ARAFAT: I CAN BE LIKE MANDELA.

[AYOUB]

Originally posted by NGONGE:

This business of defending everything and everyone is getting tiresome. I wish, for once, to get a topic where I could agree with the general sentiment and go on the attack too (maybe I’m just naturally argumentative).

Of course you're not.

 

 

As for courage, did you know the 'smiling cow' from Egypt was once a heroic fighter pilot? Both 'he' and Arafat are liabilities way past their sell by date as leaders, wouldn't you agree?.

[NGONGE]

^^^^

 

I agree that both have been in charge for far too long. That though is a completely different argument to the one we have here. Here, we were trying to belittle all the hard work of Arafat. In fact, some were even refusing to compare him to Mandela! I personally don’t even begin to see where we can compare a man who spent most of his life in jail to a man who spent all his life fighting for the independence of his people and the liberation of one of our holiest lands (well, it was an emotional comparison, was it not? ).

[AYOUB]

^^One leader is a total success, never sold out while the other is still failing.

[NGONGE]

^^^^ I have no idea what criteria you’ve used to reach your conclusion. Our dear Mandela has been criticised by many peoples (some from his beloved ANC). Many blacks and whites still criticise this great image of a saint that was given to him and point out all his faults and errors. When looking at his struggle as a whole though, most will conclude that he was indeed a great man. Still, when put alongside Arafat I’d always choose the latter. Two totally separate struggles, you see. Where Mandela sat in his prison cell content at being the symbol of Black South Africa; Arafat fought, ducked, dived and suffered in addition to being the symbol of Palestinian resistance. Where the PLO is accused of being corrupted, the ANC WAS a corrupted organisation.

 

I could go on and on with this passion-driven comparison and I’m sure I’ll end up declaring Arafat the greater man, saaxib. The situations, instances and heroic positions the man took are too numerous and overwhelming that Mandela’s symbolic prison sentence will pale into insignificance when put alongside them. Nonetheless, this comparison is really meaningless and I doubt if even Arafat was serious enough when he made it. I’m still willing to make it and continue to make you concede point after point until the first statements made by you and others in this thread are completely contradicted.

[Cawralo]

Originally posted by NGONGE:

So, in your mind’s eye a Palestinian election is what’s needed to sort everything out and give legitimacy to the Palestinian cause? The issue of the “corruption†of Arafat is what’s holding up progress, right?

I suppose you already think that the 1996 elections that were overwhelmingly won by Arafat were also corrupted, which would beg the question of why another corrupted election is needed! Maybe the answer would be to have Israeli observes overseeing this new election and making sure it’s fair and transparent, eh?

 

This side issue still doesn't explain why Arafat is such a bad guy though!

I dont like Arafat, but I'm aware of that most palestinians do. In a new election he would probably get re-elected..but I'm also sure that the palestinians would vote out corrupt politicians out of the palestinian parlement, which is a huge step in right direction. Another thing that would come out of it would be that Israel & the US would have a harder time waving off the democraticatically elected leader of the palestinian ppl and claiming that there is no one to negotiate with.

[LANDER]

Originally posted by NGONGE:

I could go on and on with this passion-driven comparison and I’m sure I’ll end up declaring Arafat the greater man, saaxib. The situations, instances and heroic positions the man took are too numerous and overwhelming that Mandela’s symbolic prison sentence will pale into insignificance when put alongside them.

