Jonathan Savage has the latest on Palestinian statehood

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Jonathan Savage joining us now to talk about the battle
for this Palestinian statehood. I'm telling you what. It comes up
all the time, and it's causing quite a rip between
now the US and Israel. And Jonathan, welcome in, Thanks
for being here. As you know, the Crown Prince of
Saudi Arabia is in Washington today to rather meet with
the President and talk about this and probably a number
of other things. And you know, the whole situation with

(00:23):
the Israel and Gaza and the Palestinian statehood here that
will certainly be a topic of discussion. So what's going
on now with this whole discussion kind of I don't
think it's ever gone away, but it seems to be
more prevalent right now.

Speaker 2 (00:37):
Yeah, it's because it's raised its head once again because
of a US fact US drafted UN resolution which is
designed to allow a mandy for international stabilization force in
Gaza for the Board of Peace to be set up,
essentially to President Trump's peace plant into action. The problem

(00:58):
for Israel, though, is that this resolution has a toughened
language on a credible pathway to Palestinian statehood and self determination. Now,
the Israeli government doesn't support a Palestinian state as things stand,
even though it was part of President Trump's peace plan
as being something that they would work for in the future.

(01:19):
The Israeli government just had to sort of swallow that
and gloss over their division on that. But now over
the weekend, Benjamin Nittanyahoo has been forced by some politicians
within his government to restate his opposition to Palestinian statehood,
come out publicly for the first time synth the cease
firing Gaza and say no, I don't actually agree with

(01:41):
this part of President Trump's peace plan. You know, the.

Speaker 1 (01:45):
Whole thing about a double you know, a two state,
you know, a big situation is it's not their land,
but to create peace. And I think this is where
you know, the Crown Prince stands too. He wants to
kind of work something out the two state resolution, if

(02:06):
you will, to end all the bickering, all the fighting
and kind of just let it go. But then you
talk to the people in Israel, It's like, no, what
are you talking about? This is our land here. So
where does the rest of the globes seem to be
landing on this now? Is if it brings peace to
the region, is that something that should be discussed.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
Well, yeah, I mean, for the first thing we just
say is that peace is not simply the absence of war.
Peace requires embassies to be set up, it requires trade,
it requires diplomatic relations, and only when you get all
these things, when you get coexistence, do you truly have peace.
And what the Trump administration has been doing since the
first term was try to get these things set up

(02:45):
between Israel and Arab neighbors, the Abraham Accords, trying to
get normalized relations, because that they think is the way
to true peace. Now, I think what some in Israel
say is that, look, as we oppose two state solution
at the moment, but if you can get these things sorted,
if you can convince us that peace is not simply

(03:07):
going to be the absence of war, but it's going
to be genuine security and cooperation, then perhaps we could
be open to it. The problem for Benjamin Nitiniahu is
there are some in his cabinet, propping up his government,
holding his government together, who will never accept that. Around
the world, there is a great support for the two
states solution, to the extent that we've seen countries like
France and the UK over the past year officially recognize

(03:30):
a Palestinian state even though one doesn't exist in actuality,
something which has been seen as highly provocative for Israel.

Speaker 1 (03:37):
Is it fair to compare this situation to Russia and Ukraine.

Speaker 2 (03:41):
I don't think it is. I think it's there are
so many different things that play. I mean, you've got
the religious aspects, which doesn't exist between Russia and the
classes of religion in many ways. Yes, it is a
dispute over land, but there are strong sort of culture
pools and pushes in various directions. I don't think. I

(04:04):
think that they have some similarities in terms of you
have two sides which see things very differently, and it's
very hard to get to reconcile that.

Speaker 1 (04:12):
I don't understand. You know why this is being discussed
so much because of the religious differences here, and you've
got Hamas in the the terrorist element of all of
this between Israel and what's happening in Gaza. And if
you give it a two state definition and you say, okay,
then let's do this, then that doesn't erase terrorism in

(04:35):
our world, which I think has got to be a
big part of this.

Speaker 2 (04:39):
I think that the problem even with eliminating Hamas is
you're not eliminating an ideology, are you? And the fear
is that the ideology will continue people who want to
wipe Israel from the map, possibly egged on by Iran
as Hamas, and that others have been that that threat
will continue in Israel. See that as and major problem.

(05:00):
You know, they have said that we have not had
a partner in peace in the past, and they don't
necessarily trust that these organizations won't come up in future
and put up stumbling blocks to that true piece that
we were referencing.

Speaker 1 (05:12):
Yeah, well, it's obviously very deep and lengthy. Is how
long this has been going on and probably will once
again Biblically speaking, it won't change until Jesus comes back.
So hey, I really appreciate you. Jonathan Savage, thank you
so much.