Bernard-Henri Levy insists settlements are not ‘colonies’ but minute ‘implantations’

Yesterday we reported on a Swiss effort to revive the Geneva Initiative for a two-state solution, in a conference featuring Bernard-Henri Levy. A Swiss friend passe along the following report:

There was nothing about the conference in the main French-speaking newspapers this morning. The Swiss radio did have a short presentation with their correspondent in Israel asking a few Palestinians and Israelis if they knew about the initiative.

Still on the radio, the main news program called Forum featured a lengthy (16 min) interview of … Bernard-Henri Levy! True to himself he speaks with grandeur and uses theatrical wording to bluff. The interviewer must have been an admirer, nice questions, no contradiction. Here is my translation:
Journalist: Is it possible to place the responsibility on one side, for instance Israel doesn’t want peace, the settlements that had never expanded as much as during the negotiations?
BHL: There is not one responsible, there are two. Sure Nethanhayu has his part when he multiplies the settlements, but the Palestinians bear a responsibility has heavy or more than the Israelis with their demand to freeze the colonization before returning to the negotiating table. The Palestinians say they will only negotiate if Israelis stop the “implantation,” and the Israeli side says the “implantations” are part of the negotiation.
Journalist: As years go by the situation is not improving, there are more and more settlements every year, the day will come when it will not be possible to relocate them.
BHL corrects. He says he prefers “implantations” (in the French language the word colonies is directly linked the French colonialism and is badly regarded). He says it is not a colonial situation and cannot be compared with the French colonial enterprise. He went on to say that removing them would not be a problem since it represents a minute part (“infime”) of the territories (such a blatant liar).

Journalist: Yes, but the best part of the land.
BHL:  Well, better land … and worst land too you know. And trust me if you look back at Zionism’s history since 1948, it is not the best land. One of the virtues of Zionism has been that it fructified arid land

Summary: The Swiss radio took pride in having a Swiss move, placing Switzerland in center stage, and renewing a tradition of quiet diplomacy from a neutral country without any colonial background, war or power. But that was about it.

Once again apart from a possible and hypothetic role for Mrs Micheline Calmy-Rey, what is this all about? Contrary to some commenters on Mondo, I believe it is a wholehearted, genuine initiative (not a fair one, but something to talk about), but it is led by sideline people who do not represent the civil society. I mean retired Yossi Beilin from a marginal party and Yasser Abed Rabbo who must in the PLO because he has always been in PLO and he’s a buddy of the other PLOist … and ? These people must be utopian and must live in their bubble, it’s as if they never look back to see if they have followers, it’s as if they believe they have the right theoretical solution and do not care whether it is actually applicable or not.

Shocking to me was this lame sentence on the GI’s web site: “A live broadcast of the conference at 19:00 Israel-time will be available here.” Israel-time! Just to remind Palestinians that they live under Israel-time … or worse, this broadcast is for Israelis only. Bad luck though: the broadcast did not work.