I really do find this comparison of yours amusing Ngonge, I wish I had more time to reply to your statements and even post some of the numerous ill-advised decisions Arafat took over the years. But I will say that Mandela never hesitated to put himself in harms way when he spoke out against the apartheid government. He took action knowing full well it could lead to his execution or life imprisonment. He sacrificed 27 years of his life for the cause of his people, and I seriously don't know how you can try to minimize that. Arafat on the other hand the political leader of the PLO, spent most of his years dictating his vision for a free Palestinian state in relative safety from Lebanon, Jordan and the beach side villas in Tunisia. His personal work consisted mostly of diplomacy and not guerilla warfare, which is apart from the isolated battles where Israel tried to corner him and he escaped, while those who were protecting him died in battle. What brave actions has he taken? The man flip-flops faster than John Forbes Kerry specially when pressured by the Israelis and the US, he orders a round up of a list of Palestinians suspected by Israel and imprisons them. Some even suggest that he hands them over to the mossad. All the while his people are being bombed by apache helicopters and all he can say is "We condemn all violence on both sides, we condemn these suicide bombings"? What time of visionary is this man? He has a branch of his Fatah known as the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade doing suicide bombings and here he is trying to condemn the very same people that are suppose to be under his control. He should have the guts to either be like Sheikh Yassin (may Allah have mercy on him) and outright support the suicide bombings and any other means of resistance or be like the last prime minister and truly reject all forms of violence and look for a diplomatic solution. Both of these polarized views take a different kind of courage but some courage never the less. Something Arafat would know very little about. What I can say about this man is that very much like Saddam Hussein, he is a survivor.

 

P.S

keep in mind, while Arafat was traveling first class to different world capitals and collecting millions of dollars to support the palestinian cause, Mandela was doing hard time and sacrificing the prime of his life in a cage serving as inspiration not only to his own people, but to millions worldwide. Including yours truly at the tender age of 7 .

[NGONGE]

Well, I’m glad that my words amused you. Nonetheless, they’re as true as those that sing the praises of Mandela’s heroism.

 

Like I said, Mandela was stuck in a prison cell for 27 years and that’s more or less what created the “mythâ€. He didn’t have to live amongst his corrupt ANC for those 27 years or he would have been as tarnished as his Mrs was.

 

Arafat on the other hand, did spend most of his life in active struggle. In Jordan, Lebanon and even Tunis. He had to deal with bigger and more complicated issues than the single problem of apartheid. He had to deal with more pressures. He was facing pressure from the two major world powers (remember the Soviets?). He was also being coerced by Arab leaders (mainly Egypt) and he was getting pressure from within his Fattah Party and the PLO. The fact that the PLO stayed in tact all those years is testament to the man’s political ability. The fact that the Palestinian issue has not left our TV screens for the past thirty odd years can also be attributed (in part) to Arafat’s tenacity. To push all that brave history aside because of some minor faults the man has made is not much of an impartial view, wouldn’t you say?

 

 

Cawrelo,

 

Your argument is a different kettle of fish altogether. You seem to blame the man for the actions of his enemies! The Israelis (and the Americans) will always find ways to discredit any future Palestinians leader. This is not an issue of leadership this is a matter of interests and politics. They want someone who will agree to all their demands without setting an upper ceiling to what is and what isn’t acceptable for the Palestinian people. They’ll twist and turn events to their advantage, just as they did with the recently aborted road map and Abu Mazen’s negotiations, just as they did under the government of Barak (before we even mention Sharon and his Likud party).

 

You speak of peace, but peace at what price is the question that Arafat asked? He spoke of the Peace of the Brave when he finally agreed to recognise the state of Israel and attempted to negotiate a settlement with them, I’m sure you know what followed (well, unless your sources for information are the Jewish press of course).

[NGONGE]

After Arafat: who could replace him?

 

Palestinians and the wider world wonder if transition can go smoothly

 

Chris McGreal in Jerusalem

Thursday October 28, 2004

The Guardian

 

Yasser Arafat's sudden health crisis has again raised the question, in Palestinian circles as in the wider world, of who ultimately will replace the 75-year-old president - and whether the succession will be smooth or volatile.

Until now, Palestinian politicians have been reluctant to speak openly about the next leader, mainly because Mr Arafat would not allow it but also because it would be seen as a betrayal, a surrender to the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, who has been successful in marginalising him.

Mr Arafat's ill-health, which has dogged him for years, was apparent only a fortnight ago when he met a small group of British journalists. He frequently rambled from issue to issue, and raised odd conspiracy theories that ranged from Iran to Chile.

