News Conferences & Interviews on the Middle East/Israel
(1986)
JANUARY 7, 1986
Palestinian Rights
Q. Mr. President, for some 40 years American Presidents
have been confronted directly with the Middle East problems. You and
your predecessors have often spoken of the legitimate rights of the
Palestinians. My question, Mr. President, is how did Palestinians attain
these rights? How do they rid themselves of foreign occupation? Should
they emulate the U.S.-backed freedom fighters in Afghanistan, the contras
in Nicaragua, or is there a peaceful way? And I'd like to follow up.
The President. Well, the peaceful way is the thing
we've been trying to promote, Helen, the idea of peace between the Arab
States and Israel. And we have emphasized from the very first that the
problem of the Palestinians must be a part of any solution. But I would
also like to point out that virtually every Arab country has thousands
and thousands of Palestinians. In fact, some of them, they're practically
a majority of their population. So, they are in a number of countries,
and in many of these countries they are not made citizens of those countries.
They're allowed to live there and so forth, but they don't have passports.
They don't have all of the privileges that a citizen of the country
would have. And there has to be a solution, particularly—we're
not talking about all of those; they seem to be content with where they're
living—but those that became refugees, the great refugee camps
that we found in Lebanon. Those are the ones that are literally people
without a country, and we think there has to be a solution found for
them. The reason that we have not approved the dealing with Arafat and
that sect, the PLO, is because how could they sit in in a peace conference
when they deny the right of Israel to exist as a nation and have refused
to endorse or support or accept the two resolutions, 442 and 238 [242
and 338], of the United Nations?
Q. Will Israel accept the existence of the Palestinians,
or will the United States continue to give Israel the veto power over
any Palestinian negotiating for their people?
The President. No, and I don't think that they ask
for that. Theirs is—and I would say this of any other country
that they're working with—that you can't ask them to negotiate
with someone who's sitting on the opposite side of the table saying
that they start from the negotiating position that Israel doesn't have
any right to exist. And this is the main thing; it's the reason why
we have not felt free to talk with an Arafat until he gives up that
position.
JUNE 11, 1986
Pollard Espionage Case
Q. Mr. President, the Pollard spy case has precipitated
some confusion within your administration over the matter of how much
Israeli spying there is in this country and if it goes beyond the Pollards.
The Justice Department officials are telling us that it goes beyond
the Pollards, and they're continuing their investigation. The State
Department officials have told us that there's no more Israeli spying
here, and they're satisfied, and they seem to want to put an end to
it. I wonder if you could clear up this confusion.
The President. The only thing I know is that the Israeli
Government has assured us, as much as they can, that they have never
had any program of trying to get intelligence information from our country
or doing any spying on us. And so far, as I say, the Justice Department
has said they will look to see if there is anything that they can find
out. But so far there's been no evidence presented to us from anyone.
Q. Well, what if they do come up with some evidence?
What would you do?
The President. Well, then, I think we'll have to deal
with that then and find out whether it's a surprise to the Israeli Government,
whether someone was off playing their own game or not.
JUNE 13, 1986
Israeli Espionage
Q. Bruce Edwards, from WSYB in Rutland, Mr. President.
Are you calling this—at least some of you are—the Year of
the Spy? How extensive is spying in this country, and what is your administration
doing about it? And in particular, how extensive do you think Israeli
spying is?
The President. With regard to the Israelis spying on
us, all we can tell you is that the Israeli Government has sworn to
us that this, certainly, is nothing official from them, if there is
such a thing going on, that they have not been doing this. We have been
doing all the investigating we can. We have no evidence that it is a
part of their government policy. But as to spies, I think they're always
present. And we do everything that we can to be able to identify and
find them if they're doing these things. And the reason it has come
to the floor and there's so much attention is we've been successful,
of late, in bringing some of them to justice. But we're going to keep
on with that, but we can never rule out that that's going on.
Sources: Public Papers of the President |