Q: You have talked of British troops taking part in the multinational force envisaged for south Lebanon. Is this a preference or a precondition?
A: I told Tony Blair yesterday .... I wanted the British Army out of Israel in 1948 and thank God we achieved it but I don’t mind having British soldiers as part of an international force in Lebanon because I trust the integrity of the British government and the British soldiers. I know that, as part of the international force, they will help fulfil the obligation which is to push out Hezbollah from the areas threatening the State of Israel and help disarm this organisation as part of the UN resolution 1559. But I didn’t make it a precondition, and I am not talking only about the British soldiers. As far as I am concerned the French are welcome, the Germans are welcome, the Italians are welcome. Turkish forces are welcome. The Saudis, Egyptians.
Anyone that is determined to fulfil that mission, of stopping violence against innocent Israelis from Lebanon and disarming this murderous organisation Hezbollah, which is the long arm of Iran."
Q: In the past Israel hasn’t been very happy to see international soldiers on the ground in this area. Why is this situation different?
A: You are talking about the [Palestinian] Territories, Judea, Samaria and Gaza. This is a different situation. That is one thing. Another, in Lebanon we wanted an effective international force. We didn’t like very much UNIFIL which was very useless and very helpless. Look what happened. Did you hear of any particular efforts of the United Nations UNIFIL force in the south of Lebanon to prevent the attacks against Israel in the first place. So they were not useful and that is why we were unhappy with them. The Territories of Judea, Samaria and Gaza are no parallel to Lebanon. Lebanon is a country governed and dominated entirely by a terrorist organisation and the government is unable to cope with it. And while Israel pulled out entirely from Lebanon [in May 2000] as was recognised by UN resolution 425, I think that the only way at this time to stop this violence coming from Lebanon is by first of all qualifying the Lebanon Army to fulfil this duty and helping this army with an additional international robust force that will be effective. And that’s what we support.
Q: Can you conceive of a situation in which the Security Council would pass a resolution with which you were not entirely happy and if that were to happen what would your response be, would your offensive continue?
A: [joking] Did it ever happen that the UN resolved (sic) something that Israel was unhappy with? To be serious, I hope that the countries involved will apply the necessary measures. Everyone understands that Israel was the defensive side and Hezbollah was the offensive side. The G8 took a very responsible action and resolution which we entirely agree with and the EU ministerial council also adopted more or less the same opinion, and so did the Convention in Rome. So why should I be afraid of a resolution where all the parties that have already joined with these resolutions that were affected by us will suddenly decide something different? I’m very hopeful and I will do everything possible in order to influence the resolution to this direction.
Q: When will the multinational force come in?
A: There should be overlap in terms of time so that we will pull out and they will come in without a time gap that will allow Hezbollah to rebuild their position in the south of Lebanon. It’s as simple as that. We want a ceasefire and we don’t want to occupy the south of Lebanon.
Q: Does that mean you are going to insist on it?
A: I don’t like to talk in those terms to our friends. We share with them our concerns, opinions and desires and they believe that they will be sensitive to these.
Q: How often are you in contact with Mr Blair?
A: Quite often, quite often. We talk, I don’t know, like every 10 days, every two weeks. We have been talking like this now for quite a time and I visited him about a month and a half ago and I found him to be very responsive, very sensitive and enormously experienced with world affairs. He is really very, very rewarding to listen to.
Q: Does he ever mention that he is under domestic pressure? You know that world opinion is leaning one way and Mr Bush and Mr Blair seem to be your two strongest allies.
A: I think that Mr Blair is sensitive enough not to say to me that which is obvious to every outside observer anyway. Mr Blair is a man of integrity. He stands by his principles and by his convictions and that is why he is so popular here and that is why I respect him so much.
Q: He made some remarks last night [Tuesday] indicating that the way the War on Terror had gone was not ideal, that relying on force and alienating the Muslim world was a mistake. Does this alarm you, do you think that he’s wobbling, to put it frankly?
A: [consulting Blair transcript] Amongst the things that Tony Blair said yesterday, he said something similar to what you have said, but he said many other things.....[citing Blair remarks on the former Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon’s, ‘brave step’ of disengaging from Gaza and the lack of emergence of ‘moderate elements’ in Hamas] I think he said there is a war that has to be fought, he said we have to win the war against global extremism and that we have to win it at the level of values and at the level of force. And I entirely agree with him on both levels.
Q: There is a perception that if President Bush rang you and told you to stop that you would respond. Are the Americans and yourselves completely eye to eye on the way things are progressing?
