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Nov. 18, 2004 Yasser Arafat died on November 11th in a military hospital in France, at the age of 75. He left behind his wife of 13 years, 41-year old Suha, and a daughter. Arafat's life seemed full of contradictions. I can't help but wonder what he might have accomplished had he not been consumed with hatred. Arafat wasn't his real name. He claimed to have been born in Jerusalem, although records indicate he was born in Cairo, Egypt. His real name was Mohammed Yasser Abdul-Ra'ouf Oudwa Al-Husseini. One could get the impression that his hatred for the Jews was due to being uprooted from a home in Palestine. However, he spent 23 of his first 27 years in Egypt, where his father was a textile merchant. After his mother died, when he was 5, he lived in Jerusalem for 4 years, before returning to Cairo. Arafat's involvement in regional politics began in his late teens. He was attending Cairo University when the 1948 Arab-Israeli War erupted. Along with other students, he attempted to fight in the war, but was disarmed by Egyptian forces and sent home before they could enter the war zone. Arafat returned to Cairo University. From 1952-1956 he was president of the Union of Palestinian Students. After at least 8 years, Arafat graduated with a Bachelor's Degree in Civil Engineering from Cairo University in 1956. During the Suez War of 1956 Arafat served as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Egyptian army. After the war he went to Kuwait, where he worked as an engineer, eventually setting up his own contracting firm. Arafat helped establish the organization Fatah in 1957, dedicated to the establishment of an independent Palestinian State in place of Israel and Jordan. Shortly after the Arab League created the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1964, Fatah became its dominant faction. With backing from Syria, in December 1964 Fatah began terrorist raids against Israeli civilians that would continue for the next forty years. Raids were launched from Jordan, Lebanon, and Egypt. Arafat was in Syria in 1966 when a coup occurred. When the leader of Fatah, installed by the new regime, was murdered, Arafat was arrested. He was going by the name of Abu Ammar. Upon his release, he fled to Beirut, Lebanon, with his inner circle. Anger over terrorist raids, and indications of mobilizations against Israel by its neighbors culminated with the 6-Day War in June 1967. Israel defeated Egypt and took the Sinai, including the Gaza Strip. Israel then defeated Jordan, took the West Bank of the Jordan Valley, and captured all of Jerusalem. Lastly, Israel defeated Syria and took the Golan Heights. Each of these captured territories was retained as a buffer to counter terrorists trying to attack Israel. After the war the PLO established a settlement in Karameh, Jordan. Terrorist raids against Israel increased. In March 1968 a school bus was attacked, killing 2 children and wounding 28. Israel launched an attack against Karameh. Arafat distributed weapons to PLO fighters, and then fled the battle. The man who always appeared in military garb, complete with pistol belt and revolver, fled dressed as a woman carrying a baby. Regular Jordanian Army units engaged the Israelis, who then withdrew across the border. In the tradition of Baghdad Bob, the Arab press hailed the battle as a great Palestinian victory, holding up Arafat as a great leader. His new gained notoriety resulted in him being elected chairman of the PLO in 1969. One morning in June 1968 I awoke to the news that Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy had been assassinated. I had been rooting for Bobby, and was really upset about it. The murderer was Sirhan Sirhan, a Palestinian, who hadn't liked something Bobby had said. Jordan's King Hussein viewed the Palestinian presence in his country with increasing trepidation. On September 12, 1970 Palestinian terrorists brought three hijacked airliners to Jordan, and blew them up. Four days later King Hussein declared martial law, and moved against the Palestinians. On the same day Arafat became commander of the Palestine Liberation Army, the regular military force of the PLO. Alarmed at the Jordanians trying to wipe out the Palestinian enclave, Syria invaded Jordan with a force that included 200 tanks. Israel countered that move with a military force of its own, instructing Syria to back off or else. After 8 days of fighting the Palestinian forces were defeated. Most of their leaders fled to Syria, and later on into Lebanon. The world was rudely made aware of the PLO's barbarity in September 1972 when Palestinian terrorists struck at the Olympic Games in Munich, Germany. In a venue dedicated to peace they murdered 11 Israeli athletes. War broke out again in October 1973, launched on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year. At