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Israel decides on expulsion or the execution of Arafat
The cabinet decided not to elaborate on exactly
what Arafat's "removal" would entail, whether
it meant the expulsion or the execution of the
PA chairman.
what Arafat's "removal" would entail, whether
it meant the expulsion or the execution of the
PA chairman.
The security cabinet decided Thursday that Arafat
"is a complete obstacle to any process of
reconciliation between Israel and the
Palestinians. Israel will work to remove this
obstacle in a manner, and at a time, of its choosing."
The decision came during ameeting of the 11-minister strong security cabinet,convened by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to discussIsrael's response to two suicide bombings in a Jerusalemcafe and outside an IDF base near Rishon Letzion on Tuesday, in which 15 people were killed.
Sharon has "instructed the security forces to
act relentlessly, continuously and determinedly
to eliminate the terrorist organizations and
take all appropriate measures against their
leaders, commanders and operatives until their
criminal activity is halted," said a statement
issued by the prime minister after the meeting.
Sources said that the security cabinet had also
decided to ask the Israel Defense Forces to
draw up a plan for the expulsion Arafat.
Following the decision, Arafat told thousands of
Palestinians rallying to his side he would stay
put in his headquarters come what may.
"You are brave people, my loved ones. Abu Ammar
is staying here," he said, using his nom de
guerre while blowing kisses to the throngs
outside his half-demolished West Bank compound
to which he has been confined by IDF troops for
most of the past 21 months.
"You are the ones who are capable of responding
to this Israeli threat," Arafat, dressed in his
usual military uniform, told the
slogan-chanting crowd.
Using a bullhorn, Arafat recited a passage from
the Koran about being steadfast in the face of
an oppressor.
He also said: "We are on sacred land, and we
will protect our holy Christian and Muslim
places. We send a message to the detainees, and
to the prisoners, together all the way to
Jerusalem."
He then led the crowd in a chant, waving his
finger in rhythm: "To Jerusalem, to Jerusalem,
to Jerusalem."
Arafat's Fatah movement urged Palestinians to
stay around the clock at his headquarters to
protect the PA chairman from any Israeli
attempt to force him into exile.
"It is true the Palestinians do not own tanks
but they own the determination to resist this
Israeli decision. We call on the Palestinian
people to be present at Abu Ammar's [Arafat]
compound day and night so the occupiers realize
that the people will defend their leadership,"
senior Fatah official Ahmed Ghneim told
reporters.
Palestinians poured onto the streets of cities
in the West Bank and Gaza Strip after word
spread of the Israeli decision.
"President Arafat is a red line and the whole
territory will turn red if he is harmed,"
declared a banner held aloft by demonstrators
in a crowd of around 7,000 that marched to his
Ramallah headquarters.
Red tracer bullets fired by masked militants
crisscrossed the night sky over Gaza. Radio
stations blared Palestinian nationalist songs
and took in a flood of phone calls in praise of
Arafat.
The decision on removing Arafat was made without
a vote, with Interior Minister Avraham Poraz
(Shinui) the sole minister opposed to the move.
The cabinet decided not to elaborate on exactly
what Arafat's "removal" would entail, whether
it meant the expulsion or the execution of the
PA chairman.
Poraz said that the United States was opposed to
any attempt to harm Arafat, and that he had
heard a similar message from U.S. Ambassador to
Israel Dan Kurtzer.
Israeli officials also said earlier that the
U.S. continues to oppose Arafat's expulsion.
During the debate at the Defense Ministry in Tel
Aviv, Sharon called Arafat a "murderer," and
Education Minister Limor Livnat said that there
was no moral difference the American desire to
capture ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and
Al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden and Israel's
attempt to strike at Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed
Yassin. She added that there was "no moral
difference between them and Arafat."
Qureia shelves bid to form government
Following the decision, Palestinian Prime
Minister-designate Ahmed Qureia said he was
shelving his bid to form a government.
"This is an adventurous and grave decision
that... finishes off any attempt by me to form
a new cabinet," he said. "[If implemented],
this grave and adventurous decision would not
only blow up the Palestinian territories but
also the entire region."
A senior Palestinian security official condemned
the decision as "stupid," saying that it would
destabilize the Middle East.
"Harming Arafat or expelling him will
destabilize the region and will only bring
disaster to the Israeli people," the official
said.
"Occupation is terrorism and the Israelis have
to realize that if they implement this stupid
decision then they are committing a crime
against their own people and against stability
in the region."
Arafat vowed earlier Thursday to stay put,
despite the IDF commandeering a building
overlooking his compound in the West Bank city
of Ramallah earlier in the day as a "message"
to him and his PA.
"No one can kick me out," Arafat said. Asked if
he would leave of his own accord, he said,
"definitely not."
"This is my homeland. This is terra sancta. No
one can kick me out," he told reporters. "They
can kill me. They have bombs," he said.
Arafat called on the quartet of the United
States, Russia, Europe and the United Nations
to "move quickly to protect peace and the road
map" peace plan.
U.S.: Expulsion 'would not be helpful'
The United States has notified Israel it is
opposed to Arafat's expulsion even though "he
is part of the problem and not part of the
solution" in the tense standoff with the
Palestinians.
"We think that it would not be helpful to expel
him because it would just give him another
stage to play on," spokesman Richard Boucher
said.
"The Israeli government is very clear on what
our views are on these things and I think
understands clearly our position," Boucher
said.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak urged Israel
not to opt for exile, saying the veteran leader
was crucial to peace moves.
A spokeswoman for European Union foreign policy
chief Javier Solana expressed "great concern"
at the news.
"This is precisely the moment when people should
make every possible effort to avoid steps that
lead to an escalation and that lead to even
more tension," Cristina Gallach said.
She added that it was "absolutely necessary for
Israel to weigh carefully the consequences of
such an action."
Peres: Israel should not act in anger
Labor Party Chairman Shimon Peres, in Washington
for talks, said that Israel should not act out
of anger, even if it was justified. "While we
have to fight terror we must be careful not to
escalate the situation," he said.
Peres urged Sharon's government to deal with
Ahmed Qureia, the new Palestinian prime
minister. Qureia "understands terror and peace
do not work together, and he prefers peace,"
Peres said.
He also faulted the government as not having
"kept its promise" on halting settlement
activity.
At the same time, Peres, who shared the 1994
Nobel Peace Prize with Arafat and then prime
minister Yitzhak Rabin, said he was against
expulsion even though Arafat was a problem.
"Occasionally you have to live with problems
without solving them," Peres said. He
criticized the government for its treatment of
Arafat, saying it had "tortured him mentally."
IDF moves into Muqata area
Earlier Thursday, IDF soldiers in the West Bank
city of Ramallah commandeered the Palestinian
Authority Culture Ministry building,
Palestinian sources told Israel Radio.
The radio said the troops took over the top
floor of the building, which overlooks Arafat's
headquarters, forcing all of the officials
working there to leave.
A military official said the building has a
commanding view of what transpires in the
Muqata, the radio reported, describing the
take-over as "deterrent in nature" and quoting
him as saying, "At this stage we are speakingof
a message and a signal to the Palestinian
Authority and Yasser Arafat."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/339400.html
"is a complete obstacle to any process of
reconciliation between Israel and the
Palestinians. Israel will work to remove this
obstacle in a manner, and at a time, of its choosing."
The decision came during ameeting of the 11-minister strong security cabinet,convened by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to discussIsrael's response to two suicide bombings in a Jerusalemcafe and outside an IDF base near Rishon Letzion on Tuesday, in which 15 people were killed.
Sharon has "instructed the security forces to
act relentlessly, continuously and determinedly
to eliminate the terrorist organizations and
take all appropriate measures against their
leaders, commanders and operatives until their
criminal activity is halted," said a statement
issued by the prime minister after the meeting.
Sources said that the security cabinet had also
decided to ask the Israel Defense Forces to
draw up a plan for the expulsion Arafat.
Following the decision, Arafat told thousands of
Palestinians rallying to his side he would stay
put in his headquarters come what may.
"You are brave people, my loved ones. Abu Ammar
is staying here," he said, using his nom de
guerre while blowing kisses to the throngs
outside his half-demolished West Bank compound
to which he has been confined by IDF troops for
most of the past 21 months.
"You are the ones who are capable of responding
to this Israeli threat," Arafat, dressed in his
usual military uniform, told the
slogan-chanting crowd.
Using a bullhorn, Arafat recited a passage from
the Koran about being steadfast in the face of
an oppressor.
He also said: "We are on sacred land, and we
will protect our holy Christian and Muslim
places. We send a message to the detainees, and
to the prisoners, together all the way to
Jerusalem."
He then led the crowd in a chant, waving his
finger in rhythm: "To Jerusalem, to Jerusalem,
to Jerusalem."
Arafat's Fatah movement urged Palestinians to
stay around the clock at his headquarters to
protect the PA chairman from any Israeli
attempt to force him into exile.
"It is true the Palestinians do not own tanks
but they own the determination to resist this
Israeli decision. We call on the Palestinian
people to be present at Abu Ammar's [Arafat]
compound day and night so the occupiers realize
that the people will defend their leadership,"
senior Fatah official Ahmed Ghneim told
reporters.
Palestinians poured onto the streets of cities
in the West Bank and Gaza Strip after word
spread of the Israeli decision.
"President Arafat is a red line and the whole
territory will turn red if he is harmed,"
declared a banner held aloft by demonstrators
in a crowd of around 7,000 that marched to his
Ramallah headquarters.
Red tracer bullets fired by masked militants
crisscrossed the night sky over Gaza. Radio
stations blared Palestinian nationalist songs
and took in a flood of phone calls in praise of
Arafat.
The decision on removing Arafat was made without
a vote, with Interior Minister Avraham Poraz
(Shinui) the sole minister opposed to the move.
The cabinet decided not to elaborate on exactly
what Arafat's "removal" would entail, whether
it meant the expulsion or the execution of the
PA chairman.
Poraz said that the United States was opposed to
any attempt to harm Arafat, and that he had
heard a similar message from U.S. Ambassador to
Israel Dan Kurtzer.
Israeli officials also said earlier that the
U.S. continues to oppose Arafat's expulsion.
During the debate at the Defense Ministry in Tel
Aviv, Sharon called Arafat a "murderer," and
Education Minister Limor Livnat said that there
was no moral difference the American desire to
capture ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and
Al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden and Israel's
attempt to strike at Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed
Yassin. She added that there was "no moral
difference between them and Arafat."
Qureia shelves bid to form government
Following the decision, Palestinian Prime
Minister-designate Ahmed Qureia said he was
shelving his bid to form a government.
"This is an adventurous and grave decision
that... finishes off any attempt by me to form
a new cabinet," he said. "[If implemented],
this grave and adventurous decision would not
only blow up the Palestinian territories but
also the entire region."
A senior Palestinian security official condemned
the decision as "stupid," saying that it would
destabilize the Middle East.
"Harming Arafat or expelling him will
destabilize the region and will only bring
disaster to the Israeli people," the official
said.
"Occupation is terrorism and the Israelis have
to realize that if they implement this stupid
decision then they are committing a crime
against their own people and against stability
in the region."
Arafat vowed earlier Thursday to stay put,
despite the IDF commandeering a building
overlooking his compound in the West Bank city
of Ramallah earlier in the day as a "message"
to him and his PA.
"No one can kick me out," Arafat said. Asked if
he would leave of his own accord, he said,
"definitely not."
"This is my homeland. This is terra sancta. No
one can kick me out," he told reporters. "They
can kill me. They have bombs," he said.
Arafat called on the quartet of the United
States, Russia, Europe and the United Nations
to "move quickly to protect peace and the road
map" peace plan.
U.S.: Expulsion 'would not be helpful'
The United States has notified Israel it is
opposed to Arafat's expulsion even though "he
is part of the problem and not part of the
solution" in the tense standoff with the
Palestinians.
"We think that it would not be helpful to expel
him because it would just give him another
stage to play on," spokesman Richard Boucher
said.
"The Israeli government is very clear on what
our views are on these things and I think
understands clearly our position," Boucher
said.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak urged Israel
not to opt for exile, saying the veteran leader
was crucial to peace moves.
A spokeswoman for European Union foreign policy
chief Javier Solana expressed "great concern"
at the news.
"This is precisely the moment when people should
make every possible effort to avoid steps that
lead to an escalation and that lead to even
more tension," Cristina Gallach said.
She added that it was "absolutely necessary for
Israel to weigh carefully the consequences of
such an action."
Peres: Israel should not act in anger
Labor Party Chairman Shimon Peres, in Washington
for talks, said that Israel should not act out
of anger, even if it was justified. "While we
have to fight terror we must be careful not to
escalate the situation," he said.
Peres urged Sharon's government to deal with
Ahmed Qureia, the new Palestinian prime
minister. Qureia "understands terror and peace
do not work together, and he prefers peace,"
Peres said.
He also faulted the government as not having
"kept its promise" on halting settlement
activity.
At the same time, Peres, who shared the 1994
Nobel Peace Prize with Arafat and then prime
minister Yitzhak Rabin, said he was against
expulsion even though Arafat was a problem.
"Occasionally you have to live with problems
without solving them," Peres said. He
criticized the government for its treatment of
Arafat, saying it had "tortured him mentally."
IDF moves into Muqata area
Earlier Thursday, IDF soldiers in the West Bank
city of Ramallah commandeered the Palestinian
Authority Culture Ministry building,
Palestinian sources told Israel Radio.
The radio said the troops took over the top
floor of the building, which overlooks Arafat's
headquarters, forcing all of the officials
working there to leave.
A military official said the building has a
commanding view of what transpires in the
Muqata, the radio reported, describing the
take-over as "deterrent in nature" and quoting
him as saying, "At this stage we are speakingof
a message and a signal to the Palestinian
Authority and Yasser Arafat."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/339400.html
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Araft will refuse to leave and if he doesnt want to leave no other country will take him if he is removed by force. What will Israel do push him out of a helicopter over another country?
It's safe to say, however, that should Yasser Arafat be murdered by the IDF, Israel will be solely responsible, and justifiably so, for the reaction that follows.
Let's not forget another thug, Ariel Sharon, has been wanting to have Arafat killed since '82 in Beirut.
Note to Anti Angie:
Refer to my post from last weekend wherein you accused me of lying with respect to this.
Let's not forget another thug, Ariel Sharon, has been wanting to have Arafat killed since '82 in Beirut.
Note to Anti Angie:
Refer to my post from last weekend wherein you accused me of lying with respect to this.
"Let's not forget another thug, Ariel Sharon, has been wanting to have Arafat killed since '82 in Beirut."
If he'd suceeded, the Palestinians would probably have a state and be doing pretty well now. But ol' Arafat - if the Palestinians win, he loses power - and he won't stand for that. Better the 'leader' of a starving people, than to be shunted aside in their prosperity.
If he'd suceeded, the Palestinians would probably have a state and be doing pretty well now. But ol' Arafat - if the Palestinians win, he loses power - and he won't stand for that. Better the 'leader' of a starving people, than to be shunted aside in their prosperity.
I just bet there would have been a Palestinian state regardless of who was leading the Palestinian peoples then, now, or in the future. It makes for great propaganda, however.
Sorry, but why would wanting to get rid of arafat back in the 80's, or at any time, have been a bad thing?