The sudden deterioration in his condition came less than 24 hours after his arch-rival, Mr Sharon, pushed through the Knesset his planned withdrawal from the Gaza Strip last year. That offered a chance to break the Middle East stalemate.

If Mr Arafat is unable to continue as leader of the Palestinians, that too will change the politics of the region. The US and Israel, and latterly Britain, have refused to work with him, claiming he is unreliable and untrustworthy.

His successor could come from one of the new generation of politicians, either the younger Palestinians who came to the West Bank and Gaza with him from exile in Tunis 10 years ago, or the generation that was brought up in the West Bank and Gaza and led the first intifada in 1987 and participated or led the second one that began in September 2000.

The successor could be a figure such as the existing prime minister or finance minister, or one of the warlords, such as Jibril Rajoub or Mohammed Dahlan, or Marwan Barghouti, at present in jail in Israel.

But the succession might not be that simple. Groups outside Mr Arafat's Fatah organisation might want a claim on leadership, not least the Islamist organisation Hamas that dominates life in Gaza.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad have been careful not to attack Mr Arafat but might not feel the same trepidation about confronting his potential successor.

Mr Arafat's glory days were as a revolutionary leader but he has been less successful as an administrator of the West Bank and Gaza after the Oslo agreement with Israel. His Palestinian Authority became synonomous with corruption and lost much popular support.

He has expressed scepticism about Mr Sharon's Gaza withdrawal plan, claiming that the Israelis would keep Gaza as an open prison and that Israel remained intent on expanding its hold on the West Bank. A successor would probably share the same view, but might be more inclined to take what is on offer and try to make the most of it, something Mr Arafat was reluctant to do.

Hamas was swift to claim that the Israeli parliament's vote to pull Jewish settlers out of the battered Gaza Strip was a victory for Palestinian resistance.

But Palestinian leaders say there is little to cheer even if Mr Sharon carries through his pledge to remove about 7,500 settlers and the army from one part of Palestinian territory.

"We should look on it as rearranging the occupation in a way that is more comfortable to the occupier," said one Palestinian cabinet minister, Ghassan Khatib. "It's clear that Sharon is linking the withdrawal from Gaza to consolidation of occupation in the West Bank. It's not going to be realised."

The Palestinian foreign minister, Nabil Shaath, said he feared that the Gaza withdrawal would be Israel's "first and last" pullout.

"The Palestinian people will be happy when they see them withdraw from all of Palestine," he said.

Mr Sharon has justified taking unilateral action on the grounds that there is no one to negotiate with on the Palestinian side because he says Yasser Arafat "will not fight terror".

A new, more robust leader could neutralise that argument, though no Palestinian leader would find it easy to take on the militants without risking all-out civil war.

 

Source

[NGONGE]

The prisoner of Ramallah: A Profile Of Yasser Arafat

Yasser Arafat at 74

By Uri Avnery

 

Every television viewer recognizes the bridge between the last two buildings left standing among the ruins of the Mukata'ah (compound) in Ramallah.

 

During one of my last visits, a Palestinian officer pointed to a simple table and chair near one of the windows of this bridge. Through this window a stretch of the Palestinian landscape beyond the town is visible. "Here Abu Ammar likes to sit between meetings and look out," he explained. Abu Ammar is the affectionate name for Yasser Arafat.

 

Twenty-one years ago, when I went to Beirut and met him for the first time, he was one of the most mobile leaders in the world, if not the most mobile of all. Once he told me that during the last five days he had visited seven countries, sleeping on the plane between destinations. At the time, his neck was in a surgical collar.

 

Now he has been imprisoned in the compound for more than two years. For some of the time, the conditions were worse than in an ordinary prison: he lived in a closed room without fresh air and almost without water, with the sewage blocked. He knew that at any moment Sharon's soldiers could storm in and kill him.

 

In a few days, he will be 74 years old. He will spend his birthday in his prison.

 

This is a good opportunity to take stock of the man and his work.