its end Israel once again emerged victorious. Despite their best efforts, the Arab nations were incapable of defeating Israel militarily. They changed their strategy to one of political coercion. Arab members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) began an oil embargo. In the United States gasoline prices soared, resulting in rationing, long lines at gas pumps, and car-pooling. Arafat began a diplomatic war against Israel. He sought to change the west's perception of the PLO into that of a movement with legitimate claims. Prior to the 1967 6-Day War Gaza had belonged to Egypt and the West Bank to Jordan. The PLO had never railed against those nations occupying those territories. Suddenly Arafat was railing against Israeli occupation of Gaza, the West Bank, and Jerusalem. Arafat never mentioned that during the 20 years the Arabs controlled Jerusalem they had prohibited Jews from worshipping at the Western Wall of the Jewish Temple Mount. In an act of appeasement the PLO was recognized by the United Nations, giving it access to that body's deliberations. On November 13, 1974 Arafat addressed the U.N. body, saying he came with an olive branch and the gun of a freedom fighter, don't let the olive branch drop. The statement was insidious; the PLO had no intention of dropping its terror campaign until Israel had been destroyed. Civil war broke out in Lebanon in 1975. Entrenched in Southern Lebanon and Beirut, the PLO helped destabilize Lebanon. It was purported to have been responsible for the persecution and murder of thousands of Lebanese citizens. Continuous terror attacks against Israel, and the firing of rockets and artillery from Southern Lebanon into Jewish settlements led to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in June 1982. By September Israeli forces were at Beirut. Lebanese hatred for the Palestinians became apparent when they entered a Palestinian refugee camp, ringed by Israeli forces, and commenced slaughtering its occupants. In a U.S. brokered cease-fire deal, Arafat and his leadership departed Beirut and went to Tunisia. It would be their base for the next ten years. With Iraqi assistance, Arafat began to reconstruct the badly battered PLO. On October 7, 1985 Palestinian terrorists hijacked the Italian cruise ship, Achille Lauro. In a courageous act of freedom fighting they murdered American Leon Klinghoffer. He was an old man of Jewish faith in a wheelchair. They tossed his body overboard, and claimed he must have fallen over. Their lies were revealed when his body washed ashore and was discovered. On December 13, 1988, in response to U.S. prodding, Arafat accepted United Nations Security Council Resolution 242. He promised future recognition of Israel, and renounced terrorism in all its forms, including state terrorism. The bit about "state terrorism" was a reference to Israel's retaliations against the PLO for its terrorist activities. I think unmitigated gall would be an apt term for his statement. Arafat's statement was supposed to reflect a shift in the PLO's primary aim from the destruction of Israel to that of the establishment of two states: Israel within the 1949 armistice lines and Palestine in Gaza and the West Bank. The reality of the PLO's intents was quite different. The Central Council of Palestine National Council (the governing body of the PLO) on April 2, 1989 elected Arafat president of the proclaimed State of Palestine. That state laid claim to the whole of Palestine, as defined by the British mandate. The irony of this is that after 40 years of bloodshed the Palestinians wanted to be given what they had refused back in 1948. The Declaration of Principles, known as the Oslo Accords, were signed on September 13, 1993 in Washington D.C. by Yasser Arafat and Shimon Peres. Israel recognized the PLO. The PLO was supposed to recognize Israel, renounce terrorism, and revoke the provision in its covenant calling for the destruction of Israel. In 1994 Arafat, along with Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. It made me sick to watch U.S. politicians fawning over Yasser Arafat like he was somebody great. I wish that, as Hamlet saw the ghost of his father, Arafat had seen the ghosts of Bobby Kennedy, the 11 athletes from Munich, and Leon Klinghoffer standing in accusation as he went up to receive his Nobel Peace Prize. Perhaps every seat in that hall could have been filled with the victims of his bloodletting over the years. In July 1994 Arafat moved from Tunisia to the Palestinian Authority, the provisional entity created by the Oslo Accords. He set up his headquarters in Ramallah, in the West Bank. He was elected to a three-year term as president of the Palestinian Authority on January 20, 1996. He held his three-year office for almost 9 years. Presidential elections were never held again. Arafat's