The fact it can also "make for great propaganda" doesn't make it any less true, Ang.
ONE OF THOSE RABID HARDCORE ARCH-ZIONISTS NAMED HIMSELF IN YOUR HONOR!: "ANTI-ANGIE"!!
GEE!! NO ZIONIST HAS NAMED HIMSELF "ANTI-JA" YET!
HOW IS IT THAT YOU RATE SO HIGHLY AND I DON'T!
YOU MUST BE DOING *SOMETHING* RIGHT FOR THEM TO HONOR YOU SO HIGHLY!
HEY RABID ZIONIST NUTCASES!!! DOESN'T ONE OF YOU WANT TO NAME YOURSELF IN *MY* HONOR???
(Angie, I came back from a late 9-11 panel tonight. Of course we all went out to eat in China town afterwards. That's why I'm home so late! Nighty-night!)
GEE!! NO ZIONIST HAS NAMED HIMSELF "ANTI-JA" YET!
HOW IS IT THAT YOU RATE SO HIGHLY AND I DON'T!
YOU MUST BE DOING *SOMETHING* RIGHT FOR THEM TO HONOR YOU SO HIGHLY!
HEY RABID ZIONIST NUTCASES!!! DOESN'T ONE OF YOU WANT TO NAME YOURSELF IN *MY* HONOR???
(Angie, I came back from a late 9-11 panel tonight. Of course we all went out to eat in China town afterwards. That's why I'm home so late! Nighty-night!)
Getting rid of Arafat will not solve the Problem.
Because it will not change the Fact that the West Bank and Gaza looks like this:
West Bank and Gaza are only 22% of what is TODAY, Israel, West Bank and Gaza.
PLEASE LOOK AT THE MAP IN THE FOLLOWING WEB PAGE:
The Orange areas are Israeli settlements in the already small 22% that is West Bank and Gaza. What kind of carved up mess will the Palestinian State be unless all the settlements are removed (which will probably never happen) or just make the settlements part of the New Palestinian State (which can happen right now)??
CLICK HERE > http://www.indybay.org/news/2003/06/1618616.php
Where will this Palestinian State Be (The Road Map???)
"""It's safe to say, however, that should Yasser Arafat be murdered by the IDF, Israel will be solely responsible, and justifiably so, for the reaction that follows."""(by Angie)
Angie, How Right you are...
If they get rid of Arafat then they should get rid of Sharon because Sharon is just as bad if not worse.....
Because it will not change the Fact that the West Bank and Gaza looks like this:
West Bank and Gaza are only 22% of what is TODAY, Israel, West Bank and Gaza.
PLEASE LOOK AT THE MAP IN THE FOLLOWING WEB PAGE:
The Orange areas are Israeli settlements in the already small 22% that is West Bank and Gaza. What kind of carved up mess will the Palestinian State be unless all the settlements are removed (which will probably never happen) or just make the settlements part of the New Palestinian State (which can happen right now)??
CLICK HERE > http://www.indybay.org/news/2003/06/1618616.php
Where will this Palestinian State Be (The Road Map???)
"""It's safe to say, however, that should Yasser Arafat be murdered by the IDF, Israel will be solely responsible, and justifiably so, for the reaction that follows."""(by Angie)
Angie, How Right you are...
If they get rid of Arafat then they should get rid of Sharon because Sharon is just as bad if not worse.....
""Getting Rid of Arafat will not Solve the Root Cause of the Problem
by ANGEL Friday September 12, 2003 at 02:34 AM""(not the real ANGEL, was posted by a Coward who is afraid to use his/her handle or How sad that he/she is mentally deficient and can not compose his/her own rebuttal to a posting.)
Correction:
Getting rid of Arafat will not solve the Problem.
Because it will not change the Fact that the West Bank and Gaza looks like this:
West Bank and Gaza are only 22% of what is TODAY, Israel, West Bank and Gaza.
PLEASE LOOK AT THE MAP IN THE FOLLOWING WEB PAGE:
The Orange areas are Israeli settlements in the already small 22% that is West Bank and Gaza. What kind of carved up mess will the Palestinian State be unless all the Settlements are removed (which will probably never happen) or just make the Settlements part of the New Palestinian State (which can not happen right now)???
CLICK HERE > http://www.indybay.org/news/2003/06/1618616.php
Where will this Palestinian State Be (The Road Map???)
"""It's safe to say, however, that should Yasser Arafat be murdered by the IDF, Israel will be solely responsible, and justifiably so, for the reaction that follows."""(by Angie)
Angie, How Wrong you are...
If they get rid of Arafat then they should not get rid of Sharon because Sharon is much better.....
by ANGEL Friday September 12, 2003 at 02:34 AM""(not the real ANGEL, was posted by a Coward who is afraid to use his/her handle or How sad that he/she is mentally deficient and can not compose his/her own rebuttal to a posting.)
Correction:
Getting rid of Arafat will not solve the Problem.
Because it will not change the Fact that the West Bank and Gaza looks like this:
West Bank and Gaza are only 22% of what is TODAY, Israel, West Bank and Gaza.
PLEASE LOOK AT THE MAP IN THE FOLLOWING WEB PAGE:
The Orange areas are Israeli settlements in the already small 22% that is West Bank and Gaza. What kind of carved up mess will the Palestinian State be unless all the Settlements are removed (which will probably never happen) or just make the Settlements part of the New Palestinian State (which can not happen right now)???
CLICK HERE > http://www.indybay.org/news/2003/06/1618616.php
Where will this Palestinian State Be (The Road Map???)
"""It's safe to say, however, that should Yasser Arafat be murdered by the IDF, Israel will be solely responsible, and justifiably so, for the reaction that follows."""(by Angie)
Angie, How Wrong you are...
If they get rid of Arafat then they should not get rid of Sharon because Sharon is much better.....
Ummm, let's see..
"Israel Good, Arafat bad"
"Jews rule, others drool"
If Hitler had come for the Palestinians, the world would have breathed a sigh of relief and let him keep France, and tossed in Bulgaria to boot...
We rule the world, that's why we've got a shitty little country in the ME instead of Monaco...
That good enough for ya? (Sheesh.)
"Israel Good, Arafat bad"
"Jews rule, others drool"
If Hitler had come for the Palestinians, the world would have breathed a sigh of relief and let him keep France, and tossed in Bulgaria to boot...
We rule the world, that's why we've got a shitty little country in the ME instead of Monaco...
That good enough for ya? (Sheesh.)
Only a complete tool and idiot would think that Arafat has been ANYTHING but a thief, murderer and obstacle to peace in the ME.
Further IF Sharon were to kill him it wd be the best possible outcome for all parties involved.
It doesn't matter who the Israeli's ELECT; as long as the dictator Arafat pulls the strings as he has done since the 60's he is condemning the arabs to a life of utter misery.
He should go back to his homeland, Egypt, if they will have him; or more preferable, the IDF should drop a 2,000# bomb on his Ramallah dump.
Further IF Sharon were to kill him it wd be the best possible outcome for all parties involved.
It doesn't matter who the Israeli's ELECT; as long as the dictator Arafat pulls the strings as he has done since the 60's he is condemning the arabs to a life of utter misery.
He should go back to his homeland, Egypt, if they will have him; or more preferable, the IDF should drop a 2,000# bomb on his Ramallah dump.
I see your faker is back. My dear Concerned Zionist has one as well. People whose only contribution to the world is to irritate and steal the ideas of others.
But those of us who have been reading your stuff for months know who the real "Angel" is. Keep up the good work.
Angie
We have the "anti angie" individual addressing someone called "Ang". Anyone know who that might be?
OH, YOU THOUGHT *YOU* WERE SO *SPECIAL*, ANGIE!!
SEE!! NOW I'M JUST AS SPECIAL AS YOU!!:
" Okay. (Sigh)
by ***Anti-JA*** Friday September 12, 2003 at 05:11 AM. "
OH, YOU *KNOW* I'M BAAAD!! I'VE GOT A ZZZIONIST NAMED IN HONOR OF *ME* NOW TOO!!
SO *THERE*!!
I SAW THAT YOU WERE GETTING A MIGHTY BIG HEAD, ANGIE, WITH THE ZZZIONISTS ALL OBSCENELY ATACKING YOU, VICIOUSLY GANGING UP ON YOU, CONSTANTLY *IMPERSONATING* YOU, EVEN NAMING THEMSELVES AFTER YOU -- "ANTI-ANGIE".
ALL IN ZZZIONIST RECOGNITION AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF JUST HOW TRULY INTELLECTUALLY *FORMIDABLE* YOU ARE -- ALL IN YOUR *HONOR*, ANGIE!!
NOT SO SPECIAL NOW, ARE YOU???
SASKATCHEWAN HAS ONE LESS SNOOTIE REDHEAD WHO THINKS SHE'S OH SO SMART NOW!!
JA RULES TOO!!
OR MAYBE WE'RE **BOTH** REALLY SPECIAL!!
HMMMMM......? SWEETIE!!!
SEE!! NOW I'M JUST AS SPECIAL AS YOU!!:
" Okay. (Sigh)
by ***Anti-JA*** Friday September 12, 2003 at 05:11 AM. "
OH, YOU *KNOW* I'M BAAAD!! I'VE GOT A ZZZIONIST NAMED IN HONOR OF *ME* NOW TOO!!
SO *THERE*!!
I SAW THAT YOU WERE GETTING A MIGHTY BIG HEAD, ANGIE, WITH THE ZZZIONISTS ALL OBSCENELY ATACKING YOU, VICIOUSLY GANGING UP ON YOU, CONSTANTLY *IMPERSONATING* YOU, EVEN NAMING THEMSELVES AFTER YOU -- "ANTI-ANGIE".
ALL IN ZZZIONIST RECOGNITION AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF JUST HOW TRULY INTELLECTUALLY *FORMIDABLE* YOU ARE -- ALL IN YOUR *HONOR*, ANGIE!!
NOT SO SPECIAL NOW, ARE YOU???
SASKATCHEWAN HAS ONE LESS SNOOTIE REDHEAD WHO THINKS SHE'S OH SO SMART NOW!!
JA RULES TOO!!
OR MAYBE WE'RE **BOTH** REALLY SPECIAL!!
HMMMMM......? SWEETIE!!!
You ever wonder
just why what and how
what someone might mean
when they say "How now, brown cow?"
just why what and how
what someone might mean
when they say "How now, brown cow?"
don't play stupid. You know Ang= short for "Angie" is you.
Stupid? Am I in the habit of having people call me "Ang" ? NO, I AM NOT!!
So doesn't that follow, then, that you will be "Anti Ang" on occasion, pray?
So doesn't that follow, then, that you will be "Anti Ang" on occasion, pray?
Poor "Saskatchewan"! It breaks my heart, but what can I do? What can I do, she wails???
I'm sitting here in hysterics!
I was coming down the page wondering who was saying what, and there it was, your own wee post!!!.
Sorry, I don't know the answer myself, but please, insert a nonsense post like this occasionally. I'm howling with merriment here!
I was coming down the page wondering who was saying what, and there it was, your own wee post!!!.
Sorry, I don't know the answer myself, but please, insert a nonsense post like this occasionally. I'm howling with merriment here!
I can't get the "VIDEO: Rachel Corrie on film. Her parents release a statement and a letter from Rachel" thread to load properly. The webpage doesn't show anything beyond the "A concerned Zionist" post from Monday September 08, 2003 at 12:20 PM.
Do you have this problem too? I wonder if others do too.
Do you have this problem too? I wonder if others do too.
No, I do not have that problem.
No, I cannot, sadly, tell you what the problem is.
Perhaps if you searched Yahoo, you might find it, but it's perfectly okay here. In fact, I just sent you a wee post there earlier. Good luck!
No, I cannot, sadly, tell you what the problem is.
Perhaps if you searched Yahoo, you might find it, but it's perfectly okay here. In fact, I just sent you a wee post there earlier. Good luck!
Followng up on my remarks above: "Arafat is a murdering thug", by ?, Friday September 12, 2003 at 05:34 AM:
"IF Sharon were to kill him it wd [sic] be the best possible outcome for all parties involved."
Yes EVERY suicide bmbng is Arafat's fault! Although Israel has him confined to a cple of rooms in what's left of his mostly destroyed cmpd and have bggd, tapped, and electronically eavesdropped on ALL his phones, we KNOW Arafat is behind all those suicide bmbngs!
(Have you actually LOOKED into his eyes?
WARNING!!: NOT DIRECTLY!! HE'S TELEPATHIC AND PSYCHOLOGICALLY TELEKINETIC!: HE CAN MAKE YOU BEND TO HIS WILL AND DO *ANYTHING*!!)
Arafat is an *Evile* Evile *Master* Mastermind!! We know that Arafat is responsible for EVERY cloudy day in Israel! When he is gone, the Palestinians wd just lay prone, their cowardly bellies sliding down on the ground, give up, and profusely beg Sharon for mercy at his feet! The suicide bmbngs wd ALL cease! The clouds wd part and the sun wd come out over all of Greater Israel!! Greater Israel wd finally have LABENSRAUM!! Peace wd reign throughout the land with our "MAN OF PEACE" Ariel Sharon ruling over all! Israel wd FINALLY be able to implement its FINAL SOLUTION to THE PALESTINIAN PROBLEM.
But, WHO *THEN* wd be *SO* USEFUL for Isreal to have to blame ALL the bombings on against innocent civilians (Israel's, not Palestinians). WHO *THEN* wd be Israel's nxt BIG BAD BOOOGEYMAN!? *WHO* *THEN* wd Israel use to break agreements with the PA (Palestinian Authority) any time the slightest attack (even in the illegally Occupied Territories) - let alone any *HAMAS* bombing - occurs against anyone Israeli? (Even after Israel has admittedly assassinated nonmilitary Hamas leaders who have directed *NO* bombings!) It might be REALLY *STUPID* for Israel to get rid of Arafat!!
Hmmm..., maybe Arafat is MORE useful to *ISRAEL* than to Palestinians, AFTER ALL!!
MAYBE WE BETTER *KEEP* HIM!!!
"IF Sharon were to kill him it wd [sic] be the best possible outcome for all parties involved."
Yes EVERY suicide bmbng is Arafat's fault! Although Israel has him confined to a cple of rooms in what's left of his mostly destroyed cmpd and have bggd, tapped, and electronically eavesdropped on ALL his phones, we KNOW Arafat is behind all those suicide bmbngs!
(Have you actually LOOKED into his eyes?
WARNING!!: NOT DIRECTLY!! HE'S TELEPATHIC AND PSYCHOLOGICALLY TELEKINETIC!: HE CAN MAKE YOU BEND TO HIS WILL AND DO *ANYTHING*!!)
Arafat is an *Evile* Evile *Master* Mastermind!! We know that Arafat is responsible for EVERY cloudy day in Israel! When he is gone, the Palestinians wd just lay prone, their cowardly bellies sliding down on the ground, give up, and profusely beg Sharon for mercy at his feet! The suicide bmbngs wd ALL cease! The clouds wd part and the sun wd come out over all of Greater Israel!! Greater Israel wd finally have LABENSRAUM!! Peace wd reign throughout the land with our "MAN OF PEACE" Ariel Sharon ruling over all! Israel wd FINALLY be able to implement its FINAL SOLUTION to THE PALESTINIAN PROBLEM.
