| Positive Commentary Patti 26 May 2002 The following is an excerpt from Commentary Section/Christian Science Monitor, May 24, 2002. I believe you will enjoy this! Kind regards, Patti "Our Audience With Arafat" Helena Cobban, Christian Science Monitor (partial text)/ Full Text: www.csmonitor.com ......."So long as Arafat was besieged and Prime Minister Sharon was calling for his ouster, the Palestinians rallied around him. But as soon as the siege was lifted, he met a barrage of criticism from his people. At the Palestinian academic conference I attended, one participant even asked whether the PA had perhaps been just a "junior subcontractor" for the Israelis all along. I heard several Palestinians remark that Arafat has now led his people to three major defeats: in Jordan in 1970, in Beirut in 1982, and now the destruction of most of the PA. This last one will most probably be his last defeat. A group of us from the conference had a 30-minute visit with Arafat. He seemed unable to describe a strategy his people might follow, and allowed his advisers to interrupt and contradict him. I've followed his career closely for nearly 30 years, and have never seen him so lacking the capacities of a national leader. He also seemed staggeringly insensitive to the concerns of people appalled by attacks on civilians. One of his aides noted that Arafat always condemns suicide bombings. But at one point Arafat himself said that history's first-ever author of a suicide operation was Samson. "Samson!" he exulted. "The first suicide bomber ever ? and he was Jewish!" "We have to follow this great example given by one of the Prophets," he added, in what seemed an attempt at a joke. If so, it was in grotesquely bad taste, and showed a stunning failure to understand key dimensions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Most Palestinians know that Arafat is a fast-fading force. The battle to succeed him has already been joined ג€“ mainly by leaders of the different Palestinian security forces. At another level, hundreds of thousands of ordinary Palestinians are openly debating what kinds of policy and activism can replace Arafat's failed policies. At the conference I attended, there were many criticisms of the suicide bombers, and calls for Palestinians to find new, creative ways to resist Israel's increasingly painful occupation of the West Bank and Gaza." * Helena Cobban is the author of five books on international issues. |
The Case Agianst Israel's Enemies by Alan Dershowitz 
Coming from England and particularly from the BBC, MUST BE SEEN VIDEO! ANOTHER MUST SEE VIDEO |