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Arafat
(Busy with some personal stuff, so I don´t have time to write things up. If you like to write something to post, please let me know and I’ll get it up.)
Arafat is dead but kept alive until some political things are sorted out. Helena Cobban has written about him a few days ago: Arafat: a Palestinian tragedy. Ze’ev Schiff, military correspondent for Haaretz thinks that with Arafats death it is Time for an Israeli initiative.
Short of a secular one state solution, I don´t expect any initiative to bring long term peace to palestine. Any ideas how that ever might come about?
Here is a nice tribute to Arafat from an Israeli.
http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-2997192,00.html
Arafat, I wish you full recovery
Yitzhak Frankenthal
Yitzhak Frankenthal, whose son Aryeh Tzvi Frankel was kidnapped and murdered by Hamas in 1994, met tens of times with Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat.
Arafat is sick, and I hope with all my heart that he recovers and leads his people for many more years.
So far I have met with him several tens of times. I met with a charismatic leader, a warm and cordial leader, the first Palestinian leader who recognized Israel as a neighbour, and wanted to make peace with it. Arafat is a leader on the level of Ben-Gurion and George Washington, a leader who is building a nation. He is a leader who knows what is good for his people, he is a leader who does not fold in the face of pressure, and continues with the strength of his spirit to advance toward the goal he set for himself.
Our habit is to hold leaders in contempt, especially leaders of the enemy. We did so with Sadat, the late Assad and now the younger Assad. Every Arab leader who is not prepared to be a Zionist – we scorn them. Indeed, Arafat is not a simple man, but he is mild and courteous, a well-mannered man, a man of honour. In all of the tens of meetings I had with him, he never lied to me. There are leaders in Israel and the world, who passed messages to Arafat through me, and I passed messages from him to them.
I always knew that I was sitting with the enemy. Arafat did not expect me to be a Palestinian. He always knew that I was a religious Zionist patriot who loved Israel, and I knew that he was a Palestinian patriot who loved his people. Over the past ten years I have met with him in different situations, and all too often I met with him while in the grip of deep shame in the face of our behaviour as Israelis.
More than once I heard on the radio or television one or another of our leaders being interviewed telling brazen lies that flew in the face of what I knew not only from Arafat but also from Israeli leaders. More than once I have come across Israeli politicians at the highest level who looked to me like dwarves compared to the personality of Arafat.
It is our habit to hold the Palestinians in contempt.
When I heard ministers talking about Arafat as if he were irrelevant, I knew that those same people who said that he was not relevant would themselves soon be irrelevant and he would continue to be relevant. I knew that those people would not be remembered in history, while Arafat has already made his mark on the pages of the history of humanity.
It is our habit to hold the Palestinians in contempt. To see them as animals in human form and Arafat as the patriarch of the animals. The principal monster. But for all that, my friends, the Arafat that I know is a leader who even today is prepared to make peace with Israel and to live as a good neighbour like in Scandinavia. Arafat wants open borders, he wants mutual respect, he wants a state whose borders were agreed on at the Camp David and Taba talks, with the addition of sovereignty over Temple Mount [the Noble Sanctuary].
Arafat has no problem with the Western Wall remaining in our hands, he has no problem if the Jewish Quarter remains in our hands, he has no problem if the right of return is to the State of Palestine, to Gaza and the West Bank and not to Israel proper. Arafat has no problem with territorial exchanges, and is ready to allow Israel to annex most of the settlements, and in return to receive Israeli territory beside Gaza. Yes, my friends, I am not disclosing anything new. All the prime ministers knew and know the above mentioned facts.
That being the case, what’s going on? What has happened? What do I fear will happen? There is no prime minister who is prepared to be a leader of the stature of Arafat and to say to his people: “that’s the way it has to be”. Arafat did that in ’92, and he could do it even now and sign a peace agreement with a courageous Israeli leader. Arafat saw in Rabin a leader who was ready to lead the way to peace. Rabin’s murder crushed Arafat’s faith that an Israeli leader would rise who could lead the way to compromise and peace.
We need only look at what’s happening now with the right’s opposition to Sharon’s plan to see where we’re headed. Arafat saw all that and knows that there is no leader in Israel. I never claimed that Arafat was a “Righteous Gentile”. But I have claimed that Arafat can lead his people to a peace of the brave with Israel. Yes, Arafat is cunning. Yes, Arafat is not prepared to bend in the face of the Israeli Goliath. And yes, Arafat is the elected leader of the Palestinians who is proud of his people.
Recently, about two months ago, I interviewed Arafat in front of a television camera, and within 18 minutes he answered my questions. I sent a copy of the tape to all the channels. No station was prepared to broadcast the interview in which Arafat talks about all the difficult issues. Israeli arrogance has extracted a high price up to now, and I fear that we will continue to pay it over and over.
Prepared to lead his people to peace with Israel
When Sharon spoke of seven days of absolute quiet, Arafat told me two things – one, even if there are weeks without terror, Sharon will not talk peace – and indeed he was right; and the second thing he said to me was that Sharon should give seven days without occupation and in return receive peace. And in this too Arafat was right.
I remember that I traveled to Oslo at the request of the late Rabin for the Nobel prize ceremony, I received a phone call from a bereft mother who told me that the moment Rabin shakes hands with the abominable Arafat, she would commit suicide, and it would be my fault because I supported Rabin. I asked her where her son was killed, and she said that he was killed in the Yom Kippur war (the October war) in Sinai. I asked her why she did not kill herself when Rabin shook hands with Sadat, and her reply was “how can you compare: one’s a president and the other is a terrorist.” I said to her, give Arafat a state, and he too will be a president and not a terrorist. She was silent.
There are those in Israel who claim that Arafat is corrupt, that he diverted billions to his pocket. That’s just a stupid joke. No leader is more modest than Arafat. In all the years I have known him he has lived a modest and ascetic life. No dazzling wealth and no personal waste. They claim that his people are corrupt, but how can we demand of a man who is not given independence that he controls a police without a polity, a government without governance, the present without a future, motivations without a motor, an orchestra without musicians, music without the ringing of liberty.
The Arafat I know is not a man who bends in the face of the rapacious occupation, but he is a man who is ready to reach a peace of the brave. To my questions he replied more than once that Hamas will join his government the moment there is peace. They will stop fighting Israel. No, he was not prepared to make war on his compatriots on Israel’s behalf, but he believes with all his heart that if he makes peace, Hamas will walk with him hand-in-hand. That’s a real leader.
To my sorrow, Arafat did not know how to play cunning tricks in order to win points with the Israeli public. He is truthful and sincere in his desire to make peace.
I will conclude where I started: Arafat is sick, and I hope with all my heart that he recovers and leads his people for many more years, because indeed Arafat, with his charisma, his personality, can lead his people to peace. For the sake of the Palestinian people and Israel I wish him a full recovery.
Posted by: Bea | Nov 9 2004 3:35 utc | 17
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