 

He has been on the world stage longer than any other current leader, apart from Fidel Castro. Many of today's world leaders, like Bush and Blair, were infants when he took the responsibility for the destiny of the Palestinian people in his hands.

 

His face is well known throughout the world.

 

He is one of the most maligned statesmen in the world, perhaps the very most.

 

He is the most hated person in Israel. Rightists and leftists compete with each other in expressing their hatred of him. There is hardly an article by an Israeli "leftist" which does not include some words of abhorrence about him.

 

He is the most admired and beloved leader of his own people, and apparently the leader most admired by the masses throughout the Arab and Muslim world.

 

Not bad for a person who is turning 74.

 

The title most often attached to his name is "symbol". Even the Palestinian opposition groups call him "the symbol of the Palestinian people". That is true, but also misleading.

 

Misleading, because a "symbolic" person is usually someone in honour of whom statues are erected and whose likeness adorns the walls. The president of Israel is a symbol, and so are the presidents of Germany and Italy, while Arafat is very much an active leader, dominating the Palestinian scene.

 

Yet the title is also appropriate. Arafat's progress, from leader of a tiny group of refugees to the present stage, when the whole world supports the idea of a Palestinian state, symbolizes the Palestinian struggle for survival. No one symbolizes the condition of the Palestinian people, its suffering, determination and courage, more than the man in the besieged Mukata'ah, a prison within a prison (Ramallah) within a prison (the Palestinian territories as a whole).

 

Much has already been written about his early life, about his father, a merchant from Gaza who had settled in Egypt; about his mother, who died when he was still an infant; about his childhood with his mother's family in Jerusalem.

 

Lately, Arafat likes to recount to his guests - Palestinians, Israelis and foreigners - about those happy years, when he played with Jewish children near the Western Wall. His years with his father's family in Cairo seem to evoke much less nostalgia.

 

He likes to remind people that he studied engineering. He attributes his legendary memory - especially for numbers and facts - to his profession. More than once he has corrected me on numbers - how many ultra-religious members were in the Knesset, exactly what percentage of the West Bank Sharon has said he was ready to "give" to the Palestinians as part of his "painful concessions".

 

His political career started in the Palestinian Students' Association in Cairo. It assumed historical significance when he was the main founder, in the late 1950s, of the Fatah organization, the first Palestinian liberation movement since the catastrophe of 1948.

 

Liberation - from who? Well, obviously from Israel. But in reality, from the domination of the Arab leaders, too. It is impossible to understand Arafat without knowing this important chapter of his life. At the time, the Palestinian cause served as a football in the inter-Arab game. Each Arab ruler used it in order to reinforce his claim for leadership of the Arab world and to beat his competitors. Gamal Abd al-Nasser in Egypt, Abd al-Karim Qasim in Iraq, the young King Hussein in Jordan and their equivalents in Saudi Arabia, Morocco and the other countries - each proclaimed himself the Defender of the Palestinian People while mercilessly suppressing any sign of independent Palestinian activity in his own realm. In the eyes of Arafat and his comrades, the "independence of Palestinian decision-making" became a sacred goal.

 

Fatah was born into this reality. Arafat and his group wanted to wrest the Palestinian cause from the hands of the Arab rulers. The new movement had no power, no money, no arms. It had no base anywhere where it could operate freely. Its activists were at the mercy of the secret services of any Arab country, if they did not fulfil the demands of the local dictator. That happened many times. The climax was reached when the Syrian dictator put the whole Fatah leadership, including Arafat, in prison. Only the wife of Abu Jihad, Umm Jihad (now the minister for social affairs in the Palestinian government) was left outside and so she assumed the command of all Fatah forces.

 

For the movement to survive, Arafat had to manoeuvre between the leaders, flatter people he despised, suck up to leaders who did not give a damn for the interests of the Palestinian people. As an important Palestinian personality told me: "For the survival of our people he had to dissemble, lie, trick, be equivocal, use ruses. At was then that the typical Arafat language evolved."