A: First of all, the President is very supportive. I don’t think relations between Israel and America is established on the basis that we get orders from the administration. I don’t know about it and I have not experienced it myself and I doubt that I every will. But it is fair to say that the relations between Israel and America are much broader than just a staunch support and a deep commitment from the President himself. Look at the Congress, the House and the Senate.......
It’s not just the President, it’s the United States of America. And you know what, it’s far beyond even an issue of an immediate interest, it is a commonality of values. It is precisely that which has been emphasised by Tony Blair, which is why I think there is such a deep friendship between America and Great Britain and between these three countries.
We all share the same commitment to the basic values of democracy, of equality, of tolerance and that we are ready to fight for these principles.
Q: But there is a sense in the world, and you must be aware of it, of lack of "proportionality". Many people question how after two soldiers kidnapped and eight killed by Hezbollah we are now seeing upwards of 400 dead and rising in Lebanon. How can such an initial incident justify such a huge response from Israel?
A: I think that you are missing a major part. The war started not only by killing eight Israeli soldiers and abducting two but by shooting Katyusha and other rockets on the northern cities of Israel on that same morning. Indiscriminately.
Now we know that for years Hezbollah - assisted by Iran - built an infrastructure of a very significant volume in the south part of Lebanon to be used against Israeli people. The most obvious, simple, way to describe it to the average British person is: can you imagine seven million British citizens sitting for 22 days in Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham in Newcastle, in Brighton and in other cities? Twenty two days in shelters because a terrorist organisation was shooting rockets and missiles on their heads? What would have been the British reaction to that? Do you know of a country that would have responded to such a brutal attack on its citizens softer than Israel did? Based on my knowledge of history no country in Europe would have responded in such a restrained manner as Israel did.
I don’t want now to draw comparisons [but] one could ask the question what precisely did the European forces [do] in Kosovo 10 years ago. How many innocent civilians were killed in Kosovo 10 years ago? We can draw on and on these comparisons.
What are we talking about? More than a million Israelis are sitting 22 days in shelters because of the fear of terrorists. In every single case...that we kill an uninvolved civilian in Lebanon, we consider it as a failure for Israel. And you know how many Israelis raise their voices as a result of this? And they don’t have to because we feel that we failed when we killed uninvolved people.
The difference between us and Hezbollah is that when we kill innocent people we consider it a failure, when they kill innocent people they consider it a success.
Tell me, who are they aiming at when they shoot already 2800 rockets on Haifa, Hanariya, Akko, Sefat, Afula and the rest of the places, if not to kill innocent people? So I’m sorry for every individual that was killed that was not involved.
And by the way, how do you really know that 400 innocent civilians were killed? How do you know who is innocent and who is not? Why? This is not an army. They don’t wear uniforms that distinguish them from other civilians. We didn’t attack any of the Christian quarters of Beirut. We didn’t attack any of the Christian residential areas in any part of Lebanon. We attacked only those areas where they had the Katyusha launchers, where they had the missile launchers, where they had the command positions of Hezbollah, where they had the storage houses, the logistic centres and so on and so forth.
So the fact that people were killed there who were not dressed in uniforms doesn’t mean that they were innocent civilians. There were Hezbollah people, they are the terrorists. Did you ever see terrorists dressed with military uniforms like we have in our army? No.
Q: Would the disputed Shebaa Farms be part of any deal?
A: The first question is how generous you want to be in your definition. You can define Shebaa to include most of the Galilee and maybe you reach the Negev also. To start with, UN resolution 425 defined the borders. It was registered by the UN that Israel has pulled out entirely from Lebanon and we don’t occupy one centimetre of Lebanon. The rest is very important, very interesting but what does it have to do with the present conflict? Here is the United Nations - Hezbollah use it as an excuse? Ok, it is an excuse but nothing else. This is precisely why we shouldn’t even consider it at this moment.
Q: So it’s off the table?
A: As far as I am concerned it is entirely off the table.
Q: How heavily armed would Israel expect a multinational force to be and what would be its mandate?
A: Number one, it has to be part of the seventh chapter of the UN Charter so the mandate from the UN has to allow and empower this international force to take real action to implement the 1559 resolution if we want it to be effective. Number two, it has to be made up of armies, not of retirees, of real soldiers, not of pensioners who have come to spend leisurely months in south Lebanon, but, rather, an army with combat units that is prepared to implement the UN resolution. I think it has to have about 15,000 soldiers. I think that's more or less what the international community understands."
