His family made the way from Germany to Palestine in the 1930s. Were they members of the Zionist movement?

No. When the Nazis took power, they decided to leave Germany, like many other Jews. Her initial idea was to travel to the United States, but earlier, the mother decided that we were going to visit an uncle who lived in Jerusalem. When he came here, he told his father that he had fallen in love with Tel Aviv beach and decided to stay. Later, they confessed to me that they repented a lot, because when they arrived they didn't know that another nation lived. Our mother was a successful artist in Germany, but in Israel she didn't work anymore because no one was interested in art or creativity. Most of the immigrants had been blinded by the mission of building Israel.

When did you start to take an interest in the Palestinian conflict?

When I was young, I was quite apolitical. Like most children, I dedicated myself to clandestine groups, distributing pamphlets against British people. But I never thought about the Palestinians. In 1951, as a sailor, we went on strike for a month, and seeing how the police responded to the strikers, I decided to follow politics more closely. I entered the Communist Party, and at that time I met some Palestinians who were part of it. I realized the government's tricks of expelling the Palestinians from the Israeli economy and society. So I decided to fight against the violent character of Zionism.

Zionism, ideology is weak, why?

Because it's an artificial identity. Political Zionism emerged to replace the emotional Zionism that existed before, and the essence of it was the construction of the Jewish State. At that time, Judaism began a process of disintegration, since at the end of the 19th century only 20% of European Jews were religious. The remaining 80% tried to assimilate it. Zionism is the nationalist movement created by non-religious Jews to keep Jewish identity out of religion. The Zionists will never accept it, but the main idea was to replace the State with God, that is, fidelity to the State, which took the place of fidelity to God. What, then, does a Jewish state do if the state is secular? Since then, they have been trying to define this question. That is why Israeli Zionists are always afraid that the Arabs will not have the demographic majority, which is what they fear. The Orthodox, for example, are not afraid of that, because they are clear about what it is to be a Jew, that is, to live according to the 613 rules established by Judaism. Netanyahu is obsessed with the Palestinians recognising that Israel is a Jewish state. Those who seek the recognition of others are demonstrating their weakness.

And what do you think of the Palestinian identity?

I would say that it is very definite. They have lived here for over 1,000 years and their identity is based on a close relationship with the earth. For the Palestinians, the word burial means “marrying the land.” This seems to me to be very dignified and beautiful. For Zionists, land is nothing more than a production tool.

He was one of the founders of the Marxist organization of Matzpe in 1962, together with other members of the Communist Party of Israel. You were the first to break with Zionism.

That's right. We pioneered Israel by saying that Zionism was a colonial project, that is, that we were facing a conflict between colonizers and colonized. The Communist Party was also unable to say that, because at the time it was more concerned about the determined defence of the Soviet Union. We are deeply critical of the bureaucratization of the Soviet model, and that is why we are leaving the party.
When we founded it in Matzpe, the Palestinian resistance was becoming a political force, and many Palestinians saw with astonishment that there were also activists among the Israelis who wanted to fight with them. In Israel, on the other hand, most of the cases declared us traitors.

Why did he disappear in Matzpe?

Our vision was not compatible with capitalism. At the same time as we were fighting colonialism, we tried to put class fighting on the political agenda of Israel, but the young people did not follow us. And gradually the organization began to divide into various factions. Matzpen disappeared because of the contradictions between capitalism and Marxism.

You have led the struggle over recent years for real democracy, and you have written the leaflet Politics without politicians about it. When did the interest in direct democracy emerge?

In the 1960s, I began to despair of Marxism, which demonstrated the inability to handle it with modern capitalism. For Marx, capitalism was based on a model of overproduction, and if governments controlled such overproduction, the crisis of capitalism would be solved through the production of wars. This reasoning was right in the early decades of the 20th century, but what happened when they invented consumerism? Capitalism invented a new method of overproduction and Marxism did not have the ability to respond to the new situation.

Then, when May 1968 erupted, I heard for the first time voices in favor of self-management and real democracy, and I realized that capitalism was not just about profit making. I felt that we had to reverse the system of representation and that everyone had to have the right and responsibility to decide the processes that would affect their lives. Since then I have worked on it.

It seems that we are facing a new international wave in defence of real democracy. However, many have argued that current companies do not have sufficient maturity to establish the model.

I have never said that direct democracy was a paradise. Human conflicts would be maintained. But in the system of representation, if something goes wrong, another representative is chosen, not a new system of values. The process becomes a circle that cannot be broken. Democracy cannot be blamed directly on the representatives, because the responsibility lies with everyone. It offers a great opportunity for self-learning, but it also needs courage. Real democracy will take time before it is implemented and there will be conflicts between those who want to monopolise the right to decide and distribute decision-making power among all. The protests that have taken place in several countries have clearly seen the clash between those who want to reform the system and change the system altogether. But that struggle is very positive, because nothing dominates more than conflict.

What moves you today?

I have divided the world between oppressors and oppressed, and I have always competed for the oppressed. If I see the Israeli soldier who is begging a Palestinian, I stand on the Palestinian side, but not because I am a Palestinian, but because I have angered him. And if I see that Palestinian crushing his wife, I'm going to support the woman, but not because she's a woman, but because she's rejected by my husband. And the same thing if the same woman tramples on her son. There are some who prioritize according to their origin, and that is why many Jews blindly defend what other Jews do.

The dichotomy between oppressors and oppressed may also be used to explain the protests in the Arab countries. Are they going to bring about profound changes?

It's hard to know, but I'm sure the second wave of the movement will be directed by women. Women will change the Arab world and the process will start from the family, as they will drive the fight against all situations of dependency. That is why the recovery of the women’s liberation movement will soon be experienced, and it will also have to come from Islam. It could be a contradiction if one takes into account the strength of Islamic movements in the Arab countries. In my opinion, however, they will collapse, because they will not be able to cope with reality.