goal of a Palestinian state was within his grasp in July 2000. President Bill Clinton held a summit meeting at Camp David between Arafat and Ehud Barak, of Israel. Although offered the most concessions ever granted by Israel, Arafat walked away from the table in anger, refusing to accept the offer or propose any counter offers. The Nobel Peace Prize's recipient's answer was a 2nd Intifada. After multiple homicide bombings Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon declared Arafat "irrelevant" Israeli forces on December 22, 2001 pushed into Ramallah and attacked the PA's headquarters compound. Arafat was confined to his office building for the remainder of his life, until he was evacuated to Paris this month. While various media formats depicted Palestinians living in squalor in refugee camps in Gaza and the West Bank, Suha Arafat was living in Paris on a monthly stipend of $100 thousand from the Palestinian Authority. Iraq had been giving the families of Palestinian homicide bombers $25,000 and the Palestinian Authority had been taking several thousand dollars of that in taxes. Forbes Magazine ranked Yasser Arafat #6 on its 2003 list of "Kings, Queens and Despots", estimating his personal wealth at a minimum of $300 million. A team of American accountants hired by the Palestinian Authority Finance Ministry in 2003 began to examine Arafat's finances. They determined part of his wealth was in a secret portfolio worth close to $1 billion. The head of the investigation stated, "although the money for the portfolio came from public funds like Palestinian taxes, virtually none of it was used for the Palestinian people; it was all controlled by Arafat, and none of these dealings were made public". The International Monetary Fund conducted an audit of the PA and discovered Arafat diverted $900 million in public funds to a special bank account controlled by Arafat and the PA Chief Financial Advisor. After Arafat slipped into a coma, Suha began bargaining with the PA. Various accounts are given by media companies regarding what was agreed to. According to Corriere de la Serra, Suha will receive $22 million a year from the PA budget. The newspapers, Maariv and La Repubblica, listed Suha's future finances as: - A one time payment of $20 million - A monthly stipend of $35 thousand for life - More than $10 million discovered last year by French authorities investigating money laundering after it was discovered multiple transfers of $1.2 million were being made from Swiss accounts into Suha's accounts in Paris. Suha has been dubbed "Miss Moneybags" by the Palestinian press. I wonder how the PA justified giving Suha that much money. What does she do in Paris to justify that much? Why did Arafat divert so many funds into secret accounts? Was it an attempt to thwart any moves by the U.S. led war on terror from seizing them should the PA be labeled a terrorist organization, like Al Qaida? One thing was certain: as long as Arafat controlled the money he would be able to retain power over the PA. And so, Yasser Arafat has died. The man who was trained to be an engineer, to my knowledge, never built anything in Palestine. The man who was a terrorist butcher was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize. The man who had tremendous talents for persuading people, coercing people, and garnering them to a cause never brought them independence or a state of their own. The man who dedicated his life to fighting for Palestine lived sixty- one years of his seventy-five year life outside Palestine in various countries. The leader who hated his enemies more than he loved his own people threw away the opportunity to give them the homeland they wanted. The man who presented his people to the world for years as impoverished refugees had millions stashed away in secret accounts. The man who could have helped Palestine become a prosperous state instead followed a path of violence for 58 years. When he died he left Palestinian cities in Gaza and the West Bank in ruins, the Palestinian economy in tatters. Arafat and the Palestinians had the same opportunity that Israel had, back in 1948. Israel followed a constructive vision, and built a prosperous nation. Arafat and the Palestinians followed a destructive vision, intent on destroying Israel rather than building Palestine. I can't help but wonder what Arafat might have accomplished had he not been consumed with hatred, and can't help thinking he wasted his life. ------------ About the author Joseph Boudreau: I spent just under 24 years in the Navy, 9 on active duty, the rest in the Naval Reserves. From paygrade E-1 I advanced to paygrade O-4, and retired as a Lieutenant Commander. Email: bunnyboggins@aol.com Tell a friend about this site! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
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