Q: Could the force be deployed both sides of the border?
A: A lot of people have a good sense of humour, but I don't have to take it seriously.
Q: Has Israel begun talking with countries about the mechanism of the "overlap", which would mean foreign troops entering an active fighting zone?
A: I can tell you only one thing - if our soldiers or our cities are attacked by Hezbollah, we will respond. There is one lesson that comes from this war, that, if anybody anticipated that Israel would tolerate these attacks without an appropriate response, this is gone. We live in a different era. Israel is not afraid of missiles. We don't like it. It's not very pleasant. I just talked to my wife - she went today to the north to visit with some people and communities and she told me: 'Listen, it's not pleasant. They are falling all the time, everywhere.'
And I have experienced it in different parts of my life. But Israel is not afraid of it and we responded in such a manner that will be registered in the collective memory, of not just the Lebanese, but of every nation that has ever had any plans to attack the state of Israel with missiles. They will know that we respond and sometimes the response can be very, very, very painful.
So, if they will attack Israel or Israeli soldiers, we will respond.
What will the international force do if they are attacked by Hezbollah? They will have to say. I'm not speaking for the international force. I can only say that we will co-operate with the international force. We are already talking with the potential partners and certainly the deal makers for the resolution about all the procedures because we want to avoid any difficulties and any inconveniences for anyone.
Q: Will Israel reserve the right to respond in future of leave it to the international force.
A: Israel will never, ever allow anyone any more to attack Israel without response.
Q: Is this an implied criticism of your predecessors for failing to deter hostile neighbours with a sufficiently hard response - Gaza for instance?
A: In Gaza I don’t think that they quite enjoy the response of Israel, but you better ask them. We have experienced in the past during the first Gulf War an attack by the Iraqis. At that time Israeli did not respond. I was a member of the defence cabinet and I was part of the decision not to respond at that time because at that time the Americans and allied forces were fighting Iraq and they were causing enough harm to Iraq without us, so we didn't have to intervene.
Our interests were at that time defended and represented in a most efficient way by the US government and the US Army and the other armies … I heard there were some voices that said that Israel should have attacked Lebanon before, during the last five years since we pulled out because of what we have seen created [there] - a big infrastructure created for Hezbollah.
I have to be very honest with you. I was only part of the time a member of the cabinet. But just for the sake of argument, could you imagine [Ariel] Sharon initiating an attack on Lebanon any time in these five years that could have won the slightest possible support from anyone?
Now everyone says about Sharon ‘why didn't he do this or that?’. But let's be honest, had he done anything at that time, particularly without such a provocation that I have encountered this time, what would have been the reaction of the world? What would have been the reaction even of the public opinion of Israel? ‘Here he comes again to Lebanon to end what he didn't finish in the 80s’. It was impossible. In most of this period you should recall Sharon took over in 2001 in the middle of the intifada when we had to face every day suicide attacks in the middle of our cities. We had other things to do.
It's always very simple for someone to say that the one before him failed and now he is coming to save everything. I can't say it with a clear conscience. On the contrary, I think Sharon did important things. He laid the foundations for the international support, which is now a major asset for the battle that we are having and I'm very grateful for his performance.
Q: Do you miss him? [Ariel Sharon]
A: As a friend and as an experienced political leader. As someone who's been through almost everything in his life and the different experiences that Israel had, it could have been great had I been able to consult with him, sure.
Q: How has the military campaign gone?
A: I think that the military campaign has been brilliant. Let put things in some perspective. I don't know of any army in modern history which has done near what we did against a guerrilla organisation. You will recall how the Russians coped with the terrorism in Afghanistan. They pulled out and ran away. Russia, not at the time of Putin, Yeltsin and Gorbachev. In the good old times when Russia was Russia [ironically] and they couldn't care less about world reaction, about internal reaction, and when they could do everything they wanted and they ran away from a terrorist organisation. A big, giant, world power, Russia. Look how difficult it is for the allied forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Why? Because you don’t fight big formats.
If Lebanon as a country had been the target within half an hour there wouldn't have been any air fields, any planes, any tanks, anything, and that would be it. Here you fight against an organisation which, for years and years and years, were getting the most sophisticated, modern weapons that can be operated by one or two persons. They don't need big units, they don't need armies.
They just need a few operators without even uniforms that can press the button of the timer, of the launcher and then with a motorcycle go to another launcher and press the timer again and then to a third and press the timer again and then you have 50 rockets falling on different parts of your country and then they hide in bunkers and caves that they built for years.