But, WHO *THEN* wd be *SO* USEFUL for Isreal to have to blame ALL the bombings on against innocent civilians (Israel's, not Palestinians). WHO *THEN* wd be Israel's nxt BIG BAD BOOOGEYMAN!? *WHO* *THEN* wd Israel use to break agreements with the PA (Palestinian Authority) any time the slightest attack (even in the illegally Occupied Territories) - let alone any *HAMAS* bombing - occurs against anyone Israeli? (Even after Israel has admittedly assassinated nonmilitary Hamas leaders who have directed *NO* bombings!) It might be REALLY *STUPID* for Israel to get rid of Arafat!!
Hmmm..., maybe Arafat is MORE useful to *ISRAEL* than to Palestinians, AFTER ALL!!
MAYBE WE BETTER *KEEP* HIM!!!
Truth may indeed conquer all, but from the Israeli standpoint we have no idea when, if ever, that will happen. Truth, in fact, is virtually nonexistent with the current Government and army (is there a difference, we wonder?).
Tonight, for example, Israel stated it CARES NOT about international condemnation re its dictum to expel (kill) Yasser Arafat.
If only, as Robert Burns, wrote (and I paraphrase) we could see ourselves as others see us!
I almost choked on my dinner. - an indirect warning, perhaps, not to watch BBC World News and eat dinner at the same time. Like, as if Israel ever gave a tiddly damn about international opinion, or UN resolutions, or anything else.
Its "spokes people" are prattling on about Yasser Arafat with nary a word about its own atrocities.
If one were tuning in to the "conflict" for the first time, one would be led to believe that Israel has been sitting there in peace and quiet, minding its own business, loving its neighbours as itself, and simply being attacked for no reason by the "sub-human" Palestinian "terrorists".
Media manipulation, unfortunately, is rampant!
Truth, sadly, hobbles about on a crutch at best.
Blessedly, we are not tuning in for the first time, and we know about the decades of oppression against the Palestinian peoples; the theft of land, the destruction of entire villages; the theft of water; the arrests without charges; the daily killiings, the bulldozing of homes, sometimes with people in them. We know of all the atrocities such as the missle attacks, the assassinations, the bombing of apartment buildings in the middle of the night, in the middle of the day, whenever, and its ethnic cleansing, and -- what did I miss?
And don't forget it's all done in the guise of "security". Yes, that little child returning from school, age 11, a major security risk!
With over seventy UN resolutions ignored, total disregard for the Fourth Geneva Convention, the Oslo Agreements, and everything else besides, Israel does think it's above the rest of us.
A fallacy, to be sure, but unfortunately one that continues to work for it.
What we should be asking is WHO really needs a wall for security?
If it's a question of who else has been "an obstacle to peace", Sharon the Wicked wouldn't have anything to do with that now, would he? And the fanatic members of the Likud party and other fringe parties as well?
SSSHHH, Angie. Bite your tongue!!! Do you want Israeli detractors to come on this Board and beat you up verbally? Well, no, but that's never stopped them yet!
Re: Recent Suicide bombings….
But in the Previous several weeks how many Palestinians were killed with bombs dropped from the safety of the cockpits of Apache Helicopters???
How can you expect to kill all these Palestinian People who had no way of defending themselves since they are not allowed to have a Military.
Do you really expect them to just sit there and take it and do nothing to retaliate??
If we had the two State Solution and the borders were set to pre 1967 (The Green Line)
Then Israel could use its superior military to guard and Control that Border instead of doing things like land confiscation, home demolitions that leave countless women and children homeless, which in turn causes a reason for the retaliation we are seeing…
West Bank and Gaza are only 22% of what is TODAY, Israel, West Bank and Gaza.
PLEASE LOOK AT THE MAP IN THE FOLLOWING WEB PAGE:
The Orange areas are Israeli settlements in the already small 22% that is West Bank and Gaza. What kind of carved up mess will the Palestinian State be unless all the settlements are removed (which will probably never happen) or just make the settlements part of the New Palestinian State (which can happen right now)??
CLICK HERE > http://mondediplo.com/maps/IMG/artoff3260.jpg
But in the Previous several weeks how many Palestinians were killed with bombs dropped from the safety of the cockpits of Apache Helicopters???
How can you expect to kill all these Palestinian People who had no way of defending themselves since they are not allowed to have a Military.
Do you really expect them to just sit there and take it and do nothing to retaliate??
If we had the two State Solution and the borders were set to pre 1967 (The Green Line)
Then Israel could use its superior military to guard and Control that Border instead of doing things like land confiscation, home demolitions that leave countless women and children homeless, which in turn causes a reason for the retaliation we are seeing…
West Bank and Gaza are only 22% of what is TODAY, Israel, West Bank and Gaza.
PLEASE LOOK AT THE MAP IN THE FOLLOWING WEB PAGE:
The Orange areas are Israeli settlements in the already small 22% that is West Bank and Gaza. What kind of carved up mess will the Palestinian State be unless all the settlements are removed (which will probably never happen) or just make the settlements part of the New Palestinian State (which can happen right now)??
CLICK HERE > http://mondediplo.com/maps/IMG/artoff3260.jpg
It's amazing how you guys ignore the real points, make up imaginary strawman points, knock down the made-up points, and act all proud of yourselves.
Angie, for example, can't possibly believe that Israel's security wall is specifically set up to protect israel from 11 year old children trying to go to school. What do you think motivates her to make up such absurd examples to scoff at?
Angie, for example, can't possibly believe that Israel's security wall is specifically set up to protect israel from 11 year old children trying to go to school. What do you think motivates her to make up such absurd examples to scoff at?
the UN has held only two special emergency sessions since 1982. No session was ever convened to condemn China's occupation of Tibet, Syria's occupation of Lebanon, the Indonesian occupation of East Timor, or the slaughters in Rwanda, the disappearances in Zaire, or any other global horror. Only Israel was so targeted - twice.
At the UN's urging, only one member state has ever been brought before the Geneva Convention. Not Cambodia for its genocide, Russia for its brutal repression of Chechnya or Sudan for its atrocities. Again, it was Israel.
The UN General Assembly, driven by a coalition of Arab, Muslim and other dictatorships, has passed more resolutions condemning Israel than any other nation on Earth. But it has never censured Israel's assailants for their three wars of aggression in 1948, 1967 and 1973.
The UN Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) passes at least five resolutions a year condemning Israel (last year it was seven) and spends about 30% of its time solely on the Jewish state. In contrast, as Beichman notes, each of the following countries or regions has been the subject of one resolution - Iraq, Iran, Russia/Chechnya, Afghanistan, Burundi, Congo, Cuba, Myanmar, Sierra Leone, Southeast Europe and Sudan. Manuel Prutschi of the Canadian Jewish Congress notes this double standard is compounded by the fact the UNCHR devotes one agenda item to focusing solely on Israel. All other nations are lumped together under a separate item.
Despite this, Israel, the only Mideast democracy, is not allowed to join the UNCHR, or the Security Council, while many of the world's worst dictatorships - Syria, Libya, Sudan, Saudi Arabia - can and do. As David Goldberg of the Canada-Israel Committee explains, membership on major UN bodies is conditional upon belonging to one of the UN's five regional groups. Israel is the only UN member excluded from this system because it has been prevented from joining its regional group - Asia - by an ongoing Arab boycott. Thus, it cannot even get a delegate appointed to the 53-nation UNCHR to defend itself from unfair attacks. Due to efforts by the U.S. and, to its credit, Canada, Israel now has partial membership in the "Western European and Others Group."
Israel, Beichman notes, is the only country to which the UNCHR assigns a special "rapporteur" to investigate human rights "violations." In other nations, rapporteurs investigate "situations." The reports by Israel's rapporteur are always one-sided because his mandate prohibits investigating Palestinian actions in addition to Israel's, even if they occur in the same area. The Israeli rapporteur's mandate is the only one not periodically reviewed by the UNCHR.
Each year on Nov. 29, the UN holds a United Nations Day of International Solidarity with the Palestinian People. The day is always a vicious diatribe against Israel. There is no UN Day of International Solidarity With the Victims of Palestinian Terrorism. No other "people" on Earth, no matter how brutally oppressed, receive a similar day of UN solidarity.
While the anti-Semitic ravings aimed at Jews at the infamous UN conference ostensibly against racism held in Durban, South Africa in 2001 are well-known, Israel is also the only UN state to have been subjected to two blood libels. In 1991, the Syrian delegate to the UNCHR accused Israel of murdering Christian children to use their blood to make matzo, an ancient anti-Semitic canard. In 1997, the Palestinian delegate accused Israel of injecting 300 Palestinian children with HIV-infected blood. Neither of these lies was immediately denounced by the UN. From 1975-91, in what even UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has called a "low point" in its history, a General Assembly resolution equating Zionism with racism stayed on the books until it was finally repealed due to a campaign by the U.S. By contrast, in 1997, the mere mention of an allegedly blasphemous reference to Islam by a UN expert from an academic source, was instantly rebuffed by the UNCHR and deleted from the record.
No fair-minded person argues Israel should be above scrutiny by the UN. No fair-minded person dismisses the suffering of the Palestinians in the Disputed Territories and the human rights abuses committed by Israel, albeit in the context of responding to the constant threat of terrorism.
But to pretend, as the UN does, year after year, that Israel is the world's worst human rights violator, or even remotely close to holding that title, is not only sheer nonsense, it is a suggestion fueled by anti-Semitism.
At the UN's urging, only one member state has ever been brought before the Geneva Convention. Not Cambodia for its genocide, Russia for its brutal repression of Chechnya or Sudan for its atrocities. Again, it was Israel.
The UN General Assembly, driven by a coalition of Arab, Muslim and other dictatorships, has passed more resolutions condemning Israel than any other nation on Earth. But it has never censured Israel's assailants for their three wars of aggression in 1948, 1967 and 1973.
The UN Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) passes at least five resolutions a year condemning Israel (last year it was seven) and spends about 30% of its time solely on the Jewish state. In contrast, as Beichman notes, each of the following countries or regions has been the subject of one resolution - Iraq, Iran, Russia/Chechnya, Afghanistan, Burundi, Congo, Cuba, Myanmar, Sierra Leone, Southeast Europe and Sudan. Manuel Prutschi of the Canadian Jewish Congress notes this double standard is compounded by the fact the UNCHR devotes one agenda item to focusing solely on Israel. All other nations are lumped together under a separate item.
Despite this, Israel, the only Mideast democracy, is not allowed to join the UNCHR, or the Security Council, while many of the world's worst dictatorships - Syria, Libya, Sudan, Saudi Arabia - can and do. As David Goldberg of the Canada-Israel Committee explains, membership on major UN bodies is conditional upon belonging to one of the UN's five regional groups. Israel is the only UN member excluded from this system because it has been prevented from joining its regional group - Asia - by an ongoing Arab boycott. Thus, it cannot even get a delegate appointed to the 53-nation UNCHR to defend itself from unfair attacks. Due to efforts by the U.S. and, to its credit, Canada, Israel now has partial membership in the "Western European and Others Group."
Israel, Beichman notes, is the only country to which the UNCHR assigns a special "rapporteur" to investigate human rights "violations." In other nations, rapporteurs investigate "situations." The reports by Israel's rapporteur are always one-sided because his mandate prohibits investigating Palestinian actions in addition to Israel's, even if they occur in the same area. The Israeli rapporteur's mandate is the only one not periodically reviewed by the UNCHR.
Each year on Nov. 29, the UN holds a United Nations Day of International Solidarity with the Palestinian People. The day is always a vicious diatribe against Israel. There is no UN Day of International Solidarity With the Victims of Palestinian Terrorism. No other "people" on Earth, no matter how brutally oppressed, receive a similar day of UN solidarity.
While the anti-Semitic ravings aimed at Jews at the infamous UN conference ostensibly against racism held in Durban, South Africa in 2001 are well-known, Israel is also the only UN state to have been subjected to two blood libels. In 1991, the Syrian delegate to the UNCHR accused Israel of murdering Christian children to use their blood to make matzo, an ancient anti-Semitic canard. In 1997, the Palestinian delegate accused Israel of injecting 300 Palestinian children with HIV-infected blood. Neither of these lies was immediately denounced by the UN. From 1975-91, in what even UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has called a "low point" in its history, a General Assembly resolution equating Zionism with racism stayed on the books until it was finally repealed due to a campaign by the U.S. By contrast, in 1997, the mere mention of an allegedly blasphemous reference to Islam by a UN expert from an academic source, was instantly rebuffed by the UNCHR and deleted from the record.
No fair-minded person argues Israel should be above scrutiny by the UN. No fair-minded person dismisses the suffering of the Palestinians in the Disputed Territories and the human rights abuses committed by Israel, albeit in the context of responding to the constant threat of terrorism.
But to pretend, as the UN does, year after year, that Israel is the world's worst human rights violator, or even remotely close to holding that title, is not only sheer nonsense, it is a suggestion fueled by anti-Semitism.
Palestinians terrorized Jordan in the early 1970's until finally King Hussein killed tens of thousands of them in just one month alone.
Palestinians terrorized Kuwait so much that in 1991 after Kuwait was liberated the first thing they did was throw about 350,000 Palestinians right the hell out of Kuwait. Did you protest that? Why not? Why do you think Kuwait did that? Do you think it had something to do with the fact that palestinians were actively terrorizing and hurting innocent Kuwaitis who were not doing anything to them?
Palestinians have terrorized Israel for decades now, which is why it is ridiculous for Israel to be expected to hand land to them especially when the likes of Arafat would gain the control.
Egypt wants no part of the Palestinains and allows very few of them to immigrate to Egypt (which, by the way, is where Arafat is originally from).
Arabs, from 1948 to 1967, controlled 100% of the west bank, gaza strip and east jerusalem, and instead of forming a palestinian state, they kept attacking israel until in 1967 israel won the war and took control of the land. And you're mad that Israel hasn't allowed a palestinian state to be formed on it, even as for decades terrorism against israel continued, and it was a miracle just to get them to even pretend to officially recognize israel as a state? Get a damn grip!
Palestinians terrorized Kuwait so much that in 1991 after Kuwait was liberated the first thing they did was throw about 350,000 Palestinians right the hell out of Kuwait. Did you protest that? Why not? Why do you think Kuwait did that? Do you think it had something to do with the fact that palestinians were actively terrorizing and hurting innocent Kuwaitis who were not doing anything to them?
Palestinians have terrorized Israel for decades now, which is why it is ridiculous for Israel to be expected to hand land to them especially when the likes of Arafat would gain the control.
Egypt wants no part of the Palestinains and allows very few of them to immigrate to Egypt (which, by the way, is where Arafat is originally from).
Arabs, from 1948 to 1967, controlled 100% of the west bank, gaza strip and east jerusalem, and instead of forming a palestinian state, they kept attacking israel until in 1967 israel won the war and took control of the land. And you're mad that Israel hasn't allowed a palestinian state to be formed on it, even as for decades terrorism against israel continued, and it was a miracle just to get them to even pretend to officially recognize israel as a state? Get a damn grip!
"Palestinians terrorized Jordan in the early 1970's until finally King Hussein killed tens of thousands of them in just one month alone. "
Jordan is probably as guilty of genocide against the Palestinians as Israel itself. The Jordanian government has worked behind the scenes with Israel for years since both have an interest in preventing Palestinians from ever gaining real political rights. After all if Palestinians got a country next to Jordan where they could vote, they might demand an end to the monarchy terrorizing their relatives across the river.
