there can be peace even if there is an Israeli state in the remainder of the area -- Jaffa, Haifa etc.
Rantisi: Look, where are you from?
IMRA: The States.
Rantisi: Can you accept Jews to establish Israel in your land and make peace with them after that?
IMRA: If there wasn't a state, could the Jews who live in this area now stay or some of them stay or what?
Rantisi: When the Jews were oppressed in Europe they found a good citizenship under the umbrella of an Islamic state. So we are welcoming religions as religions. As Jews and Christians from anywhere. But we will not accept any occupiers.
IMRA: Every year there are tens of thousands of new people coming into the area. What about these newcomers?
Rantisi: You should ask what about the fate of the four million living in camps.
IMRA: What do you see ultimately happening to the people who moved into Israel. We have the people who came from Europe, Russia, the Arab states.
Rantisi: I will tell you something. I feel that it is justice for us to do with Jews as they did with us.
IMRA: To let them stay?
Rantisi: In the same way that they dispossessed our people. They killed thousands of Palestinians in tens of massacres and they destroyed homes. So I think it is just to do with them as they did with us.
(Excerpt) Read more at imra.org.il ...
We will doubtless -- in the days and weeks to come -- be swamped with alphabet network assertions to the effect that the newly-appointed Rantisi is (you guessed it) a "Muslim moderate."
Bookmark these revealing interviews, in anticipation of having to refute that obvious lie.
Abdel Azziz al Rantisi is a charming fellow. You have to give him credit, that unlike Arafart and other Arab leaders, when he speaks English, he means for Western and Israeli audiences the same message he conveys in Arabic to his own people. If the late Sheik was a radical, Rantisi is to the far Left of him.
To them ALL of Israel is the OCCUPIED territory
Here's a hankie so you can wipe that foam off of your chin.
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