Terror Behind Bars: 60 Minutes Interviews Jailed Palestinian Terrorists

In a segment aired last night, 60 Minutes co-host Bob Simon interviewed some of the most dangerous Palestinian terrorists who are imprisoned in Israel. The full transcript is available below the fold, and we recommend you read the whole thing, but for those in a rush, we've pulled out some quotes here:

Abdullah Barghouti, on his responsibility for 66 deaths, including the deaths of 5 Americans: "I feel bad because the number only 66."

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Muhammed Jalala, on stabbing 12 people on a bus:

Mr. JALALA: I decide to stab him. I...

SIMON: To stab him?

Mr. JALALA: Yes.

SIMON: And then?

Mr. JALALA: And then they start to shout, they tried to attack me. And then begin the party.

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Finally, Barghouti remarks on his remorse for his crimes:

SIMON: You would do it again?

Mr. BARGHOUTI: Again, again, again. If my organization, she say you should do it, I will do it and I will close my eyes.

BOB SIMON, co-host: Anyone who thought we were winning the war on terror got a rude shock when Hamas won an overwhelming victory in Palestinian elections in the West Bank and Gaza. Hamas is a militant Islamic organization dedicated to the total destruction of Israel. It's responsible for more suicide bombings than all the other Palestinian organizations combined. Hamas leaders say they're struggling against the Israeli occupation. But really goes through the mind of a terrorist when he's bombing a cafe or plotting the murder of someone he never met? We know very little about this. Accomplished terrorists are hardly ever captured alive. And when they are, they rarely give interviews--rarely. But we were given unprecedented access to terrorist leaders in Israel's top-security prison. We met men and women who haven't spoken to journalists since their capture. We heard tales of terror which we will not forget.

   (Footage of Abdullah Barghouti being led into a room where Bob Simon is waiting; Barghouti's feet being unchained)

SIMON: (Voiceover) The most notorious of all the prisoners is Abdullah Barghouti. It's not easy to get to see him because he's being held in indefinite solitary confinement. He's convicted of being the mastermind behind Hamas' deadliest suicide bombings, responsible for the deaths of 66 people, including five Americans. How does he feel about this death toll?

Mr. ABDULLAH BARGHOUTI: I feel bad because the number only 66. This answer, you want to hear it?

SIMON: I want to hear what you have to say.

Mr. BARGHOUTI: No, this what they want to hear it? Yes, I feel bad, because I want more.

   (Footage of emergency worker at site of bombing; emergency workers loading gurney onto ambulance; bystanders at bombing sites; wounded; Barghouti; cuffed hands)

SIMON: (Voiceover) Barghouti's already killed more Israelis than anyone else. For two years, he sent suicide bombers to places, ordinary places, the names of which no Israeli will ever forget: the Moment Cafe, the Hebrew University cafeteria; the Sbarro Pizzeria, where seven children were killed. And what's particularly grotesque about Barghouti's story is that he's a university graduate, well-traveled, a music lover. In fact, listen to how he made his first suicide bomb with his most prized possession.

Mr. BARGHOUTI: I get my best piece, the guitar. I have it, I like it, I respect it.

SIMON: Your guitar.

Mr. BARGHOUTI: My guitar. I open it, make a bomb inside it, close it, send it with the guy, and he make the bomb and it's done.

   (Footage of protest; bodies)

SIMON: (Voiceover) Barghouti says he was driven by revenge after Israel killed two Hamas leaders who were his best friends in an Apache helicopter attack in Nablus in July 2001.

Mr. BARGHOUTI: After I see that, what do you think me? Sit in the home, in the corner and cry? No. The God, the holy Quran tell me, who try to destroy you, you should destroy him. It's easy. The eye and the eye. And the...

SMITH: Tooth for the tooth.

Mr. BARGHOUTI: Yes. Who he's kick my eye, I will kick his two eye and broke his leg because I--maybe I can't see but I can walk. He, he can't see and he can't walk.