Its strange no media (left or mainstream) really dealt with that when the Jordanian embassy in Iraq was attacked and Iraqis seemed to be celebrating in the street in support of the attack. People in the Middle East know Jordan is guilty of genoide against Palestinians but the other dictatorships are afraid of alienating one of their own.
Jordan's guilt in no way makes Israel less guilty of war crimes, but it is a shame that some on the Left have chosen to support Jordan since it seems to oppose Israel; it never has and never will since Abdullah's father, the late King Hussein was put in power by the British and owes everything to them (the country was craved out by the British and Hussein wasnt even from the place he was put in as ruler). Jordan appears at times to act against the interests of the US and Israel but internal memos from the various wars with Israel show that he had been in corespondence with the Israelis at the time and was just trying to save his ass (Jordan was a small country and couldnt win a war against the forces attacking Israel).
Jordan is probably as guilty of genocide against the Palestinians as Israel itself. The Jordanian government has worked behind the scenes with Israel for years since both have an interest in preventing Palestinians from ever gaining real political rights. After all if Palestinians got a country next to Jordan where they could vote, they might demand an end to the monarchy terrorizing their relatives across the river.
Its strange no media (left or mainstream) really dealt with that when the Jordanian embassy in Iraq was attacked and Iraqis seemed to be celebrating in the street in support of the attack. People in the Middle East know Jordan is guilty of genoide against Palestinians but the other dictatorships are afraid of alienating one of their own.
Jordan's guilt in no way makes Israel less guilty of war crimes, but it is a shame that some on the Left have chosen to support Jordan since it seems to oppose Israel; it never has and never will since Abdullah's father, the late King Hussein was put in power by the British and owes everything to them (the country was craved out by the British and Hussein wasnt even from the place he was put in as ruler). Jordan appears at times to act against the interests of the US and Israel but internal memos from the various wars with Israel show that he had been in corespondence with the Israelis at the time and was just trying to save his ass (Jordan was a small country and couldnt win a war against the forces attacking Israel).
Genocide is wrong.
But here's the thing. Palestinians, as a group, in an organized, concerted effort, were trying to take over Jordan, terrorizing as many innocent people there as they could. So Jordan in "black september" killed more palestinians in one month than israel has killed in the last 30 years. Was Jordan wrong to do that? Was that genocide or self defense?
Again, a FACT: The country of Jordan killed more Palestinians in one month than Israel has killed in the last 30 years.
I don't advocate genocide, but how do you handle the palestinians, exactly?
"ASK FOR DEATH!"
The Indoctrination of Palestinian Children
to Seek Death for Allah – Shahada
by Itamar Marcus
Director, Palestinian Media Watch
To view the 20 minute documentary click here:
To read the report with Video links continue here:
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
"Ask for death" is the message that the Palestinian Authority [PA] has been conveying to its children since the start of violence in October 2000. In June 2002, two articulate 11-year-old girls were interviewed in the studio of official Palestinian Authority TV. Among other topics, they spoke of their personal yearning to achieve death through Shahada – Death for Allah – and of a similar desire they said exists in "every Palestinian child." It is striking that their desire for death was expressed as a personal goal, not related to the conflict with Israel. Having been convinced that dying for Allah is preferable to life, their goal in living is not to experience a good life, but to achieve the proper death – Shahada.
The following is a selection from their remarks:
Host: "You described Shahada as something beautiful. Do you think it is beautiful?"
Walla: "Shahada is very, very beautiful. Everyone yearns for Shahada. What could be better than going to paradise?"
Host: "What is better, peace and full rights for the Palestinian people, or Shahada?"
Walla: "Shahada. I will achieve my rights after becoming a Shahida."
Yussra: "Of course Shahada is a good thing. We don’t want this world, we want the Afterlife. We benefit not from this life, but from the Afterlife... The children of Palestine have accepted the concept that this is Shahada, and that death by Shahada is very good. Every Palestinian child aged, say 12, says ’Oh Lord, I would like to become a Shahid.’"
[PATV, June 9, 2002]
To see this video click here:
What has caused this compelling desire for death among these children, a desire that conflicts with the basic survival instinct of every human being?
During the more than two and a half years of armed conflict, the Palestinian Authority [PA] has been making a paramount effort to convince their own children that there is no greater achievement than to die for Allah in battle, known as Shahada. This has been done via the many mediums at its disposal, including children’s TV broadcasting, the educational system, cultural programs, directives from political and religious leaders and even encouragement from within the family.
In November 2000, a mere six weeks after the start of violence, Palestinian Media Watch published a report documenting the first indications that this was a PA goal. The official PA daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, glorified children who were killed in confrontations and described their deaths as personal achievements. It wrote of a 14-year-old: "He responded to the call of Allah and achieved the Shahada he yearned…. He reached the highest levels with Allah…" The paper reported with admiration that the dead boy’s "classmates swore they would continue on the path of Shahada…" [PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, November 9, 2000] Other children were said to have been disappointed at having merely been injured and not killed. An injured 13-year-old: "My goal is not to be injured, rather something loftier: Shahada." [PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, November 8, 2000] Since then, Palestinian Media Watch has published numerous reports on the progress of this PA indoctrination of its children and on the varying methods the PA employs to portray death for Allah to its children, not only as an ideal, but, as something that is expected of them.
The Results of the Indoctrination
In recent months the success of the PA indoctrination efforts are apparent. The 11-year
olds quoted above defining death for Allah as their goal in life and public opinion polls confirm the widespread acceptance of this sentiment. These polls show 80% of Palestinian children seek death as Shahids.
Still more grave are the cases in which 14 year-olds have fulfilled this PA directive, writing farewell letters to their parents proudly describing their desire to be Shahids, and embarking on suicide terrorist missions hoping to die. It must be emphasized: the children’s farewell letters have included phrases identical to phrases from the propaganda films produced by the PA, such as "Mother, don’t cry for me," showing a direct link between the PA propaganda and the children’s drive for heroic death.
THE RESEARCH
This paper documents the PA’s indoctrination of Palestinian children to seek death, and its effects on the children. With the exception of statements made by parents, all the indoctrination cited in this report is directed by the Palestinian Authority.
Part I:
The Indoctrination of Children to Seek Death
a. Short Propaganda Films for Children
b. Schools and Textbooks
c. Culture
d. Political Leadership
e. Parents and the Palestinian Public
f. Religious Leadership
Part II:
Results of the PA Shahada Indoctrination
a. Ages 6-9: Playing Death Games
b. Ages 10-13: Expressing Desire to Die
c. Ages 14-17: Shahada Missions
Part III:
Findings and Conclusions
Part I:
The Indoctrination of Palestinian Children
to Seek Death for Allah – Shahada
A. Propaganda Films for Children
Short propaganda film-clips for children, teaching them to see violence and Shahada – Death for Allah – as ideal values that are expected of them, are broadcast daily on PATV, often for several hours a day. The following are three examples from among hundreds:
The "Farewell Letter"
Film-Clip: "How Sweet is Shahada" for children
The Muhammad Al-Dura Clip: "Follow me" to a Child’s Paradise
1. The "Farewell Letter"
A propaganda film-clip designed to offset a child’s natural fear of death, portrays Shahada as both heroic and tranquil. The film’s hero, a nice looking schoolboy, leaves a farewell letter explaining his choice to achieve Shahada, describing the death he is seeking as pleasurable: "How sweet is Shahada." It was broadcast repeatedly in 2001-02, even three times a day.
The following are selections from the boy’s letter, which are sung accompanying scenes of the boy calmly heading toward his death:
"Do not be sad, my dear,
"And do not cry over my parting,
"Oh my dear father,
"For my country, Shahada…
"How sweet is Shahada
"When I embrace you, Oh my land!…"
"My beloved, my mother,
"My most dear,
"Be joyous over my blood
"And do not cry for me…"
The words "How sweet is Shahada when I embrace you, oh my land!" are sung as the child actor is seen in the above picture falling dead and "embracing" the land.
[PATV, hundreds of times since May 7, 2001. Recently September 27, 2002]
To view click here:
2. The Film-Clip: "I am the Shahid, My Mother"
"I am the Shahid, oh my mother! I have inscribed my name with my blood…
"I have prayed for the land
"And I have responded to the promise
"And if I do not return, don’t cry for me my mother! (3x)
"Sound a cry of joy, sound a cry of joy, my mother!…
"I am the Shahid, oh my mother! I have inscribed my name with my blood!"
[PATV, many times in 2001-2002, beginning May 16, 2001]
3. The Muhammad Al-Dura Clip: "Follow me" to a Child’s Paradise
In a striking film-clip, the most famous child Shahid, Muhammad Al-Dura, whose death in a crossfire was captured by a cameraman and broadcast on television, calls to Palestinian children: "follow me" to paradise. Al-Dura, played in the clip by a child actor, is portrayed in paradise, going to an amusement park, flying a kite and frolicking on the beach. The aim of the soothing words and scenes is to eliminate a child’s natural fear of death: "How sweet is the fragrance of the Shahids… I go with no fear, no tears…"
The film-clip opens with the following invitation from Al-Dura displayed on the full screen:
"I am waving to you not to part, but to say ’follow me’"
[signed] "Muhammad Al-Dura"
The following calming words are from the film-clip:
Narrator: "How sweeis the fragrance of the Shahids,
"How sweet is the scent of the earth,
"Its thirst by the gush of blood
"Flowing from the youthful body."
Vocalist: "Oh father ’til we meet, Oh father, ’til we meet!
"I shall go with no fear, no tears,
"How sweet is the fragrance of the Shahids!
"I shall go to my place in heaven,
"How sweet is the fragrance of the Shahids!"
Choir: "How sweet is the fragrance of the Shahids!"
Vocalist: "Oh father ’til we meet, Oh father, ’til we meet!"
[PATV December 25, 2000, and many times since]
To view click here
B. Schools and Textbooks
The PA Ministry of Education’s textbooks portray Shahada as an ideal. For example, "The Poem of the Shahid" extols yearning for death, and includes the words: "I see my death, but I hasten my steps towards it…" It appears in schoolbooks for grades 5, 6, 7, and 12. The illustration below of a dead child appearing in a textbook published in September 2001, teaches the children to identify a child as the one who is yearning death.
1. "The Shahid" in Four Different Grades’ Curricula
"I shall carry my soul in my palm
And toss it into the abyss of destruction...
And then, either life, gladdening friends,
Or death, enraging the enemies.
By your life! I see my death,
But I hasten my steps towards it...
By your life! This is the death of men
And who asks for a noble death – here it is…"
[Our Arabic Language for 5th grade, p. 60, Our Beautiful Language for 6th grade, section 1, p. 47, Our Beautiful Language for 7th grade, section 1, p. 97, Arabic Language Improvement Guide for 12th grade, p. 84]
2. Textbooks Educate for Shahada
"The Moslem sacrifices himself for his belief, and wages Jihad [Holy War] for Allah. He is not swayed, for he knows that the date of his death has been predetermined and that his death as a Shahid on the field of battle is preferable to death in his bed…"
[Islamic Education, for 8th grade, page 176, by the PA Ministry of Education, based on a Jordanian book, CMIP Report]
3. In School
The following, one example among many from the PA official newspaper, shows a teacher’s supportive attitude toward his student’s seeking Shahada:
"The Shahid Wajdi Al-Hattab [9th grade] responded to the call of Allah and achieved the Shahada he yearned for... He would always say to his friends: ‘When I become a Shahid, give out cake... he attained what he yearned. He reached the highest levels with Allah… [Wajdi’s gym teacher said:] ’Wajdi asked me to give out cake if he becomes a Shahid…’ His classmates swore that they would continue in the path of Shahada…"
[PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 9, 2000]
4. Higher Education: "We do not Love Life!"
Professor Issam Sissalem, Chairman of the History Department in the Islamic University of Gaza and host of an educational program on PA TV: "…Allah rewards those who offer Shahids for the sake of heroism and honor with great compensation. We are not afraid to die, and do not love life.…"
[PATV, Sep. 8, 2002]
C. Culture
Many cultural programs idolize Shahada and the Shahids – those who died for Allah. The regular PA TV programming includes song and dance accompanying scenes of violence and words glorifying willingness to die for Allah. The following are some examples of cultural PA TV broadcasts glorifying Shahda:
1. A Song of Praise to Wafa Idris, the First Woman Suicide Terrorist
A song honoring Wafa Idris, the first woman suicide terrorist, who blew herself up in the center of Jerusalem, was broadcast on PA TV three times in two weeks. The song extols and praises both Idris and her act of suicide terrorism. It calls her a "blossom" and a "heartbeat of pride" and applauds her choice of death: "You chose Shahada, in death you have brought life to our will."
The lyrics:
Vocalist: "My sister, Wafa,
"My sister, Wafa,
"Oh, the heartbeat of pride,
"Oh, blossom who was on the Earth and is now in heaven, (2x)
"My sister, Wafa, My sister, Wafa,
"Oh, the heartbeat of pride,
"Oh, blossom who was on the Earth and is now in heaven, (2x)
"My sister, Wafa…"
Choir: "Allah Akbar! Oh Palestine of the Arabs
"Allah Akbar, Oh Wafa!"
Vocalist: "But you chose Shahada,
"In death you have brought life to our will.
"But you chose Shahada,
"In death you have brought life to our will."
[PATV, May 12, 2002 and others]
To view click here.
2. Dancing and Singing: "I will Even Fall as a Shahid"
This song calls upon children to attack Israel with stones: "You will not be saved, Oh Zionist, from the volcano of my county’s stones." It reiterates the preparedness to die: "I will even willingly fall as a Shahid!," is sung to scenes of children throwing stones and participating in a frenzied "war dance." [See picture]
"Allah Akbar! [Allah is Great]
"Oh, the young ones…
"Shake the earth, raise the stones
"You will not be saved, Oh Zionist,
"From the volcano of my county’s stones. (2x)
"You are the target of my eyes
"I will even willingly fall as a Shahid!
"Allah Akbar! Oh, the young ones."
[PATV, many times in 2002, beginning July 24, 2002 as recent as Oct. 9, 2002]
D. Political Leadership
The Shahada mandate to children comes from the Palestinian political leadership. Arafat presents the actions of children who intentionally died as Shahids as model behavior. 14-year-old Faris Ouda died a week after having been broadcast on TV hurling stones at an Israeli tank. The story of his successfully achieving death was glorified in the PA official press: "On the day of his death Faris Ouda left his home with a slingshot, after having made himself a wreath decorated with photos of himself and having written on it ’The Brave Shahid Faris Ouda’…" He said to his mother: "Don’t worry, mother, Shahada is sweet…"
[PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 30, 2000, Feb. 3, 2001]
Yasser Arafat has singled out Ouda as a role model for children. Addressing an assembly of summer camp children, he praised Ouda’s action, and called the children there "peers of Faris Ouda." Asked in a TV interview what was his message to Palestinian children, he cited Ouda’s suicide act, saying dead Palestinian children Shahids are "the greatest message to the world."
1. Arafat: Displaying Dead Palestinian Children to the World is "The Greatest Message."
Question: "Mr. President, what message would you like to send to the Palestinian people, in general, and, in particular, to the Palestinian children?"