 

In spite of sabotage by the Arab regimes and with the help of these methods, the power of Fatah slowly grew. In order to block it and to subordinate the Palestinians to Egyptian interests, Abd al-Nasser initiated the founding of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and appointed an ageing and ineffectual demagogue, Ahmad Shukairy, as its leader. But the June 1967 war destroyed the respect for the rulers of Cairo, Amman and Damascus. The battle of Karameh (1968), in which the Fatah fighters, led by Arafat in person, won a victory against the Israeli forces sent to destroy them, caused Fatah's prestige to rise sky-high. After three Arab armies had been shamefully defeated by Israel, the fighters of Fatah had held on heroically. The result: Fatah took over the PLO, the 39 years old Arafat became the leader of the nation.

 

All the Arab leaders with whom Arafat had to contend at that time have in the meantime died natural or unnatural deaths. Arafat remains.

 

Perhaps his greatest achievement as a national leader lies in his ability to hold the Palestinians together.

 

Most liberation movements have known fratricidal wars, bitter splits and desperate internal struggles. The pre-state Hebrew underground, too, experienced the fratricidal "saison" and the bloody Altalena incident. But the Palestinians, whose situation was incomparably more difficult, were spared this fate.

 

Almost all other movements grew from populations that lived on their land, under one particular foreign regime. But the Palestinian people were dispersed in a dozen countries, almost all of them oppressive dictatorships. The name "Palestine" had disappeared altogether from the map, and even the Palestinians who had remained in their homeland lived under oppressive rulers - first the Jordanian and Egyptian, and then the Israeli military governor.

 

When the PLO grew, all the Arab regimes tried to gain influence over it. Damascus, Baghdad, Riyad, Cairo, in addition to Moscow, set up Palestinian organizations in order to impose their agendas on the Palestinian people. Secular and religious, leftist and rightist organization tried to play their games inside the movement. Arafat had to cope with all of them, manoeuvre, cajole, threaten, appease. He became a past master of this art, perhaps its outstanding practitioner in the world.

 

At the same time, he had to lead the national struggle. Like almost all leaders of modern liberation movements, from Garibaldi to Nelson Mandela, he was convinced of the need for the "armed struggle" (always called "terrorism" by the opposing regime.) The PLO organizations carried out many bloody attacks, many of them brutal, some of them outright monstrous, even if most of these were made by organizations who also fought against Arafat. All PLO leaders believed that the "armed struggle" was necessary, considering the vast disproportion between the might of Israel and the almost negligible force of the Palestinians.

 

Arafat himself, according to the testimony of his assistants, is far from being cruel or bloodthirsty. Only in rare instances did he confirm death sentences, and that only when the public demand was irresistible. The number of executions carried out in his domain is incomparably lower than in former Governor George W. Bush's Texas.

 

It is accepted by most authorities that, without the "armed struggle", the Palestinians would not have achieved anything and would have lost their homeland long ago. They believe that the violent attacks enabled the Palestinian people to return to the world map and allowed the PLO to attain its historic achievements: its recognition as the "sole legitimate representative" of the Palestinian people, its invitation to the UN, its international standing, the Oslo agreement, its return to Palestine and the creation of a world-wide consensus supporting the idea of a Palestinian state.

 

But Arafat did not see the "armed struggle" as an end in itself. Violence is for him one means among many.

 

At the end of 1973 he did something that is rare among leaders. After making one revolution (the creation of Fatah and the start of the "armed struggle") he initiated another. (Years later, Yitzhaq Rabin did something similar.)

 

The October 1973 war changed his strategic concept. Until then he believed that Israel could be overthrown by force. The Palestinian struggle was designed, primarily, to cause a general military confrontation between Israel and the Arab world, as happened in 1967. In October 1973 Arafat realized that this hope had no basis in fact. The armies of Egypt and Syria did indeed attack Israel and achieved initial surprise, giving them a resounding victory, but within two weeks the Israeli army had turned the tables and was advancing on Cairo and Damascus. Arafat, forever the rational engineer, drew the logical conclusion: there exists no military option.