   (Footage of prison; Simon walking inside prison corridors; prisoners behind bars; Simon talking with prisoner; door being opened; Muhammed Jalala; photo rescue workers carrying gurney; soldiers; people lying on the ground; soldier putting gun in man's face)

SIMON: (Voiceover) Walking through this prison, this fortress in the desert, is an experience one can't prepare oneself for. This block is home to the most hardened prisoners, all serving multiple life terms. The guards call it the "all-star block." I knew the names of almost all these men, their names and their deeds. I never thought I'd be standing a few inches from them having a chat. Muhammed Jalala started his campaign from a strange place. He was a nurse in a Jerusalem hospital. In 1990, he helped care for Palestinian victims after the Israelis shot into a crowd at Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Mr. MUHAMMED JALALA: I hate to see a drop of a blood from any kind of people.

   (Footage off fallen Palestinian; men carrying body; men riding in back of truck with bodies; people standing at bus stop)

SIMON: (Voiceover) But it was seeing the blood of his own people that inspired him to change his career, from nurse to terrorist. Five months after the Al-Aqsa tragedy, he went to this bus stop in a residential neighborhood in Jerusalem. Men and women were waiting there as civilians he'd never seen before. He went for a man.

Mr. JALALA: I decide to stab him. I...

SIMON: To stab him?

Mr. JALALA: Yes.

SIMON: And then?

Mr. JALALA: And then they start to shout, they tried to attack me. And then begin the party.

   (Footage of police removing bodies; Jalala)

SIMON: (Voiceover) The party. Before he was subdued, Jalala stabbed 12 people, four of them women whom he stabbed to death. What I'm trying to decipher is what was going through your mind as you were stabbing Israeli women?

Mr. JALALA: I believe that any occupied people have to defend themselves in any means, in any ways.

SIMON: This is a...

Mr. JALALA: If--if you kill my wife, I have to kill yours. This is a punishment. This is the point.

SIMON: This is--this may be a point, but I don't believe that it was these points that were going through your mind as you were stabbing these women. I want to know what was going through your mind at the time.

Mr. JALALA: I just saw black title: The revenge is the only means to stop our people killing.

   (Footage of prisoners; prison guard Gilad Cohen)

SIMON: (Voiceover) It was quenching that thirst for revenge which has packed Israel's prisons. The men's security prison Be'er Sheva Prison is teeming, often eight to a cell. Gilad Cohen is a guard here.

Mr. GILAD COHEN: Most Israelis, if they saw these men, would--would kill them.

SIMON: Yes. And you have to see them every day.

Mr. COHEN: Yes.

SIMON: What's it like?

Mr. COHEN: It's very tough, very tough.

   (Footage of armed guards; prisoners; guards drilling with attack dogs; prisoners exercising; man shaving beard of another man; man receiving newspaper; newscaster on television; man cooking eggs; prisoners talking with visitors)

SIMON: (Voiceover) And the Israelis subject the prisoners to a very tough regimen. There are constant head counts and cell searches. Guards perform drills in the open to remind inmates what can happen if they step too far out of line. But these prisoners maintain their own discipline. They see themselves as prisoners of war. Their cellblocks are separated into political factions: Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the PLO. There are no drugs, there's no violence. And they've won privileges. With money provided by their factions, they get daily newspapers. They watch TV with a choice of 15 channels, they buy and cook their own food. The leaders meet regularly with their lawyers, who pass messages to their followers on the outside, which means they can give orders from the inside. So, you're dealing with very powerful people?

Mr. COHEN: Yes.

SIMON: Very strong people.

Mr. COHEN: Very strong, very smart people.

   (Footage of women greeting one another; woman holding baby)

SIMON: (Voiceover) But don't be surprised that the very strong, very smart people aren't just men. Take a look at Hasharon Prison for women. What are they in for?

Ms. AMNA MUNA: Most of them, because they plan to make suicide bomb.

SIMON: Most of the women we're looking at now planned to be suicide bombers?

Ms. MUNA: Yes.

   (Footage of Muna brushing her hair; photo of Ophir; photo of Muna)

SIMON: (Voiceover) Amna Muna wasn't looking to blow herself up. She was looking for fame. She wanted to attack an Israeli in a new way. So she struck up a romance, an Internet romance, with a 16-year-old Israeli boy named Ophir. She said her name was Sally and she wanted to have sex. Let me read you some of the exchanges you had with Ophir on the Internet. You wrote to Ophir, "Did you ever have sex with a lady?" Ophir replied, "I'm only 16 and a half. How many times do you think I had sex?" You wrote, "You want sex with me?" What's it like hearing those words now?