Arafat: "…This child, who is grasping the stone, facing the tank, is it not the greatest message to the world when that hero becomes a Shahid? We are proud of them…"
[PATV Jan. 15, 2002]
2. Yasser Arafat: Palestinian Children are "Peers" of Faris Ouda. The Children: "Millions of Shahid’s Marching to Jerusalem!"
Newscaster: "The president said in his address to these boys and girls [in summer camp] that the [14-year-old] Shahid Faris Ouda and all the Shahids of our people constitute the fundamental and victorious power, Allah willing!"
Arafat to the children: "Oh, children of Palestine! The peers, friends, brothers and sisters of Faris Ouda. The peers of this hero represent this immense and fundamental power that is within, and it shall be victorious, Allah willing!... Onward together to Jerusalem! Onward together to Jerusalem!"The children respond, cheering and chanting: "Millions of Shahids marching to Jerusalem!"
[PATV Aug. 18, 2002]
3. Arafat’s Fatah Organizes Young Girls to Celebrate a Woman Suicide Terrorist.
In a Fatah demonstration, young girls were given posters of the first woman suicide terrorist, Wafa Idris, portraying the terrorist as a hero.
The poster’s text:
"The Fatah Movement... eulogizes with great pride its heroine Shahida... the Shahida Wafa Idris."
[Al-Ayyam, Feb. 1, 2002]
E. Parents and the Palestinian public
In order to present Shahada-seeking as a popular and broad based phenomenon, the Palestinian Authority gives significant media exposure to parents who praise their children’s choice to die, and express gratification and joy with their Shahada. The PA media also highlights praise offered anonymously by the "man on the street" for acts of Shahada. The following are a number of examples.
1. Mother of a Shahid and the Palestinian Public Express Satisfaction with Shahada
:The mother of Ashraf Zwayed: "Praise to Allah... I hold my head high. The honor is mine; the pride is mine. I have a son who is a Shahid. And not only is my son a Shahid, but all the Shahids amy children, Praise Allah.... The honor is mine; the pride is mine."
To view click here
Man on the street #1: "Their death as Shahids is a source of great joy for us. They responded to the call of the country. May Allah’s mercy be upon all of them. They are Shahids, close to Allah, in a position of the highest status."
Man on the street #2: "Praise Allah for giving us the Shahada. We are a people who love the Shahada and love defending our country..." [PATV, September 24, 2002]
2. A Child’s Death – a Mother’s Day Present
The Mother of Abbas Al Awiwi: "The best Mother’s Day present I got this year was the death as a Shahid of Abbas.’ The mother of the Shahid Munib says to the mothers of Shahids on Mother’s Day: ’A blessed day and a blessed Shahada’." [PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, March 21, 2001]
3. A Mother Encourages Her Son to Shahada
"She is interested in nothing, other than to encourage her sons to sacrifice and to die as Shahids for the sake of the land of Palestine."
[Al-Ayyam, November 1, 2000]
4. "Praise Allah, I Gave Birth to Heroes"– Mother of Dead Boys
"After Fatma read this passage [her son’s desire for Shahada] aloud, her expression took on a look of pride and honor at her sons’ sacrifice, and her own sacrifice. Then she said: ’Praise to Allah, I gave birth to heroes’…"
[’Voice of the Women’, Al-Ayyam, February 28, 2002]
5. For the TV camera, a Mother Sends her Son to be Killed
Some of the suicide terror attacks were preceded by a parting ceremony of the terrorist from his mother. One such ceremony was filmed of a 17-year-old terrorist, who later killed 5 Israeli teenagers before he was shot dead. The following are the TV narrator’s description of her hugs and kisses, and an interview after the attack, in which she explains her sending him to his death:
To view click here
Narrator: "In a silence filled with tears, with a mother’s warm longing, his mother embraced him good-bye, planting kisses on his cheeks before the moment of parting. She ordered him not to come back to her except as a Shahid."
The mother [after he was killed]: "I give my son to Jihad for Allah. This is a religious obligation for us. If I were to have compassion for him, or allow him to change his mind it would not be right. I do not want to follow my heart, a mother’s feelings. I mean: I sacrificed him for something greater. Even something like this is connected to motherhood. How? Because I love my son and I want to choose the best for him…"
[Arab News Network TV]
F. Religious leadership
In Islam, religious teaching is not limited to the realm of worship, as social and military activities are considered within Islam’s jurisdiction. Palestinian religious leaders have been a driving force, through their religion classes and their televised sermons, in calling for Palestinians to kill Jews, especially through suicide bombings. They teach that seeking death for Allah as a Shahid is every Moslem’s duty, and direct these messages to children as well. Religious rulings [Fatwas] have also established that children are obligated to participate in these activities. The following are a number of examples:
1. Children are Obligated to Shahada: Ruling of a Senior Religious Leader
Interview with Sheikh Hamed Al-Bitawi, Head of the Council of Sages of Religion of Palestine and Preacher in the Al-Aqsa mosque:
Question: "Is children’s participation in Shahada-Seeking missions permitted?"
Al Bitawi: "The sages say: ’They should go [on Jihad], the men and the women, and even the children’. In the time of the Prophet [Muhammad] it was shown that children, who had not reached maturity, participated in Jihad… We in Palestine have a great love of Jihad and Shahada, and that makes many children compete among themselves in carrying out Jihad and Shahada-seeking missions."
Question: "What is the obligation to be obedient to parents in cases where they insist their child not participate in the confrontations with the enemy?"
Al Bitawi: "…if the enemy conquers a portion of Moslem land, Jihad becomes a personal obligation on every Moslem man and woman… and as the Prophet said: ’One must not obey a creation [the objecting parent] and disobey the Creator [Who demands Jihad].’
The principle is that this son and others like him will take part in Jihad against the enemy."
[http://www.islamonline.net, September 28, 2002]
2. "The Moslem was Created to Die for Allah"
"The believer was created to know his Lord and to uphold Islam… to be a Shahid, or intend to be a Shahid. If the Moslem does not yearn Shahada, he will die as in the Jahiliya [pre-Islam faith]. We must yearn Shahada and request it from Allah. If we truthfully request it of Allah, He will grant us its rewards even if we die in bed… [Allah] has planted within our youth the love of Jihad, the love of Shahada. Our youth have turned into bombs, they blow themselves up among them [Israelis] day and night."
[Sheikh Ahmed Abdul Razek, PATV March 22, 2002]
3. Religious Leader: Fathers Should Send Sons on Suicide Terror Attacks
"Shame upon he who does not educate his children the education of Jihad…blessings upon he who dons a vest of explosives on himself or on his children and goes in to the midst of the Jews and says: Allah Akbar [Allah is Great]..."
[Dr. Muhammad Ibrahim Madi, Friday sermon, PA television, June 8, 2001]
4. Preaching Suicide Terror Attacks to 14-Year-Olds
"I was uplifted when a youth said: ’Oh, Sheikh, I am 14 years old. I have 4 more years and then I will blow myself up among Allah’s enemies, I will blow myself up among the Jews.’ I said to him, ’Oh young child, may Allah let you merit Shahada and let me merit Shahada...‘ All the weapons must be aimed at the Jews, Allah’s enemies, the cursed nation in the Koran, whom Allah describes as monkeys and pigs, worshippers of the calf and idol worshippers… Nothing will deter them except the color of blood in their filthy nation… unless we blow ourselves up, willingly and as our duty, in their midst…’ May Allah make the Moslem rule over the Jew. We will blow them up in Hadera, we will blow them up in Tel-Aviv and in Netanya so that Allah will make us masters over this riff-raff. We will fight against them and rule over them until the Jew will hide behind the trees and stones and the tree and stone will say: ’Moslem! Servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, kill him.’ We shall enter Jerusalem as conquerors, and Jaffa as conquerors, and Haifa as conquerors and Ashkelon as conquerors.… Blessings upon he who educates his sons in the path of Jihad and Shahada!"
[Dr. Muhammad Ibrahim Madi, Friday sermon, PATV, August 3, 2001]
To view click here.
Part II:
Results of the Shahada Indoctrination
Palestinian polls show that 72% - 80% of Palestinian children desire death as Shahids. In games and in conversation, the yearning to die for Allah is an integral component of the Palestinian child’s worldview. Children are already acting on the indoctrination – a 17-year old girl has blown herself up in a terrorist attack in a Jerusalem supermarket. 14-year-old children have written "farewell letters" to their parents, incorporating expressions from PA propaganda film-clips. In the letters they took pride in their eagerness to die as Shahids and then set out on attacks in which they did, in fact, die. Following are some examples, listed by age groups.
Ages 6-9:
Playing Death Games
Palestinian children have embraced honoring Shahada from an early age, as expressed in the "Shahid Game," in which children act out a Shahid’s funeral. An interesting note on this game: the children argue who will have the honor of playing the dead child. "I am younger than you. I should be the one to die!" is the 6-year-old’s assertion. Even at this young age, they have already internalized the message that thonorable role is the Shahid.
The "Shahid Game" as described in the PA media:
"Nada, a seven year old girl, says to her friends: ’Let’s play the Shahid Game!’ The children fetch an old sheet that they spread on the ground, and then they argue who will play the Shahid. Fa’iz, 6 years old, says: ’You were the Shahid yesterday, today it’s my turn! I’m younger than you. I will be the one to die!’
"Then he lies down on the sheet. Nada, playing the role of ’mother of the Shahid’ cries and yells as the rest of the children lift Fa’iz up, wrapped in his ’shrouds’. The children walk, chanting ’Allah Akbar! Make way for the Shahid!’ As they brandish plastic toy Kalatchnikov [AK-47] rifles…"
[PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Dec. 26, 2001]
Children Play the Shahid Game
Ages 10-13:
Expressing the Wish to Die
1. 11 Year-Olds: Shahada is Preferable to Peace
In July 2002, two articulate 11-year-old girls were interviewed in the studio of official Palestinian Authority TV. Among other topics, they spoke of their personal yearning to achieve death through Shahada – Death for Allah – and of a similar desire they said exists in "every Palestinian child." It is striking that their desire for death was expressed as a personal goal, not related to the conflict with Israel, having been convinced that dying for Allah is preferable to life. Their goal in living is not to experience a good life, but to achieve the proper death – Shahada.
The following are portions from the TV discussion:
Host: "You described Shahada as something beautiful. Do you think it is beautiful?"
Walla: "Shahada is very, very beautiful. Everyone yearns for Shahada. What could be better than going to Paradise?"
Host: "What is better, peace and full rights for the Palestinian people, or Shahada?"
Walla: "Shahada. I will achieve my rights after becoming a Shahida. We won’t stay children forever."
Host: "OK. Yussra, would you agree with that?"
Yussra: "Of course Shahada is a good thing. We don’t want this world, we want the Afterlife. We benefit not from this life, but from the Afterlife. And so all young Palestinians are not like other youth, they are hot tempered. Of course they prefer Shahada; since they are Palestinian."
Host: "I want to ask you, do you actually love death?"
Yussra: "There’s a difference between death and Shahada."
Host: "No, I mean the absence that is in death, the physical absence. Do you love death?"
Yussra: "No child loves death. The children of Palestine have accepted the concept that this is Shahada, and that death by Shahada is very good. Every Palestinian child aged, say 12, says ’Oh Lord, I would like to become a Shahid."[’Letter of the People’, PA TV, June 9, 2002]
2. Public Opinion Polls
"72% of the children sampled from all the districts of Gaza expressed the hope of becoming Shahids in the confrontations..."
[’Sout Al-Nissa’-Voice of the Women, Al-Ayyam, January. 24, 2002]
"…79-80% of the children expressed willingness to be Shahids."
[PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 18, 2002]
3. Children’s Poetry
"I swear to you by all that I hold dear that I will purify your land… For your land we will die, we shall advance to Shahada in groups!"
[10th grade boy reads a poem, PATV, August 23, 2002]
4. Three Girls go to Seek Shahada
"The residents of the village Yassid…found the 3 girls who had disappeared two days ago, following a full day of extensive, strenuous searching. Yassid residents said that the three girls, aged 10,11 and 12, packed clothes, food and some money, and left eastward, looking for the way to Jerusalem, in order to achieve Shahada there. The girls got as far as a PA checkpoint, and there the officer on duty convinced them to go back. The children said they had wanted to get weapons and to go to Jerusalem in order to achieve Shahada there, and that the Israeli Army checkpoint would not have prevented them from their aspiration to achieve Shahada."
Ages 14-17:
Embarking on Suicide Attacks
The PA indoctrination has already led to the death of Palestinian children. Young chlidren have written "farewell letters" to their parents in which they express pride in their desire to die, and have set out on suicide terrorist attacks. These children’s farewell letters included phrases identical to "farewell" phrases from the propaganda films produced by the PA: "Mother, don’t cry for me," indicating a direct link between the PA propaganda and the children’s desire for heroic death.
In addition, a 17-year-old girl blew herself up in a suicide terrorist attack in Jerusalem.
Following are the stories from the press:
1. Leaving Farewell Letters: "Do Not Cry for Me"
Three 14-year old boys set out to attack an Israeli village, hoping to be killed. They left farewell letters which included phrases from the TV clip "Farewell Letter" which was broadcast hundreds of times on PA TV: "The child Yussouf Zaakut wrote: ’…Don’t cry for me. Bury me with my brothers and with the Shahids…’"
[The New York Times, April 25, 2002]
2. Brothers Leave Farewell Letters: "Don’t Cry for Me, My Mother"
Two brothers who took part in the confrontations left farewell letters to their parents expressing their hope of being killed:
"He wrote phrases of love of the counrty and love of Al-Aqsa and becoming a Shahid, for liberty and independence. He referred to himself as a Shahid. On one of his notebooks he wrote: ’The hero Shahid, Yasser Sami Al-Koussba died as a Shahid on the land of Palestine…’"
"Sammer wrote the following phrase on one of his notebooks, a few days before he became a Shahid: ’Mother! Don’t cry over me if I am killed. Death does not scare me, my aspiration is to be a Shahid’"
[’Sout Al-Nissa-Voice of the Women’, Al-Ayyam, Feb. 28, 2002]
3. 17-year-old Girl commits Suicide Terrorist Bombing in Jerusalem
Ayyat Al Achris, wearing a belt of explosives, walked into a supermarket in Jerusalem’s Kiryat Yovel neighborhood, on March 29, 2002. She was 17 years old. The security guard at the door, suspecting she was a terrorist, pushed her outside, and she detonated her explosives, killing the security guard and a 17-year-old Israeli girl.
Part III:
Findings and Conclusions
The Palestinian Authority has created a violent, death seeking reality for their young children, having taught them to see death for Allah – Shahada – as an ideal, which they are expected to achieve. As Arafat said in his message to children: "Is it not the greatest message to the world when that hero becomes a Shahid?"
The examples presented in this report are a representative selection, demonstrating the comprehensive campaign waged by the Palestinian Authority. If just 1% of the children attempt to fulfill their "duty" and seek Shahada through suicide terrorism, the ramifications will be cataclysmic. The targets of the future Palestinian terror wave will be Israel, and in all likelihood, other Western democracies, as well.
