PARIS LETTER : When Charles Enderlin received the prestigious prix de la presse diplomatique here a few days ago, the Jerusalem bureau chief for France 2 television spoke solemnly of the difficulty of working in Israel and the Occupied Territories. He blamed "war in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and the policy of Israeli authorities against the foreign press".
France 2's Palestinian cameramen have no freedom to work, and most Israeli journalists do not venture into the Occupied Territories for fear of their lives. "In a little over two years, the dream of peace has shattered to become a daily hell," Enderlin said.
Born in Paris in 1945, Enderlin moved to Israel at the age of 23 and worked for Israeli radio. His third book came out in France last year and will be published in New York next month as Shattered Dreams: The Failure of the Peace Process in the Middle East, 1995 - 2002. The text has achieved the singular distinction of impressing Arabs and Israelis alike with its fairness.
The former prime minister Shimon Peres praised Enderlin's "perceptiveness" and "uncanny insight". Yasser Abed Rabbo, the Palestinian minister of culture and information, describes the book as "a balanced representation" of negotiations. The chief Palestinian negotiator, Saeb Erekat, predicted that "once peace talks are resumed, negotiators on both sides will have to read this account very carefully".
The television version of Shattered Dreams, in which Enderlin interviewed all the chief protagonists, won the best documentary award at the Angers Festival, and is a candidate in upcoming Emmy awards in New York. More accurately, it is two candidates. When PBS wanted to broadcast the programme last year, Enderlin's Israeli producer and editor flew to the US to edit a shortened version, in which the 150-minute documentary was cut by a third. Enderlin distanced himself from the US film, saying it's been "ideologised" and "strengthens the Israeli version of events". The entire French film is now being shown throughout the Arab world on Abu Dhabi TV, but an Israeli broadcast has faltered over attempts to cut Enderlin's commentaries.
For as Enderlin learned long ago, reporting the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a most dangerous assignment. On October 2nd, 2000, his cameraman in Gaza, Talal Abou Rahma, filmed the death of 12-year-old Mohamed al-Durrah. The Israeli army conducted a "reconstitution" of the killing, without outside experts. "At no point did they officially ask France 2 for testimony or to participate in an inquiry," says Enderlin. "I'm convinced that the bullets came from the Israeli position."
For having broadcast the murder of Mohamed al-Durrah, Enderlin received death threats and had to move house. Extremist Israeli groups accused him of staging the footage. Last autumn, Jewish groups held a sham award ceremony in front of France 2 headquarters in Paris and said they were giving Enderlin - who is Jewish - the "Goebbels award for disinformation", after the Nazi propaganda chief. As a result, and in response to personal threats, Enderlin and France 2 have initiated several lawsuits.
Enderlin's work is so meticulous that both sides can find ammunition in it. For example, Yasser Arafat claims dubiously there is no evidence that a Jewish temple existed near the Al Aqsa mosque. Personally, I would quibble with Enderlin's calling Israeli army atrocities in southern Lebanon bavures or "unfortunate mistakes", but on the whole his reporting of the conflict is as good as it gets.
Without accusing anyone, Shattered Dreams makes clear that Israel's leaders also bear huge responsibility for the failure of the peace process. Mistakes documented by Enderlin include the assassination of the Hamas "engineer" Yahia Ayyash, then prime minister Benyamin Netanyahu's opening of a tunnel under the old city of Jerusalem, and Ehud Barak's snubbing of the Palestinians to negotiate with Damascus, only to get cold feet over giving up the Golan Heights. Contrary to subsequent US and Israeli claims, there was not a "generous offer" rejected by the Palestinians at Camp David in July 2000.
Netanyahu, now Israel's Foreign Minister, does not come well out of Shattered Dreams. Witness his behaviour at the 1998 Wye Plantation negotiations, where he threatened to walk out, saying "I've got [the Americans\] by the balls". After agreement was reached, Netanyahu claimed - in defiance of then president Clinton's statements to the contrary - the Americans promised to release the Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard.
Yet despite his shortcomings, Enderlin says, "Netanyahu's policy of giving as little as possible to the Palestinians did not lead to total failure of the peace process, as happened with Barak - who of course blamed the Palestinians". Six days before Israeli general elections that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is expected to win, Enderlin sees no hope for the foreseeable future.
Only international intervention - and the peacekeeping force demanded by Palestinians and rejected by Israelis - could bring peace, Enderlin says. Any agreement would have to be based on the Clinton proposals of December 2000, which foresaw Israeli withdrawal from most of the Occupied Territories, East Jerusalem as the capital of a Palestinian state, and a solution for the holy sites of Judaism and Islam.