Ms. MUNA: The same. I know that I don't want to make sex with a boy or with any--with anyone. The aim was to kidnap him and to let all the world know what our families felt when they killed our--our sons.

   (Footage of photo of Ophir; Jerusalem street; bus)

SIMON: (Voiceover) She invited Ophir over the Internet to meet her in Jerusalem. He boarded a bus. She picked him up at the station. What did he look like?

Ms. MUNA: He was cute, cute.

   (Footage of road looking from inside a moving vehicle; car; roadway; body being loaded into van)

SIMON: (Voiceover) They left Jerusalem and headed for the West Bank. Muna was driving. She pulled over on the side of the road. Two of her friends approached with machine guns and ordered Ophir out of the car. When he refused, they riddled him with bullets. His body was found two days later.

Ms. MUNA: I don't know what happened, because they...

SIMON: What do you mean you don't know what happened? You were there.

Ms. MUNA: I was there. But I don't know exactly what happened. I was in a shock.

SIMON: You feel guilty?

Ms. MUNA: I'm guilty because a human being killed and I was the reason.

SIMON: That's a good reason to feel guilty.

Ms. MUNA: But I think that I help my people, help my people. Till now, all the world talking about my case.

SIMON: Are you proud of that?

Ms. MUNA: I have to be proud. There's something inside me all the time telling me that I am kind inside myself, and I will be continue to be kind. I will be continue.

SIMON: I'd like to hear you tell Ophir's parents that, that you're really a kind person. I'd like to hear you tell them that and I'd like to see their faces when you tell them that.

Ms. MUNA: They will not understand me. They will not understand me. But they have to understand it's a war. It's a war.

   (Footage of Simon being escorted by Cohen and another guard in prison; women casting ballots; Muna surrounded by celebrating prisoners; Yuval Biton talking with inmates; Biton and assistant working on inmate's teeth)

SIMON: (Voiceover) Muna is continuing her war behind bars. There are elections in these prisoners, yes, elections, and she campaigned hard to become leader of the women prisoners. She won hands down. Why do the Israelis allow this? They need prisoner leaders to deal with. In jail, Israelis and Palestinians have to co-exist. In fact, this is one of the few places in the Middle East where the two sides actually talk to each other. It you want to see that happening, just watch Israeli Major Yuval Biton. He's always talking to the inmates. That is when he's not working his day job as prison dentist, seeing to the cavities and root canals of the killers. You're dealing with some very dangerous men.

Maj. YUVAL BITON: Maybe outside.

SIMON: You don't think they're dangerous here?

Maj. BITON: For me?

SIMON: Yeah.

Maj. BITON: No.

SIMON: You don't think--you're never afraid that one of them will attack you?

Maj. BITON: No.

SIMON: When you're treating a patient, he's sitting in the chair, you're treating him, is there anyone else in the room?

Maj. BITON: No.

SIMON: Just you and him? Some of these guys are very big. Wouldn't be difficult for them to get up and take you prisoner.

Maj. BITON: They need to be crazy to attack me. I assist them, and they understand it.

   (Footage of prisoners; prisoner studying; Israeli flag; man looking at photo album; photos; Simon talking with Barghouti)

SIMON: (Voiceover) Before they were jailed, these Palestinians only understood Israelis as armed soldiers. But in jail, they learn Hebrew, they take courses at Israeli universities. And the prison authorities told us many of them become more pragmatic while they're behind bars. But make no mistake, all the prisoners we talked to see themselves as disciplined soldiers, loyal to their organizations, committed to the struggle. If you escaped from jail...

Mr. BARGHOUTI: OK.

SIMON: ...and six months from now...

Mr. BARGHOUTI: Yes.

SIMON: ...Hamas would say, `It's time to kill Israelis again,' would you do it?

Mr. BARGHOUTI: I will make it again.

SIMON: You would do it again?

Mr. BARGHOUTI: Again, again, again. If my organization, she say you should do it, I will do it and I will close my eyes.