Today an entire generation of Palestinian children, victims of the PA’s indoctrination and propaganda, believe that their death for Allah in war is the highest achievement attainable in life. This education is an indelible stain on Palestinian society, and places the Palestinian Authority among the greatest child abusers in history.
http://www.pmw.org.il/new/ASK%20FOR%20DEATH.htm
But here's the thing. Palestinians, as a group, in an organized, concerted effort, were trying to take over Jordan, terrorizing as many innocent people there as they could. So Jordan in "black september" killed more palestinians in one month than israel has killed in the last 30 years. Was Jordan wrong to do that? Was that genocide or self defense?
Again, a FACT: The country of Jordan killed more Palestinians in one month than Israel has killed in the last 30 years.
I don't advocate genocide, but how do you handle the palestinians, exactly?
"ASK FOR DEATH!"
The Indoctrination of Palestinian Children
to Seek Death for Allah – Shahada
by Itamar Marcus
Director, Palestinian Media Watch
To view the 20 minute documentary click here:
To read the report with Video links continue here:
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
"Ask for death" is the message that the Palestinian Authority [PA] has been conveying to its children since the start of violence in October 2000. In June 2002, two articulate 11-year-old girls were interviewed in the studio of official Palestinian Authority TV. Among other topics, they spoke of their personal yearning to achieve death through Shahada – Death for Allah – and of a similar desire they said exists in "every Palestinian child." It is striking that their desire for death was expressed as a personal goal, not related to the conflict with Israel. Having been convinced that dying for Allah is preferable to life, their goal in living is not to experience a good life, but to achieve the proper death – Shahada.
The following is a selection from their remarks:
Host: "You described Shahada as something beautiful. Do you think it is beautiful?"
Walla: "Shahada is very, very beautiful. Everyone yearns for Shahada. What could be better than going to paradise?"
Host: "What is better, peace and full rights for the Palestinian people, or Shahada?"
Walla: "Shahada. I will achieve my rights after becoming a Shahida."
Yussra: "Of course Shahada is a good thing. We don’t want this world, we want the Afterlife. We benefit not from this life, but from the Afterlife... The children of Palestine have accepted the concept that this is Shahada, and that death by Shahada is very good. Every Palestinian child aged, say 12, says ’Oh Lord, I would like to become a Shahid.’"
[PATV, June 9, 2002]
To see this video click here:
What has caused this compelling desire for death among these children, a desire that conflicts with the basic survival instinct of every human being?
During the more than two and a half years of armed conflict, the Palestinian Authority [PA] has been making a paramount effort to convince their own children that there is no greater achievement than to die for Allah in battle, known as Shahada. This has been done via the many mediums at its disposal, including children’s TV broadcasting, the educational system, cultural programs, directives from political and religious leaders and even encouragement from within the family.
In November 2000, a mere six weeks after the start of violence, Palestinian Media Watch published a report documenting the first indications that this was a PA goal. The official PA daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, glorified children who were killed in confrontations and described their deaths as personal achievements. It wrote of a 14-year-old: "He responded to the call of Allah and achieved the Shahada he yearned…. He reached the highest levels with Allah…" The paper reported with admiration that the dead boy’s "classmates swore they would continue on the path of Shahada…" [PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, November 9, 2000] Other children were said to have been disappointed at having merely been injured and not killed. An injured 13-year-old: "My goal is not to be injured, rather something loftier: Shahada." [PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, November 8, 2000] Since then, Palestinian Media Watch has published numerous reports on the progress of this PA indoctrination of its children and on the varying methods the PA employs to portray death for Allah to its children, not only as an ideal, but, as something that is expected of them.
The Results of the Indoctrination
In recent months the success of the PA indoctrination efforts are apparent. The 11-year
olds quoted above defining death for Allah as their goal in life and public opinion polls confirm the widespread acceptance of this sentiment. These polls show 80% of Palestinian children seek death as Shahids.
Still more grave are the cases in which 14 year-olds have fulfilled this PA directive, writing farewell letters to their parents proudly describing their desire to be Shahids, and embarking on suicide terrorist missions hoping to die. It must be emphasized: the children’s farewell letters have included phrases identical to phrases from the propaganda films produced by the PA, such as "Mother, don’t cry for me," showing a direct link between the PA propaganda and the children’s drive for heroic death.
THE RESEARCH
This paper documents the PA’s indoctrination of Palestinian children to seek death, and its effects on the children. With the exception of statements made by parents, all the indoctrination cited in this report is directed by the Palestinian Authority.
Part I:
The Indoctrination of Children to Seek Death
a. Short Propaganda Films for Children
b. Schools and Textbooks
c. Culture
d. Political Leadership
e. Parents and the Palestinian Public
f. Religious Leadership
Part II:
Results of the PA Shahada Indoctrination
a. Ages 6-9: Playing Death Games
b. Ages 10-13: Expressing Desire to Die
c. Ages 14-17: Shahada Missions
Part III:
Findings and Conclusions
Part I:
The Indoctrination of Palestinian Children
to Seek Death for Allah – Shahada
A. Propaganda Films for Children
Short propaganda film-clips for children, teaching them to see violence and Shahada – Death for Allah – as ideal values that are expected of them, are broadcast daily on PATV, often for several hours a day. The following are three examples from among hundreds:
The "Farewell Letter"
Film-Clip: "How Sweet is Shahada" for children
The Muhammad Al-Dura Clip: "Follow me" to a Child’s Paradise
1. The "Farewell Letter"
A propaganda film-clip designed to offset a child’s natural fear of death, portrays Shahada as both heroic and tranquil. The film’s hero, a nice looking schoolboy, leaves a farewell letter explaining his choice to achieve Shahada, describing the death he is seeking as pleasurable: "How sweet is Shahada." It was broadcast repeatedly in 2001-02, even three times a day.
The following are selections from the boy’s letter, which are sung accompanying scenes of the boy calmly heading toward his death:
"Do not be sad, my dear,
"And do not cry over my parting,
"Oh my dear father,
"For my country, Shahada…
"How sweet is Shahada
"When I embrace you, Oh my land!…"
"My beloved, my mother,
"My most dear,
"Be joyous over my blood
"And do not cry for me…"
The words "How sweet is Shahada when I embrace you, oh my land!" are sung as the child actor is seen in the above picture falling dead and "embracing" the land.
[PATV, hundreds of times since May 7, 2001. Recently September 27, 2002]
To view click here:
2. The Film-Clip: "I am the Shahid, My Mother"
"I am the Shahid, oh my mother! I have inscribed my name with my blood…
"I have prayed for the land
"And I have responded to the promise
"And if I do not return, don’t cry for me my mother! (3x)
"Sound a cry of joy, sound a cry of joy, my mother!…
"I am the Shahid, oh my mother! I have inscribed my name with my blood!"
[PATV, many times in 2001-2002, beginning May 16, 2001]
3. The Muhammad Al-Dura Clip: "Follow me" to a Child’s Paradise
In a striking film-clip, the most famous child Shahid, Muhammad Al-Dura, whose death in a crossfire was captured by a cameraman and broadcast on television, calls to Palestinian children: "follow me" to paradise. Al-Dura, played in the clip by a child actor, is portrayed in paradise, going to an amusement park, flying a kite and frolicking on the beach. The aim of the soothing words and scenes is to eliminate a child’s natural fear of death: "How sweet is the fragrance of the Shahids… I go with no fear, no tears…"
The film-clip opens with the following invitation from Al-Dura displayed on the full screen:
"I am waving to you not to part, but to say ’follow me’"
[signed] "Muhammad Al-Dura"
The following calming words are from the film-clip:
Narrator: "How sweeis the fragrance of the Shahids,
"How sweet is the scent of the earth,
"Its thirst by the gush of blood
"Flowing from the youthful body."
Vocalist: "Oh father ’til we meet, Oh father, ’til we meet!
"I shall go with no fear, no tears,
"How sweet is the fragrance of the Shahids!
"I shall go to my place in heaven,
"How sweet is the fragrance of the Shahids!"
Choir: "How sweet is the fragrance of the Shahids!"
Vocalist: "Oh father ’til we meet, Oh father, ’til we meet!"
[PATV December 25, 2000, and many times since]
To view click here
B. Schools and Textbooks
The PA Ministry of Education’s textbooks portray Shahada as an ideal. For example, "The Poem of the Shahid" extols yearning for death, and includes the words: "I see my death, but I hasten my steps towards it…" It appears in schoolbooks for grades 5, 6, 7, and 12. The illustration below of a dead child appearing in a textbook published in September 2001, teaches the children to identify a child as the one who is yearning death.
1. "The Shahid" in Four Different Grades’ Curricula
"I shall carry my soul in my palm
And toss it into the abyss of destruction...
And then, either life, gladdening friends,
Or death, enraging the enemies.
By your life! I see my death,
But I hasten my steps towards it...
By your life! This is the death of men
And who asks for a noble death – here it is…"
[Our Arabic Language for 5th grade, p. 60, Our Beautiful Language for 6th grade, section 1, p. 47, Our Beautiful Language for 7th grade, section 1, p. 97, Arabic Language Improvement Guide for 12th grade, p. 84]
2. Textbooks Educate for Shahada
"The Moslem sacrifices himself for his belief, and wages Jihad [Holy War] for Allah. He is not swayed, for he knows that the date of his death has been predetermined and that his death as a Shahid on the field of battle is preferable to death in his bed…"
[Islamic Education, for 8th grade, page 176, by the PA Ministry of Education, based on a Jordanian book, CMIP Report]
3. In School
The following, one example among many from the PA official newspaper, shows a teacher’s supportive attitude toward his student’s seeking Shahada:
"The Shahid Wajdi Al-Hattab [9th grade] responded to the call of Allah and achieved the Shahada he yearned for... He would always say to his friends: ‘When I become a Shahid, give out cake... he attained what he yearned. He reached the highest levels with Allah… [Wajdi’s gym teacher said:] ’Wajdi asked me to give out cake if he becomes a Shahid…’ His classmates swore that they would continue in the path of Shahada…"
[PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 9, 2000]
4. Higher Education: "We do not Love Life!"
Professor Issam Sissalem, Chairman of the History Department in the Islamic University of Gaza and host of an educational program on PA TV: "…Allah rewards those who offer Shahids for the sake of heroism and honor with great compensation. We are not afraid to die, and do not love life.…"
[PATV, Sep. 8, 2002]
C. Culture
Many cultural programs idolize Shahada and the Shahids – those who died for Allah. The regular PA TV programming includes song and dance accompanying scenes of violence and words glorifying willingness to die for Allah. The following are some examples of cultural PA TV broadcasts glorifying Shahda:
1. A Song of Praise to Wafa Idris, the First Woman Suicide Terrorist
A song honoring Wafa Idris, the first woman suicide terrorist, who blew herself up in the center of Jerusalem, was broadcast on PA TV three times in two weeks. The song extols and praises both Idris and her act of suicide terrorism. It calls her a "blossom" and a "heartbeat of pride" and applauds her choice of death: "You chose Shahada, in death you have brought life to our will."
The lyrics:
Vocalist: "My sister, Wafa,
"My sister, Wafa,
"Oh, the heartbeat of pride,
"Oh, blossom who was on the Earth and is now in heaven, (2x)
"My sister, Wafa, My sister, Wafa,
"Oh, the heartbeat of pride,
"Oh, blossom who was on the Earth and is now in heaven, (2x)
"My sister, Wafa…"
Choir: "Allah Akbar! Oh Palestine of the Arabs
"Allah Akbar, Oh Wafa!"
Vocalist: "But you chose Shahada,
"In death you have brought life to our will.
"But you chose Shahada,
"In death you have brought life to our will."
[PATV, May 12, 2002 and others]
To view click here.
2. Dancing and Singing: "I will Even Fall as a Shahid"
This song calls upon children to attack Israel with stones: "You will not be saved, Oh Zionist, from the volcano of my county’s stones." It reiterates the preparedness to die: "I will even willingly fall as a Shahid!," is sung to scenes of children throwing stones and participating in a frenzied "war dance." [See picture]
"Allah Akbar! [Allah is Great]
"Oh, the young ones…
"Shake the earth, raise the stones
"You will not be saved, Oh Zionist,
"From the volcano of my county’s stones. (2x)
"You are the target of my eyes
"I will even willingly fall as a Shahid!
"Allah Akbar! Oh, the young ones."
[PATV, many times in 2002, beginning July 24, 2002 as recent as Oct. 9, 2002]
D. Political Leadership
The Shahada mandate to children comes from the Palestinian political leadership. Arafat presents the actions of children who intentionally died as Shahids as model behavior. 14-year-old Faris Ouda died a week after having been broadcast on TV hurling stones at an Israeli tank. The story of his successfully achieving death was glorified in the PA official press: "On the day of his death Faris Ouda left his home with a slingshot, after having made himself a wreath decorated with photos of himself and having written on it ’The Brave Shahid Faris Ouda’…" He said to his mother: "Don’t worry, mother, Shahada is sweet…"
[PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 30, 2000, Feb. 3, 2001]
Yasser Arafat has singled out Ouda as a role model for children. Addressing an assembly of summer camp children, he praised Ouda’s action, and called the children there "peers of Faris Ouda." Asked in a TV interview what was his message to Palestinian children, he cited Ouda’s suicide act, saying dead Palestinian children Shahids are "the greatest message to the world."
1. Arafat: Displaying Dead Palestinian Children to the World is "The Greatest Message."
Question: "Mr. President, what message would you like to send to the Palestinian people, in general, and, in particular, to the Palestinian children?"
Arafat: "…This child, who is grasping the stone, facing the tank, is it not the greatest message to the world when that hero becomes a Shahid? We are proud of them…"
[PATV Jan. 15, 2002]
2. Yasser Arafat: Palestinian Children are "Peers" of Faris Ouda. The Children: "Millions of Shahid’s Marching to Jerusalem!"
Newscaster: "The president said in his address to these boys and girls [in summer camp] that the [14-year-old] Shahid Faris Ouda and all the Shahids of our people constitute the fundamental and victorious power, Allah willing!"
Arafat to the children: "Oh, children of Palestine! The peers, friends, brothers and sisters of Faris Ouda. The peers of this hero represent this immense and fundamental power that is within, and it shall be victorious, Allah willing!... Onward together to Jerusalem! Onward together to Jerusalem!"The children respond, cheering and chanting: "Millions of Shahids marching to Jerusalem!"
[PATV Aug. 18, 2002]
3. Arafat’s Fatah Organizes Young Girls to Celebrate a Woman Suicide Terrorist.
In a Fatah demonstration, young girls were given posters of the first woman suicide terrorist, Wafa Idris, portraying the terrorist as a hero.
The poster’s text:
"The Fatah Movement... eulogizes with great pride its heroine Shahida... the Shahida Wafa Idris."
[Al-Ayyam, Feb. 1, 2002]
E. Parents and the Palestinian public
In order to present Shahada-seeking as a popular and broad based phenomenon, the Palestinian Authority gives significant media exposure to parents who praise their children’s choice to die, and express gratification and joy with their Shahada. The PA media also highlights praise offered anonymously by the "man on the street" for acts of Shahada. The following are a number of examples.
1. Mother of a Shahid and the Palestinian Public Express Satisfaction with Shahada
:The mother of Ashraf Zwayed: "Praise to Allah... I hold my head high. The honor is mine; the pride is mine. I have a son who is a Shahid. And not only is my son a Shahid, but all the Shahids amy children, Praise Allah.... The honor is mine; the pride is mine."