Can you imagine that on the first night Israel destroyed tens and tens of these launchers that were hidden in private homes spread all over the south of Lebanon and due to the enormous, unbelievable intelligence we knew in every village which home they had these launchers and we succeeded in hitting that particular home and not all the neighbouring ones, in tens of different locations.
We destroyed most of the launchers of the longer range missiles, again due to unbelievable intelligence. We also destroyed 700 targets that served as command positions, as logistical positions, as storage houses as offices of Hezbollah across Lebanon. So I think that the army operation was very successful.
It is enough to look at the face of Nasrallah to know one thing. That it doesn’t matter how many Katyusha short range rockets he still possesses, had he been able to reverse it to square one and not to start it altogether he would have done it immediately. I think he will live to regret what has developed of what he thought would be something entirely different.
Number one, the Hezbollah lost entirely their status in the political structure of Lebanon. Number two, they lost their position amongst the moderate Arab countries. For Hezbollah to hear that Saudi Arabia is opposed to them is a blow in the heart, and so is Abu Dhabi and Jordan and Egypt. This is a dramatic development of historical proportions, let alone the rest of the international community.
If indeed at the end of this they will be forced out of the south of Lebanon they will therefore not have direct contact with the Israeli border then they have lost a strategic asset.
“One can say ‘but still they are shooting rockets’. We are not dumb. We knew from day one that no matter how successful we would be there would always be rockets of enough range to reach Israel, if not from Lebanon from Syria.
No-one can seriously argue that we genuinely thought that at the end of this operation Israel will not be threatened potentially by missiles.
It’s whether or not Hezbollah and the Syrians and all the others would be quick to assume that it’s worthwhile to shoot rockets or missiles at Israel or they will think twice, three and five times before they dare enter into this again after the experience with Lebanon considering what was the response of Israel and how long we have been ready to endure these attacks and to fight back.
And therefore I think that in the long run this is a dramatic defeat for Hezbollah and for the Iranians that manipulated them. I think the Iranians as well as Hezbollah made a dramatic error of judgement, which is the source of all this failure. And this error of judgement was that Israel would not respond in the way that we did.
Q: Did Iran also misjudge the west, thinking it would rein in Israel more?
A: They misjudged Israel and also consequently they misjudged the west. I think they made a mistake both sides.
Q: How much longer is left - days? weeks?
A: I don’t think it will take weeks. I think that a resolution will be made sometime next week by the UN Security Council and then it depends on the rapidity of deployment of the international forces into the south of Lebanon.
Obviously, as I said, we will not pull out and we will not stop shooting until there is an international force that will effectively control the area.
Q: The off button for Israel is not the resolution but the arrival of an international force?
A: The resolution defines the framework, which is very important. And part of it is also the international force and part of it is the mechanisms of its deployment. I believe that the mechanism of the arrival will be part of the resolution. We will cooperate with any reasonable resolution that will consider the interests of the people of Israel and the rights of self defence.
Q: You volunteered for reserve duty in Lebanon between 1979 and 1982?
When I was a member of parliament I was not recruited in any formal manner but I volunteered and I served for about a month in south Lebanon. We were escorting convoys of Israeli supplies into the fighting units in Lebanon, in various parts of the south of Lebanon. I remember all of these names [of villages where fighting has occurred] - they are part of the collective memory of many Israelis and sometimes of the private memories of many Israelis.
Q: It is going to be hard to crush Hezbollah?
A: I have never talked in those terms. I am not a Nasrallah. I am not talking in this arrogant and pompous manner. We said that we will treat Hezbollah according to their behaviour.
Q: How much will be enough? How will you judge that you have inflicted enough damage on Hezbollah?
A: I think already there has been a lot of damage inflicted on them and I think they feel it. By the way, if Nasrallah is so courageous why doesn’t he resurface? Why is he afraid even to feel the light of the sun. No one knows where he is. I am in my office and I have been to the northern part of Israel many times in the last few weeks and I am not hiding. Where exactly is Nasrallah, this big mouth? It shows how cowardly he is and how afraid he is to even surface and to share some of the things that the Lebanese population and the Shia population suffered during this period of time.
Q: How important is it to get Muslim and Arab armies as part of the international force?
A: I think it is very important. I will be happy to see Turkish soldiers. We have a lot of respect for the Turkish army and the Turkish government.
Q: So you can have all your old colonial powers back?
A: Not in Israel. In Lebanon.