 

From there it was but one step to the second conclusion: the Palestinian state can be achieved only through compromise, by a political settlement with Israel. He started to work on it.

 

The necessary effort was immense. A whole generation of Palestinians saw in Israel a monstrous enemy that had expelled half the Palestinian people from their homes and lands and continued to oppress and dispossess the other half. In their time of desperation, the Palestinians clung to their belief that the very existence of Israel is illegitimate and that some day, somehow, it will be eradicated. Arafat had to uproot this belief and to cause his people to accept a compromise that left the Palestinian people only 22 per cent of their historic homeland.

 

He worked as he always has done: with infinite patience, sensitivity to human beings, tactical manoeuvres, zigzags and equivocation. He started secret contacts with a tiny group of Israeli peace activists (including myself), hoping that they would open the way to the heart of the Israeli establishment. He encouraged some of his people (mainly Sa'id Hamami and Isam Sartawi, who were both murdered because of this) to express his hidden thoughts publicly. He caused the Palestinian National Council, the parliament in exile, to gradually change its resolutions. In this effort, which lasted from 1974 to 1988, he was assisted mainly by Abu Mazen.

 

At that time, Yitzhaq Rabin was still an extreme opponent of a peace settlement with the Palestinians, and Shimon Peres was the godfather of the settlements. Both advocated the "Jordanian option" (returning parts of the West Bank to Jordan and making peace with the king, ignoring the will of the Palestinians). If anyone deserved the Nobel Prize for the Oslo agreement, it was Arafat.

 

One of the attributes that endear him to the Palestinian public is his rare personal courage.

 

When Ariel Sharon invaded Lebanon in 1982, in order to expel the Palestinians and kill their leader, Arafat could have easily left Beirut in time. This would have been accepted by everyone as a sensible step. But he remained with his fighters in the besieged city until the last day. After a long battle, his men left with their heads held high, bearing their arms, led by Arafat.

 

Another, almost forgotten, episode brought him even more esteem. A year after the exit from Beirut, the Syrians and their agents attacked the Palestinian forces in a north Lebanese refugee camp near Tripoli. At the time, Arafat was the guest of the UN in Geneva. He did something almost unbelievable: he secretly returned to Lebanon, slipped into the besieged camp and, in the end, left with his fighters, who did not surrender this time either.

 

He has spent most of his life in constant danger, with a dozen secret services trying to kill him. He survived several assassination attempts. Once he escaped with his life when his plane had to perform a tough emergency landing in the middle of the desert. His bodyguards were killed.

 

In the middle of the battle of Beirut I asked him where he would go if he got out alive. Without hesitation, he said: "Home, of course!" Twelve years later, on his first day in Gaza, he whispered to me: "Remember what I told you in Beirut? Well, here I am."

 

As head of the new Palestinian National Authority, he was confronted with one of the toughest jobs of his life. He faced a challenge unknown to any other liberation movement: to set up a kind of state while the liberation struggle was still far from over.

 

Arafat returned together with the veterans of the struggle, who believed, quite understandably, that it was their right to control the Palestinian National Authority. The same was claimed by a new generation of fighters, veterans of the Intifada, the prisons and the underground. The same was claimed by thousands of professionals who had studied in universities the world over. (One of them told me: "OK, let's give medals to all the fighters. But the state must be governed by people trained for it.") Arafat had to give a part of the pie to the Christian minority, to the representatives of the various regions, and, most importantly, to the heads of the great families who have dominated Palestinian society for centuries and without whom one cannot rule. Altogether, an almost impossible task.

 

It cannot be said that the establishment of the Palestinian National Authority was an unqualified success. But, considering the objective pressures, Arafat did not do too bad a job either.

 

One of the weak points was the centralism of the new administration. During the decades of struggle, Arafat has got used to deciding alone and quickly. His colleagues had all too willingly let him take the historic decisions that demanded courage and personal risk. Most of his closest comrade- in-arms had been killed during the struggle, some by Israel, some by the Iraqi agent Abu Nidal and his ilk. Like all leaders who have been at the centre of internal struggles and responsibility for a long time, Arafat has become lonely and suspicious.