To view click here
Man on the street #1: "Their death as Shahids is a source of great joy for us. They responded to the call of the country. May Allah’s mercy be upon all of them. They are Shahids, close to Allah, in a position of the highest status."
Man on the street #2: "Praise Allah for giving us the Shahada. We are a people who love the Shahada and love defending our country..." [PATV, September 24, 2002]
2. A Child’s Death – a Mother’s Day Present
The Mother of Abbas Al Awiwi: "The best Mother’s Day present I got this year was the death as a Shahid of Abbas.’ The mother of the Shahid Munib says to the mothers of Shahids on Mother’s Day: ’A blessed day and a blessed Shahada’." [PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, March 21, 2001]
3. A Mother Encourages Her Son to Shahada
"She is interested in nothing, other than to encourage her sons to sacrifice and to die as Shahids for the sake of the land of Palestine."
[Al-Ayyam, November 1, 2000]
4. "Praise Allah, I Gave Birth to Heroes"– Mother of Dead Boys
"After Fatma read this passage [her son’s desire for Shahada] aloud, her expression took on a look of pride and honor at her sons’ sacrifice, and her own sacrifice. Then she said: ’Praise to Allah, I gave birth to heroes’…"
[’Voice of the Women’, Al-Ayyam, February 28, 2002]
5. For the TV camera, a Mother Sends her Son to be Killed
Some of the suicide terror attacks were preceded by a parting ceremony of the terrorist from his mother. One such ceremony was filmed of a 17-year-old terrorist, who later killed 5 Israeli teenagers before he was shot dead. The following are the TV narrator’s description of her hugs and kisses, and an interview after the attack, in which she explains her sending him to his death:
To view click here
Narrator: "In a silence filled with tears, with a mother’s warm longing, his mother embraced him good-bye, planting kisses on his cheeks before the moment of parting. She ordered him not to come back to her except as a Shahid."
The mother [after he was killed]: "I give my son to Jihad for Allah. This is a religious obligation for us. If I were to have compassion for him, or allow him to change his mind it would not be right. I do not want to follow my heart, a mother’s feelings. I mean: I sacrificed him for something greater. Even something like this is connected to motherhood. How? Because I love my son and I want to choose the best for him…"
[Arab News Network TV]
F. Religious leadership
In Islam, religious teaching is not limited to the realm of worship, as social and military activities are considered within Islam’s jurisdiction. Palestinian religious leaders have been a driving force, through their religion classes and their televised sermons, in calling for Palestinians to kill Jews, especially through suicide bombings. They teach that seeking death for Allah as a Shahid is every Moslem’s duty, and direct these messages to children as well. Religious rulings [Fatwas] have also established that children are obligated to participate in these activities. The following are a number of examples:
1. Children are Obligated to Shahada: Ruling of a Senior Religious Leader
Interview with Sheikh Hamed Al-Bitawi, Head of the Council of Sages of Religion of Palestine and Preacher in the Al-Aqsa mosque:
Question: "Is children’s participation in Shahada-Seeking missions permitted?"
Al Bitawi: "The sages say: ’They should go [on Jihad], the men and the women, and even the children’. In the time of the Prophet [Muhammad] it was shown that children, who had not reached maturity, participated in Jihad… We in Palestine have a great love of Jihad and Shahada, and that makes many children compete among themselves in carrying out Jihad and Shahada-seeking missions."
Question: "What is the obligation to be obedient to parents in cases where they insist their child not participate in the confrontations with the enemy?"
Al Bitawi: "…if the enemy conquers a portion of Moslem land, Jihad becomes a personal obligation on every Moslem man and woman… and as the Prophet said: ’One must not obey a creation [the objecting parent] and disobey the Creator [Who demands Jihad].’
The principle is that this son and others like him will take part in Jihad against the enemy."
[http://www.islamonline.net, September 28, 2002]
2. "The Moslem was Created to Die for Allah"
"The believer was created to know his Lord and to uphold Islam… to be a Shahid, or intend to be a Shahid. If the Moslem does not yearn Shahada, he will die as in the Jahiliya [pre-Islam faith]. We must yearn Shahada and request it from Allah. If we truthfully request it of Allah, He will grant us its rewards even if we die in bed… [Allah] has planted within our youth the love of Jihad, the love of Shahada. Our youth have turned into bombs, they blow themselves up among them [Israelis] day and night."
[Sheikh Ahmed Abdul Razek, PATV March 22, 2002]
3. Religious Leader: Fathers Should Send Sons on Suicide Terror Attacks
"Shame upon he who does not educate his children the education of Jihad…blessings upon he who dons a vest of explosives on himself or on his children and goes in to the midst of the Jews and says: Allah Akbar [Allah is Great]..."
[Dr. Muhammad Ibrahim Madi, Friday sermon, PA television, June 8, 2001]
4. Preaching Suicide Terror Attacks to 14-Year-Olds
"I was uplifted when a youth said: ’Oh, Sheikh, I am 14 years old. I have 4 more years and then I will blow myself up among Allah’s enemies, I will blow myself up among the Jews.’ I said to him, ’Oh young child, may Allah let you merit Shahada and let me merit Shahada...‘ All the weapons must be aimed at the Jews, Allah’s enemies, the cursed nation in the Koran, whom Allah describes as monkeys and pigs, worshippers of the calf and idol worshippers… Nothing will deter them except the color of blood in their filthy nation… unless we blow ourselves up, willingly and as our duty, in their midst…’ May Allah make the Moslem rule over the Jew. We will blow them up in Hadera, we will blow them up in Tel-Aviv and in Netanya so that Allah will make us masters over this riff-raff. We will fight against them and rule over them until the Jew will hide behind the trees and stones and the tree and stone will say: ’Moslem! Servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, kill him.’ We shall enter Jerusalem as conquerors, and Jaffa as conquerors, and Haifa as conquerors and Ashkelon as conquerors.… Blessings upon he who educates his sons in the path of Jihad and Shahada!"
[Dr. Muhammad Ibrahim Madi, Friday sermon, PATV, August 3, 2001]
To view click here.
Part II:
Results of the Shahada Indoctrination
Palestinian polls show that 72% - 80% of Palestinian children desire death as Shahids. In games and in conversation, the yearning to die for Allah is an integral component of the Palestinian child’s worldview. Children are already acting on the indoctrination – a 17-year old girl has blown herself up in a terrorist attack in a Jerusalem supermarket. 14-year-old children have written "farewell letters" to their parents, incorporating expressions from PA propaganda film-clips. In the letters they took pride in their eagerness to die as Shahids and then set out on attacks in which they did, in fact, die. Following are some examples, listed by age groups.
Ages 6-9:
Playing Death Games
Palestinian children have embraced honoring Shahada from an early age, as expressed in the "Shahid Game," in which children act out a Shahid’s funeral. An interesting note on this game: the children argue who will have the honor of playing the dead child. "I am younger than you. I should be the one to die!" is the 6-year-old’s assertion. Even at this young age, they have already internalized the message that thonorable role is the Shahid.
The "Shahid Game" as described in the PA media:
"Nada, a seven year old girl, says to her friends: ’Let’s play the Shahid Game!’ The children fetch an old sheet that they spread on the ground, and then they argue who will play the Shahid. Fa’iz, 6 years old, says: ’You were the Shahid yesterday, today it’s my turn! I’m younger than you. I will be the one to die!’
"Then he lies down on the sheet. Nada, playing the role of ’mother of the Shahid’ cries and yells as the rest of the children lift Fa’iz up, wrapped in his ’shrouds’. The children walk, chanting ’Allah Akbar! Make way for the Shahid!’ As they brandish plastic toy Kalatchnikov [AK-47] rifles…"
[PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Dec. 26, 2001]
Children Play the Shahid Game
Ages 10-13:
Expressing the Wish to Die
1. 11 Year-Olds: Shahada is Preferable to Peace
In July 2002, two articulate 11-year-old girls were interviewed in the studio of official Palestinian Authority TV. Among other topics, they spoke of their personal yearning to achieve death through Shahada – Death for Allah – and of a similar desire they said exists in "every Palestinian child." It is striking that their desire for death was expressed as a personal goal, not related to the conflict with Israel, having been convinced that dying for Allah is preferable to life. Their goal in living is not to experience a good life, but to achieve the proper death – Shahada.
The following are portions from the TV discussion:
Host: "You described Shahada as something beautiful. Do you think it is beautiful?"
Walla: "Shahada is very, very beautiful. Everyone yearns for Shahada. What could be better than going to Paradise?"
Host: "What is better, peace and full rights for the Palestinian people, or Shahada?"
Walla: "Shahada. I will achieve my rights after becoming a Shahida. We won’t stay children forever."
Host: "OK. Yussra, would you agree with that?"
Yussra: "Of course Shahada is a good thing. We don’t want this world, we want the Afterlife. We benefit not from this life, but from the Afterlife. And so all young Palestinians are not like other youth, they are hot tempered. Of course they prefer Shahada; since they are Palestinian."
Host: "I want to ask you, do you actually love death?"
Yussra: "There’s a difference between death and Shahada."
Host: "No, I mean the absence that is in death, the physical absence. Do you love death?"
Yussra: "No child loves death. The children of Palestine have accepted the concept that this is Shahada, and that death by Shahada is very good. Every Palestinian child aged, say 12, says ’Oh Lord, I would like to become a Shahid."[’Letter of the People’, PA TV, June 9, 2002]
2. Public Opinion Polls
"72% of the children sampled from all the districts of Gaza expressed the hope of becoming Shahids in the confrontations..."
[’Sout Al-Nissa’-Voice of the Women, Al-Ayyam, January. 24, 2002]
"…79-80% of the children expressed willingness to be Shahids."
[PA official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 18, 2002]
3. Children’s Poetry
"I swear to you by all that I hold dear that I will purify your land… For your land we will die, we shall advance to Shahada in groups!"
[10th grade boy reads a poem, PATV, August 23, 2002]
4. Three Girls go to Seek Shahada
"The residents of the village Yassid…found the 3 girls who had disappeared two days ago, following a full day of extensive, strenuous searching. Yassid residents said that the three girls, aged 10,11 and 12, packed clothes, food and some money, and left eastward, looking for the way to Jerusalem, in order to achieve Shahada there. The girls got as far as a PA checkpoint, and there the officer on duty convinced them to go back. The children said they had wanted to get weapons and to go to Jerusalem in order to achieve Shahada there, and that the Israeli Army checkpoint would not have prevented them from their aspiration to achieve Shahada."
Ages 14-17:
Embarking on Suicide Attacks
The PA indoctrination has already led to the death of Palestinian children. Young chlidren have written "farewell letters" to their parents in which they express pride in their desire to die, and have set out on suicide terrorist attacks. These children’s farewell letters included phrases identical to "farewell" phrases from the propaganda films produced by the PA: "Mother, don’t cry for me," indicating a direct link between the PA propaganda and the children’s desire for heroic death.
In addition, a 17-year-old girl blew herself up in a suicide terrorist attack in Jerusalem.
Following are the stories from the press:
1. Leaving Farewell Letters: "Do Not Cry for Me"
Three 14-year old boys set out to attack an Israeli village, hoping to be killed. They left farewell letters which included phrases from the TV clip "Farewell Letter" which was broadcast hundreds of times on PA TV: "The child Yussouf Zaakut wrote: ’…Don’t cry for me. Bury me with my brothers and with the Shahids…’"
[The New York Times, April 25, 2002]
2. Brothers Leave Farewell Letters: "Don’t Cry for Me, My Mother"
Two brothers who took part in the confrontations left farewell letters to their parents expressing their hope of being killed:
"He wrote phrases of love of the counrty and love of Al-Aqsa and becoming a Shahid, for liberty and independence. He referred to himself as a Shahid. On one of his notebooks he wrote: ’The hero Shahid, Yasser Sami Al-Koussba died as a Shahid on the land of Palestine…’"
"Sammer wrote the following phrase on one of his notebooks, a few days before he became a Shahid: ’Mother! Don’t cry over me if I am killed. Death does not scare me, my aspiration is to be a Shahid’"
[’Sout Al-Nissa-Voice of the Women’, Al-Ayyam, Feb. 28, 2002]
3. 17-year-old Girl commits Suicide Terrorist Bombing in Jerusalem
Ayyat Al Achris, wearing a belt of explosives, walked into a supermarket in Jerusalem’s Kiryat Yovel neighborhood, on March 29, 2002. She was 17 years old. The security guard at the door, suspecting she was a terrorist, pushed her outside, and she detonated her explosives, killing the security guard and a 17-year-old Israeli girl.
Part III:
Findings and Conclusions
The Palestinian Authority has created a violent, death seeking reality for their young children, having taught them to see death for Allah – Shahada – as an ideal, which they are expected to achieve. As Arafat said in his message to children: "Is it not the greatest message to the world when that hero becomes a Shahid?"
The examples presented in this report are a representative selection, demonstrating the comprehensive campaign waged by the Palestinian Authority. If just 1% of the children attempt to fulfill their "duty" and seek Shahada through suicide terrorism, the ramifications will be cataclysmic. The targets of the future Palestinian terror wave will be Israel, and in all likelihood, other Western democracies, as well.
Today an entire generation of Palestinian children, victims of the PA’s indoctrination and propaganda, believe that their death for Allah in war is the highest achievement attainable in life. This education is an indelible stain on Palestinian society, and places the Palestinian Authority among the greatest child abusers in history.
http://www.pmw.org.il/new/ASK%20FOR%20DEATH.htm
Deaths since the Start of the Intifada.
Who and How???
Take the time to look:
CLICK HERE > http://www.ifamericansknew.org/stats/deaths.html
To end the resistance to the Occupation you have to end the Occupation that allows for the resistance….
Who and How???
Take the time to look:
CLICK HERE > http://www.ifamericansknew.org/stats/deaths.html
To end the resistance to the Occupation you have to end the Occupation that allows for the resistance….
That ALL people deserve equal human rights and equal dignity regardless of race, religion or gender?;
that no race deserves to dominate another?;
that just as Jews should not be dispossessed and oppressed, Jews should not dispossess and oppress others?;
that Jews should demand for Palestinians (Muslims and Christians) what Jews demand for theselves everywhere else in the West (a secular democratic state with equal rights for ALL people regardless of religion)?;
that there should be no apartheid states or ethnic-supremacist states?;
that Palestine was NOT "a land without a people"?
that no race deserves to dominate another?;
that just as Jews should not be dispossessed and oppressed, Jews should not dispossess and oppress others?;
that Jews should demand for Palestinians (Muslims and Christians) what Jews demand for theselves everywhere else in the West (a secular democratic state with equal rights for ALL people regardless of religion)?;
that there should be no apartheid states or ethnic-supremacist states?;
that Palestine was NOT "a land without a people"?
>Palestinians, as a group, in an organized, concerted effort, were trying to take over Jordan,
Wait a minute. Haven't you guys been telling us all along that Jordan actually *is* Palestine? If Jordan *is* Palestine, what's wrong with Palestinians trying to "take over" their own land from the Hashimites, who weren't from there, but were brought in and put into power over them by the British imperialists?
Wait a minute. Haven't you guys been telling us all along that Jordan actually *is* Palestine? If Jordan *is* Palestine, what's wrong with Palestinians trying to "take over" their own land from the Hashimites, who weren't from there, but were brought in and put into power over them by the British imperialists?
