Samir Kassir

But I, I cannot forget both of those, and I, I always, you know, hold both those thoughts in, in our mind.

And I want to quote, um, Samir Kassir, Lebanese leftist intellectual, who was very outspoken about, um, the, uh, you know, the abuses of the Syrian regime against its own people, against Lebanon, but who held the cause of Palestine very high in, in, in regard because he was Palestinian.

And he had this quote which said, "Democracy for Syria, independence for Lebanon, and freedom for Palestine." And it wasn't an exclusionary absolutist slogan.

When it came to Palestine, for him it was about real peace negotiations that would bring real freedom to Palestinians and to Israelis, freedom of fear.

But Samir Kassir was able to, uh, recognize the abuses of a Syrian regime that only paid lip service to the Palestinian cause while holding the Palestinian cause dear.

And I think, you know, we need more Samir Kassirs today, and more Malcolm Kurz.

I wanted to just finish, because we are at the end of the conversation, but I want to just finish by going back to the, the thought I was starting about you experiencing the civil war.

You spent so much of your life explaining conflicts and things that you have seen on the ground to other people, but I wonder if you think that it, is it ever really possible for anyone to understand what you and so many others lived through, and how that impacts-