 

Some of the Palestinian personalities believed that, with the establishment of the Authority, the struggle had come to an end. They started to look out for their own personal interests, some became corrupt, assimilating the norms of the neighbouring countries (and not only theirs.) This aroused resentment among the Palestinian public. Israeli leftists began to condemn the "corrupt Authority", the official Israeli propaganda machine took the story up and gleefully distributed it around the world. This caused grievous damage to the Palestinian cause at a most sensitive time.

 

But not the slightest hint of suspicion ever attached itself to Yasser Arafat himself. While Ariel Sharon is sinking in a morass of corruption affairs and world leaders like Helmut Kohl in Germany and Jacques Chirac in France have starred in major scandals, Arafat has remained above suspicion. Neither his opponents at home nor the Israeli intelligence agencies have succeeded in discovering any spots. He lives a very simple life, has no home of his own, his clothes are his khaki uniforms.

 

Throughout his life, Arafat has made many mistakes. He may have exaggerated his opposition to the 1977 Sadat initiative, surrendering to the pressure of his enraged colleagues. His support of Saddam Hussein during the first Gulf war was a major mistake that cost dearly. More than once he erred in choosing assistants and confidants.

 

But, to his own people, he has remained the only leader who can be trusted unconditionally. Foreigners are unable to understand this. They find it odd that the very same attributes that made him abhorrent to many people in the West make him a hero to his people.

 

For example, when, at Camp David, Arafat emphatically rejected the proposals of Ehud Barak and Bill Clinton, he was condemned by most of the Israeli "peace camp". But, in Palestinian eyes, it was the epitome of courage and national pride. When he went to the summit meeting, many Palestinians were afraid that he was walking into a trap and would not have the strength to extricate himself. It was clear that the "generous proposals" of Barak did not meet the minimum demands of the Palestinians. When he came back without having surrendered, he received a hero's welcome.

 

Now the Palestinians are ready to give some credit to Abu Mazen, who believes that he can get some concessions from Israel and the US. Abu Mazen is an old partner of Arafat and respected by the public. But no Palestinian can imagine entrusting him with the destiny of the nation.

 

One person only enjoys that kind of trust: the man besieged in the Mukata'ah. He remains the ultimate judge.

 

Uri Avnery is an Israeli journalist, writer and peace activist.

 

 

Link

 

One more link - Have a look.

[LANDER]

It would be unfortunate to lose Arafat, despite his shortcomings in recent times, he has fought long for the palestinian cause and has become the symbol of palestinian resistance. Not to mention the possible chaos that could result from his leaving a power vacum in the Palestinian leadership.

 

PS

NGONGE I really wasn't trying to belittle Arafat but was simply pointing out the inconsistent comparison and to some degree your own belittlement of Nelson Mandela, one of the great figures of our century.

[NGONGE]

Call me cold hearted, saaxib. But, I’m not much of a fan of African unity, black power and the multitude of other slogans and movements related to race and colour. I appreciate and respect Mandela’s struggle, admire his unwavering principles, but he is no hero of mine. Other than an accidental similarity in our skin shades, we have nothing at all in common. Arafat on the other hand, shares my religion, my desire to liberate the holly land and most of my other beliefs. Does it surprise you then that I would regard him as the greater man?

 

An Israeli journalist who used to be an active member of the Hagganah (current IDF) and fought for the creation of the state of Israel wrote the article above. He witnessed most of the battles, political games and Palestinian resistance. At some point in the past, he changed direction and began to criticise the obvious oppression and wrongdoings of the state of Israel. It’s ironic that a former Israeli “resistance†fighter should come out on the side of Mr Arafat, wouldn’t you say?

 

At least we’re in agreement on the complications that will arise once Arafat passes away. Let us hope it doesn’t work to the benefit of the occupiers.

