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Uri Avnery (1923-2018) was an Israeli writer, journalist and peace activist. He was editor-in-chief of the weekly news magazine "HaOlam HaZeh" and founded the Gush Shalom peace movement. [Listener: Anat Saragusti; date recorded: 2017]

TRANSCRIPT: The next chapter − we said we'd talk about Husseini: Faisal Husseini. Faisal al-Husseini, one should say. He died while he was on a mission to one of the Gulf States, Kuwait I believe. He died suddenly following an asthma attack. The truth is that this seems somewhat suspicious, but I have no proof on which to base my doubts. I really, truly loved and appreciated Faisal al-Husseini. The al-Husseini family is huge. There are about 5000 members: men, women and children. There is an entire neighborhood in Jerusalem, the neighborhood where Orient House is, where his office was, the American Colony – this is where the Husseini family lives. The Husseini family is one of the oldest and most honorable families in Jerusalem, perhaps the most distinguished and the oldest. In Jerusalem, like in every Arab town, there are two, three, four respected families, who have ruled everything for generations. During the Turkish period these families – Husseini, al-Khalidi, Nashashibi, although I'm not sure that Nashashibi is Jerusalem, and part of the Nusseibeh family – were the ruling families in Jerusalem and they divided the positions among themselves. The positions were the Mufti, the Mayor, I think the Director of the Temple Mount, and these positions would rotate between these families. If Husseini were the Mufti then the Mayor would be Khalidi and so on. Faisal Husseini was a distant relative of the Mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini and he was a great person, I must say. He had a certain integrity. He was an aristocrat. Let's say that in England he would probably have been a Duke or something, a Lord at least. And he had the trait that real aristocrats have: they are able to talk with people from all walks of life in exactly the same way, not in a condescending manner, to speak with them, to listen to ordinary people. He was a true Palestinian patriot, radical but not extreme. On the contrary, he was a very moderate man. He believed in peace based on understanding and friendship, he was the undisputed leader of the Arab community in Jerusalem. Orient House, which belonged to the Husseini family, was without a doubt the HQ for Palestinians in Jerusalem, and he was both an intellectual and a man of the people. I had many conversations with him. We almost always had an absolute mutual understanding. I only say 'almost' because my wife Rachel taught me that when I make statements like that, I need to add the word 'almost', because I am by nature prone to definitive declarations.