'To Iran, Israel is not a goal, it's a tool'

Dr. James J. Zogby, founder and president of the Arab American Institute in Washington D.C., would certainly like to see Avigdor Lieberman and Hamas sitting at the same negotiating table. In fact, he trusts Senator George Mitchell, President Barack Obama's special envoy to the Middle East, when he says that it will happen one day.

"George Mitchell is much smarter than anyone who has done this job before in the Middle East," Zogby tells Haaretz. "If you study how George Mitchell worked on the [Northern Ireland peace] plan - he works slowly and methodically, he changes perceptions and he knows that you have to have a holistic view as you move forward."

And how does Netanyahu government fit into this plan?


"It doesn't matter. You could have said the same thing about 'bad guys' win, it's a setback - but it's also a necessary setback to move forward.

"At some point you have to have Hamas and Lieberman sitting at the same table together. They'll kick and scream and may not want to go to the table, but one represents maybe 20 percent of the population, the other maybe 40 percent, and if you don't have them at the table you're not going to move forward. Both sides' extremes have to be there, there is no way around it.

"Mitchell also says, the more preconditions you put on the negotiations, the less chance it's going to work. The only precondition should be: violence should stop. He didn't accede to the Irish Republic demand that IRA first have to give up their weapons, because then no one would be sitting down. So I don't think that everyone sitting at the table must agree that Israel is a sovereign and independent state, or that everyone from the Israeli side should agree that there should be an independent Palestinian state based on the '67 borders. They have to agree that we talk, not shoot - the rest is up for the discussion. Otherwise you will have Hamas continuing to cause damage and some Israeli groups that won't agree to withdraw from the West Bank. It's better to have them talking, even if it takes years to unwind these attitudes."

Don't you think that with complications like Iran, there is no luxury to waste time in endless talks?

"I think that Iran was inserted into the region, and they can be separated from the region. I don't think it's a fixed component of this issue."

And in the event that they get nuclear weapons?

"If they get the bomb, they're not a threat to Israel. They are a threat to the Gulf. Because Iran's goal is not Israel; Israel is a tool that Iran uses in order to export its extremism into the Gulf. From the days of the Shah, they wanted hegemony in the Gulf, and Israel is a game they play. So when they want to win support among Arabs, they start screaming about Israel; they simply play off frustrations and fears in the Arab world. And to some degree they've succeeded ? we've granted them a great victory with Iraq, we got the region upset, we turned the people against their governments, and the combination of the foolish policies of Bush and the foolish policies of Israel have handed the Iranians the great set of diplomatic victories in the region. Can you unwind it? Absolutely. You make progress towards peace and justice, and at the same time you open a door for a dialogue with Iran, but get tough with them."