Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad has called on the Palestinian leadership to stay relevant and engaged. The outgoing prime minister, who is heading a caretaker government, made this plea from his office in Ramallah.

In an exclusive and wide-ranging interview with Al-Monitor, Fayyad explains the reason for his optimistic outlook despite the general pessimism. An unexpected event could trigger a breakthrough, he argues. It could be as simple as the video of Ahmad from Hebron, he said, referring to a YouTube video that has gone viral in which a 15-year-old Palestinian boy innocently asks an Israeli soldier coming to arrest him if he could postpone the arrest one day because he has an important test at school.

The outgoing prime minister shows no sign of winding down politically. He talks with vivid detail about his exchanges with US Secretary of State John Kerry and his one-on-one conversation with President Barack Obama. With both, Fayyad says he stressed the practical, leaving the political discussion to the Palestinian president. Fayyad reflected on the case of Palestinian farmers in the Jordan Valley, reportedly telling his American counterparts to imagine having water pipes run by your land, hearing the flow of water going to nearby Jewish settlement but being unable to access a drop of water for your own land.

Building the infrastructure of the Palestinian state has always been the focus of Fayyad’s term in the Palestinian government. He pushed hard for a Palestinian airport near Jericho and is a firm believer in the need to develop the 65% of the West Bank which Palestinians are barred from accessing because it is under area C.