Ha'aretz today

'There is no Palestinian Sadat, no Palestinian Mandela'

By Ari Shavit ...Everyone with eyes to see, sees that there is a failure of Palestinian leadership. There is no Palestinian Sadat. There is no Palestinian Mandela. Abu Mazen is not vulgar like Arafat and not militant and extreme like Hamas. There could be worse than him. But even in him I do not discern the interest or the will to arrive at the end of the conflict with Israel. On the contrary, he is preserving eternal grievances against us and intensifying them... ...At the moment, there is no one on the map. There are no true peace leaders among the Palestinians. But I am not deterministic. I do not think this is part of the Palestinians' genetic makeup. I want to believe that in the future a different type of leadership will arise. I hope that a Palestinian - woman or man - will emerge who is able to recognize that there is some justice on the Israeli side, too. Because, you know, in Israel there are so many who see the justice of the Palestinians' cause and write about it and make a living from it. Read the paper you work for, for example. But true peace will come when Palestinians emerge who recognize there is also Israeli justice - that there is also a little Israeli justice. At the moment there are none...