"Well, I think that Amir Peretz definitely has different rhetorics, but it should be clear that the Israeli left has been using rhetorics with complete—with absolutely no connection to their practices on the ground, and I have no hope that this will actually change the political situation in Israel. People should remember that the left was in control in 1948 with the expulsions. It was in control in 1967 when Israel occupied the Occupied Territories. It was in control when the settlement project, the illegal settlement project in the West Bank began in the 1970s. The left, the Zionist left, is the one that took the so-called peace process in Oslo and used it to cantonize the Occupied Territories and to maintain control over the Palestinians using less military might, but just as much control. And this is what we see from the Zionist left throughout history. And I don’t see any reason why Amir Peretz will be different. And his rhetoric is still racist. It’s maybe more progressive, but it is still racist. So, I don’t see a big change. It may affect the Israeli political map, but that doesn’t mean there will be a real change on the ground. There’s a very strong consolidation of Israeli politics around the center, and Amir Peretz isn’t a variation to that."
— Jonathan Pollak (in a debate with Meretz-USA's Lily Rivlin on Democracy Now, Nov. 16, 2005)
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