“On my past visits to Israel, I always listened to all the viewpoints,” said . “Now that’s become almost impossible. I know that a lot of people won’t like what I have to say, but these are things that must be said.”
“The occupation must end,” said Richard Gere in a recent interview with Israeli news media outlet Yediot Ahoronot.
Gere expressed commitment to the “two-state solution,” calling for a “Palestinian” state to be established with territory roughly encompassing the West Bank. Jewish settlements east of the 1949 Armistice Line, he continued, amounted to “provocations.” Israel’s government, he added, was dominated by supporters of the settlement enterprise:
“Why do you need all of these provocations,” Gere asked rhetorically, referring to Jewish settlements. “How is it that the settlers are running the Israeli government? And how is it that the State of Israel, of all countries, is ruling over another people? Many Israelis that I know say that the state has lost its way, and I think that every Israeli knows that.”
Gere pushed the anti-Zionist narratives of “occupation” and “apartheid” with respect to the Jewish-Muslim conflict, describing the phenomena as socially corrosive:
“The occupation is ruining everyone on both sides. A bi-national state won’t solve anything, it will only turn Israel into an apartheid state. There need to be two states for two peoples, and Jerusalem needs to be the capital of both nations,” said Gere.
Listening to unspecified competing viewpoints had now become “almost impossible,” said Gere: “On my past visits to Israel, I always listened to all the viewpoints. Now that’s become almost impossible. I know that a lot of people won’t like what I have to say, but these are things that must be said.”
In Jerusalem promoting his latest film, “Norman: The Moderate Rise and Tragic Fall of a New York Fixer,” Gere is slated to meet with foreign-funded left-wing anti-Zionist groups such as Breaking the Silence.
RAMALLAH, -: Palestinian Legislative Council Hanan Ashrawi (R) receives US movie star Richard Gere in the West Bank city of Ramallah 09 December 2003. Gere, who arrived from Jordan, is on a three-day visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories, organized by Peacemakers Circle International (PCI). He is also expected to visit former information minister Yasser Abed Rabbo, a promoter of the Geneva Initiative peace plan unveiled last week. AFP PHOTO/JAMAL ARURI (Photo credit should read JAMAL ARURI/AFP/Getty Images)
H/T David Rosenberg at Israel National News/Arutz Sheva
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