Ha'aretz correspondent Amira Hass -- the only Israeli journalist living in the Occupied Territories -- speaks with Amy Goodman from Democracy Now!

Some excerpts from the transcript:

AMY GOODMAN: What about your decision to live in the Occupied Territories, the only Jewish Israeli reporter to do this over the last decade. Can you talk about just the process that you came to to do this, and where you’ve lived?

AMIRA HASS: First, I would like to say that there are many Israeli journalists who have been working for different papers, and especially for Ha’aretz, for years and did not live in the Occupied Territories, but still their coverage of the Israeli occupation was very meticulous, very accurate, very courageous ’til today. For me, it seemed like -- I guess it fits my temperament. I guess it fits my curiosity. I wanted to experience life under occupation day by day and night by night, not just on visits here and there. And it was when I -- I never was satisfied with what I learned from Palestinians in my short visits; and that's how ten years ago, almost ten years ago, when I started going to Gaza, I -- before I became a correspondent, I stayed more and more overnight at friends' place, first in Gaza City, then in refugee camps. Then I wanted to know more, and the more you know more, the more you realize that you want – you need to know more. ...

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: we continue our conversation with Israeli journalist, Amira Hass, long-time correspondent for Ha'aretz newspaper. She is the only full-time Jewish Israeli journalist living among Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, has lived in Gaza, has lived in the West Bank. Her books, Drinking the Sea at Gaza: Days and Nights in a Land Under Siege. Her most recent book, just out, Reporting from Ramallah: An Israeli Journalist in an Occupied Land. She joins us in our New York studio. Can you talk about the influence of your family, of your parents, of the Holocaust, and why you have chose to report from the Occupied Territories?

AMIRA HASS: I grew up in the houses of survivors and left wing activists since before the Holocaust and afterwards. This was like -- the things, this quest for justice, the anger with power, the being dissidents, it was a way of life. It was as natural as you waking up in the morning. So, that's why I say it wasn't -- all my decisions later on, my -- related to work and then going to Gaza were not such a revolutionary -- they were not so revolutionary as it might sound. You could say I'm even conservative. I follow the suit of my parents. ...

AMY GOODMAN: Amira Hass is our guest. What is the reaction of the Israeli population to your writing from the Occupied Territories, and of Palestinians to what you are doing?

AMIRA HASS: There are many -- Israeli society is very, very, variated, and you would hear a plethora of reactions. Some would say I'm a traitor. Some would be very proud of me. I have heard quite often from military officials that they know that I'm very accurate in the details that I bring. I think it has been proven that these details, this information that I gather, because I'm there on the ground and because I talk to people and collect testimonies, it has been proven how accurate it was. Things that were written, not only by me, but others, by others who go and speak directly to Palestinians, not through the channels of Israeli intelligence, so things that we wrote and said at the beginning of the Intifada are common knowledge today, about the Intifada being a spontaneous outburst of Palestinians, about Arafat not planning it. In a way, he was very scared by the Intifada, by the uprising. Testimonies about the behavior of the Israeli army. Now there are so many testimonies being exposed by Israeli soldiers in a group called Breaking the Silence, Shovrim Shtika. So, these are also some of the reactions I get. People do know that I -- do remember that I wrote about it three, four years ago. Then as for Palestinians, I think, I have often also criticized and I am the Palestinian Authority, Palestinian leadership, I am able to write things that maybe other Palestinian journalists think, but do not dare to write or do not have the right -- the place to write this criticism of the leadership, and I do hear people saying that this is good that at least I can write and express their criticisms. I don't think that the Palestinian Authority always likes what I write, and I wouldn't expect them to like. I mean, I would have been worried if they liked everything which I wrote. As a whole, and it's true about me, and it's true about other journalists, and it's true also about Israeli activists who fight against occupation, that we turned out without planning to be the good messengers of Israel. Because it's through us that Palestinians know that Israelis are not only settlers and soldiers of occupation. ...

AMY GOODMAN: How do you deal with the Israeli press attacks on you? For example, the Jerusalem Post and the issue of being objective. What is your response to that whole line of criticism?

AMIRA HASS: I doubt if anybody can be objective. All of us who are Israelis, we are part of this conflict. We cannot be objective. This is a myth, and it’s a myth always taken by those who support the official policy. All of us have opinions. All of us have certain angles of -- from which we view the situation. The thing is, if you report correctly, if you bring facts, if you allow different voices to be heard in your reporting, or to determine the reporting, and I think I have been trying to do this as much as I can and as much as my work requires. And, you know, Jerusalem Post, I'm not -- I don't follow it. It's not -- it has not determined my writing.