[Wiilo]

Well, my dear, Arafat and his Palestinian Libration Organiztion (PLO) didn't do that much ever since they got there, (Power) why can we see Palestinian State that totaly and complately independent from Isreal? Since signing the Olso accords on September 13, 1993, Arafat and the Plo have done little to show that they are ready to rule or have the desire to engage in electoral politics. Democratic Palestinian State in Gaza and the West Bank is essential to peace and stability in the area, but u cann't have that until u have an excellent leaders who are willing to lead their people (Palestinians) to free from occupation. What seems important here in the Palestinian case is to begin an electoral process that allows for widespread representation, not a winner take-all system. To give chance to other leaders who are willing (may be) can change the long running struggle and the devastation of Palestine people. Well, we shall see how things progress in the coming years.........

 

http://www.iap.org/index2.html

 

Wabillaahi Towfiiq:

[Wiilo]

Palestinian students and the violations on freedom of movement

 

Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (Oct 28, 2004)

 

Ibrahim Jabarin, a 31 years old pharmacist from the West Bank village of Tuqu`, turned to Physicians for Human Rights-Israel in regards to advocating his exit to Sweden, after he received his third scholarship to study abroad. In the past he missed two scholarships to study because he was “blocked†from exiting the West Bank by the Israeli GSS. Following a high court petition filed by PHR-Israel to the Israeli court with Adv. Andrey Rosenthal, regarding his case, the State’s attorneys agreed to allow him to leave for his studies on the condition that he will not return to the occupied territories for the next two years.

 

On the advice of the association, Mr. Jabarin refused to accept this illogical demand and the court was asked to decide on the issue. On 14 October 2004, the state agreed to allow him to leave without any conditions, before the High Court decided on the case.

 

Physicians for Human Rights-Israel struggles to make the various authorities let Palestinian medical professionals travel for the purpose of studying and receiving professional training abroad.

 

As part of the closure policy placed on the occupied territories, Israel tends to block Palestinian students from leaving in order to study, under the pretense of security problems or due to a total block on people leaving.

 

Jabain’s case is just one of dozens of cases of Palestinian students who turn to Physicians for Human Rights-Israel. Many of them study in foreign universities, and when they arrive for a visit during the summer vacation they find themselves being forced to struggle with the army authorities in order to return to the institution where they study. The latest movement restrictions placed on the Gaza Strip in the past several months included orders to not allow any men from the ages of 16-35 to leave the Gaza Strip. This age category includes hundreds of students amongst them dozens who study various medical fields. For example, al-Quds University in Abu Dis was forced to find other options for its students from Gaza, whether by sending teachers to them or by using video conferencing. Since there are no university hospitals in Gaza, the students are forced to do the hands-on training at hospitals that are not affiliated with universities.

 

The West Bank students’ situation is not much better, since they must pass through two security checks- once by the Israeli GSS and then a second time by the Jordanian intelligence, which has begun to ask from every Palestinian requesting to enter into Jordan to produce an “integrity†certificate from the Jordanian Interior Ministry before they leave the West Bank.

 

The case of Ibrahim Jabarin is just one example of many of the way Israel, as an occupying power, ignores the basic rights of the residents of the occupied Palestinian territories.

 

Limiting the freedom of movement of Palestinian in the occupied territories, and especially from young students looking to acquire education abroad due to a lack in educational institutions and the inability to reach distant medical centers in their own land, is another way of paralyzing the Palestinian society and preventing its development. The Palestinian health care system is thus especially liable to become stagnant and unable to develop. Without connection with the rest of the world and without the ability to learn and receive training, no health system can function and grow.

 

Wabillaahi Towfiiq:

[Libaax-Sankataabte]

I pray for him. May Allah give him a good recovery. Arafat is a symbol of Palestinian struggle.

 

[Wiilo]

There is a phrase that says "What have You done for me Lately" :confused: that is what it is for Arafat and his (PLO) group............Lol What have they (plo) done for the Palestinian Ppl?

Good question........huhhhhhhh..... Lol

 

Go figure