"But here's the thing. Palestinians, as a group, in an organized, concerted effort, were trying to take over Jordan, terrorizing as many innocent people there as they could."
Jordan is a monarchy. You are blaming people for trying to revolt to overthrow a monarchy to create a democratic government? Your brushing aside of mass murder by Jordan would be like brushing off a massacre of American colonists by the British when the US was gaining it independence. If the PLO was really going after Jordanian civilians why is there almost universal support for the Arafat and other radical Palestinian groups by Jordanians.
Its weird how the defenders of Israel always yell about how activists are focusing too much on Irsael when there are abuses in neighbroing countries, but then suddenly turn to defending those countries when you question their dictatorial governments. The truth is that opposition to Israel throughout the Middle East is by the public and not really by the governments. The governments use hatred against Israel for political advantage but behind the scenes they have no problem with Israel. Like Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Jordan, Isreal wants to keep millions of Arabs in the West Bank and Gaza from obtaining political rights. If there was a democratic government in the West Bank and Gaza, it would be a threat to the Saudis, the Kuwaitis, the Egyptians etc.. since it would act as an example and inflame demand for change in the region.
Until recently the Palestinians were the best hope for a multireligious secular democracy in the Arab world (the PLO's leadership contains many Christians as well as Muslims). Hamas is a threat to that dream which could be why the PA was attacked by Israel to the point where Hamas was left with the upper hand power wise (its also why neighboring countries secretly support Hamas). If Israel expells one of the few elected leaders in the Middle East (Arafat), there will be an outcry from neighboring countries, but in the end they will be thrilled. A free Palestinians state will pose a far greater threat to the monarchies (and the dictatorship in Egypt) than it will to Israel.
Jordan is a monarchy. You are blaming people for trying to revolt to overthrow a monarchy to create a democratic government? Your brushing aside of mass murder by Jordan would be like brushing off a massacre of American colonists by the British when the US was gaining it independence. If the PLO was really going after Jordanian civilians why is there almost universal support for the Arafat and other radical Palestinian groups by Jordanians.
Its weird how the defenders of Israel always yell about how activists are focusing too much on Irsael when there are abuses in neighbroing countries, but then suddenly turn to defending those countries when you question their dictatorial governments. The truth is that opposition to Israel throughout the Middle East is by the public and not really by the governments. The governments use hatred against Israel for political advantage but behind the scenes they have no problem with Israel. Like Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Jordan, Isreal wants to keep millions of Arabs in the West Bank and Gaza from obtaining political rights. If there was a democratic government in the West Bank and Gaza, it would be a threat to the Saudis, the Kuwaitis, the Egyptians etc.. since it would act as an example and inflame demand for change in the region.
Until recently the Palestinians were the best hope for a multireligious secular democracy in the Arab world (the PLO's leadership contains many Christians as well as Muslims). Hamas is a threat to that dream which could be why the PA was attacked by Israel to the point where Hamas was left with the upper hand power wise (its also why neighboring countries secretly support Hamas). If Israel expells one of the few elected leaders in the Middle East (Arafat), there will be an outcry from neighboring countries, but in the end they will be thrilled. A free Palestinians state will pose a far greater threat to the monarchies (and the dictatorship in Egypt) than it will to Israel.
>A free Palestinians state will pose a far greater threat to the monarchies (and the dictatorship in Egypt) than it will to Israel.
You dont think the monarchies have thought that far ahead? If the Palestinians did gain a state, you would suddenly find a civil war between secularists (PFLP, DFLP, PLO) and the religious groups backed by the monarchies (Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad). The war would keep the Palestians focused inward so they wouldnt have the time or desire to start questioning policies in other countries in the region. The war would probably also be directed at Israel in that unless the Temple Mount were part of the new state, the Islamic parties could use that to rally parts of the population against the secular groups. There would probably also be efforts by the Gulf States to undermine the Palestinian economy since that would also help to keep Palestinians focused inward.
The real war in the Middle East is between Israel and the monarchies against the desire by the Arab street for freedom and democracy. The monarchies and Israel dont have all the same interests but they have a lot more than one is lead to believe by the corporate and alternative medias.
You dont think the monarchies have thought that far ahead? If the Palestinians did gain a state, you would suddenly find a civil war between secularists (PFLP, DFLP, PLO) and the religious groups backed by the monarchies (Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad). The war would keep the Palestians focused inward so they wouldnt have the time or desire to start questioning policies in other countries in the region. The war would probably also be directed at Israel in that unless the Temple Mount were part of the new state, the Islamic parties could use that to rally parts of the population against the secular groups. There would probably also be efforts by the Gulf States to undermine the Palestinian economy since that would also help to keep Palestinians focused inward.
The real war in the Middle East is between Israel and the monarchies against the desire by the Arab street for freedom and democracy. The monarchies and Israel dont have all the same interests but they have a lot more than one is lead to believe by the corporate and alternative medias.
It should surprise no one that whenever there's a "major" event in the Palestine/Israel madness that I rush to journalist and peace activist, Uri Avnery, for explanations, insight, and guidance.
The decision earlier this week by war criminal, Ariel Sharon, to assassinate Yasser Arafat has to be considered "major" (at least as far as Arafat is concerned), so earlier this a.m. I sat around fidgeting and restless until Uri's column dropped into my home page (which is his web site).
Of course, his article entitled "A Disaster Foretold" (13 September 03) dealt with the Israeli dictum re Arafat, and Mr. Avnery didn't waste any time preambling with respect to same. In a bald, unembroderied statement, he tells us:
"So now it is official. The government of Israel has decided to assassinate Yasser Arafat".
I doubt that there is any surprise on Uri's part to this decision, as he's talked about it in earlier articles, and he firmly believes that Israel will send Arafat to meet his maker sooner or later.
"Some people comfort themselves with the thought that this is just an empty resolution", he writes. "It's supposed to be implemented at a time and in a way yet to be decided. But this is wishful thinking, a cold comfort. The decision legitimizing his assassination is, by itself, a far-reaching political act. It is intended to get Israeli and international public used to the idea. What used to sound like a crazy plot by extreme fanatics now has the air of a letitimate political process, with only the time and mode of implementation still open".
Of course, anyone who's familiar with Ariel Sharon will agree that it's only a matter of time.
"He (Sharon) is patient", says Uri. "When he decides to do something, he is ready to wait, but he won't deviate from his goal".
And aside from the assassination of Arafat, what exactly does Sharon want?
"Sharon wants to conclude the historic clash between Zionism and the Palesetinian people with a clear-cut decision, solid Israeli control over the entire country, and a situation that will compel the Palestinians to get out".
So what happens, then, if, despite world condemnation (something Israel has never concerned itself with), and despite human shields dedicated to guarding Arafat day and night, Sharon achieves his objective, and Arafat is enroute to meet his Maker?
Uri is not only blunt but scary. He talks about how, despite the crises between Israel and Palestine, a compromise situation would be the end result. If, however, it is pairs Rsnomat is assassinated, we can forget that.
"We shall return to the stage of "all or nothing", he explains. "Greater Israel or greater Palestine, throwing the Jews into the sea or pushing the Palestinians out into the desert".
That, however, is not his only prediction. There's another much more ominous.
"Violence will reign supreme", adding that said violence will not be confined to the land between the Mediterranean and Jordan, but the whole Arab world will erupt".
He goes on:
"Arafat, the Shahid, the martyr, the hero, the symbol, will become an all Arab, all Muslim mythological figure. His name will become a battle cry for all revoluntaries from Indonesia to Morocco, a slogan for all religious and nationalist underground organizations".
And there's more.
"Bloodshed will be universal. Every Israeli target - every airplane, every group of tourists, every Israeli institution will be in constant danger".
And what about the United States, and their objection to this assassination (even if it is, as many have said, rather weak)? And apart from shaking Arab and Muslim faith in the US to the core, there is the guerilla war in Iraq that is widening daily, and will no doubt spread throughout the region, other Muslim countries, and the world at large.
"Every Arab and Muslim will believe that Sharon acted with American consent and encouragement, whatever feeble verbal opposition there may have been", Uri warns. "The fury will be directed against them. A host of new Bin Ladens will plot revenget".
And does Ariel Sharon know about these consequences? Uri is emphatic.
"Of course he does! But Sharon knows what the conseqences are likely to be, and he relishes them".
And what about the people of Israel? Will this have a bearing on them? One can almost feel Uri's despair when he writes:
"The poor, brainwashed, despairing and apathetic people does not intervene. The silent, bleeding majority behaves as if all this does not concern them and their children. They are following Sharon as the children followed the pied piper, right into the river".
In conclusion he writes:
"The thundering silence is disastrous. In order to prevent the disaster, it is our duty to break it".
The decision earlier this week by war criminal, Ariel Sharon, to assassinate Yasser Arafat has to be considered "major" (at least as far as Arafat is concerned), so earlier this a.m. I sat around fidgeting and restless until Uri's column dropped into my home page (which is his web site).
Of course, his article entitled "A Disaster Foretold" (13 September 03) dealt with the Israeli dictum re Arafat, and Mr. Avnery didn't waste any time preambling with respect to same. In a bald, unembroderied statement, he tells us:
"So now it is official. The government of Israel has decided to assassinate Yasser Arafat".
I doubt that there is any surprise on Uri's part to this decision, as he's talked about it in earlier articles, and he firmly believes that Israel will send Arafat to meet his maker sooner or later.
"Some people comfort themselves with the thought that this is just an empty resolution", he writes. "It's supposed to be implemented at a time and in a way yet to be decided. But this is wishful thinking, a cold comfort. The decision legitimizing his assassination is, by itself, a far-reaching political act. It is intended to get Israeli and international public used to the idea. What used to sound like a crazy plot by extreme fanatics now has the air of a letitimate political process, with only the time and mode of implementation still open".
Of course, anyone who's familiar with Ariel Sharon will agree that it's only a matter of time.
"He (Sharon) is patient", says Uri. "When he decides to do something, he is ready to wait, but he won't deviate from his goal".
And aside from the assassination of Arafat, what exactly does Sharon want?
"Sharon wants to conclude the historic clash between Zionism and the Palesetinian people with a clear-cut decision, solid Israeli control over the entire country, and a situation that will compel the Palestinians to get out".
So what happens, then, if, despite world condemnation (something Israel has never concerned itself with), and despite human shields dedicated to guarding Arafat day and night, Sharon achieves his objective, and Arafat is enroute to meet his Maker?
Uri is not only blunt but scary. He talks about how, despite the crises between Israel and Palestine, a compromise situation would be the end result. If, however, it is pairs Rsnomat is assassinated, we can forget that.
"We shall return to the stage of "all or nothing", he explains. "Greater Israel or greater Palestine, throwing the Jews into the sea or pushing the Palestinians out into the desert".
That, however, is not his only prediction. There's another much more ominous.
"Violence will reign supreme", adding that said violence will not be confined to the land between the Mediterranean and Jordan, but the whole Arab world will erupt".
He goes on:
"Arafat, the Shahid, the martyr, the hero, the symbol, will become an all Arab, all Muslim mythological figure. His name will become a battle cry for all revoluntaries from Indonesia to Morocco, a slogan for all religious and nationalist underground organizations".
And there's more.
"Bloodshed will be universal. Every Israeli target - every airplane, every group of tourists, every Israeli institution will be in constant danger".
And what about the United States, and their objection to this assassination (even if it is, as many have said, rather weak)? And apart from shaking Arab and Muslim faith in the US to the core, there is the guerilla war in Iraq that is widening daily, and will no doubt spread throughout the region, other Muslim countries, and the world at large.
"Every Arab and Muslim will believe that Sharon acted with American consent and encouragement, whatever feeble verbal opposition there may have been", Uri warns. "The fury will be directed against them. A host of new Bin Ladens will plot revenget".
And does Ariel Sharon know about these consequences? Uri is emphatic.
"Of course he does! But Sharon knows what the conseqences are likely to be, and he relishes them".
And what about the people of Israel? Will this have a bearing on them? One can almost feel Uri's despair when he writes:
"The poor, brainwashed, despairing and apathetic people does not intervene. The silent, bleeding majority behaves as if all this does not concern them and their children. They are following Sharon as the children followed the pied piper, right into the river".
In conclusion he writes:
"The thundering silence is disastrous. In order to prevent the disaster, it is our duty to break it".
Whoops!
The line commencing with:
Uri is not only blunt but scary", should read:
"Uri is not only blunt but scary. He talks about how, despite the crises between Israel and Palestine, a compromise situation would be the end result. If, however, Arafat is assassinated, we can forget that".
You will note in the originial a wee error. Blame it on Freedom, who, apart from landing on my head, also likes to land on the keyboard. I thought I'd managed to correct the mistakes this caused just now, but I missed that one.
The boy may be clever, more so than GWBush even, but he still can't type!
Sorry!
The line commencing with:
Uri is not only blunt but scary", should read:
"Uri is not only blunt but scary. He talks about how, despite the crises between Israel and Palestine, a compromise situation would be the end result. If, however, Arafat is assassinated, we can forget that".
You will note in the originial a wee error. Blame it on Freedom, who, apart from landing on my head, also likes to land on the keyboard. I thought I'd managed to correct the mistakes this caused just now, but I missed that one.
The boy may be clever, more so than GWBush even, but he still can't type!
Sorry!
Thanks for conveying Avneri's latest "insight". You've broken the silence on SF-IMC alright, as usual...
Who or what is Freedom?
Who or what is Freedom?
Yes, I love being Uri's mouthpiece. I had a thank you note from him tonight (I sent him a birthday card earlier!) Imagine he's 80!!
Freedom is my almost 12 year old, all white angora cat, that I brought home in my pocket from the SPCA when he was four weeks old. He's sort of hooked on the computer, lad. I woke up the other morning and stumbled out to find him in the chair with his paw patting the keyboard! I kid you not!
I called him Freedom because it is my favourite word.
I happen to believe that his article above was quite to the point. Don't blame him should all of the above come about!!
"Of course, anyone who's familiar with Ariel Sharon will agree that it's only a matter of time [to carry out a decision to assassinate Arafat]."
Your private crystal ball is no substitute for trying so substantiate such a statement.
"world condemnation (something Israel has never concerned itself with)"
Once more, you're running your mouth but have no idea what has really happened. You made a false sweeping satement. I know it's wrong.
"Uri is not only blunt but scary. He talks about how, despite the crises between Israel and Palestine, a compromise situation would be the end result. If, however, it Arafat is assassinated, we can forget that. "We shall return to the stage of "all or nothing", he explains. "Greater Israel or greater Palestine, throwing the Jews into the sea or pushing the Palestinians out into the desert". "
Now avneri is the one who apparently saw all this forecast being played out in HIS crystal ball. He offers no substatiation. This guy is a fear monger and a bit of a provacateur, in a manner of speaking. This goes also for all the other passages...
Such dire and stern warnings were sounded many times before, such as over the several years before the Orient House in East Jerusalem was seized and shut down by Israel. Also, the Temple Mount was reopend for non-Muslim visitors a few weeks ago. Non of the ominious warnings came to pass in the aftermath of these two events. I'm allowing myself to be very doubtful of Avneri's predictions.
Your private crystal ball is no substitute for trying so substantiate such a statement.
"world condemnation (something Israel has never concerned itself with)"
Once more, you're running your mouth but have no idea what has really happened. You made a false sweeping satement. I know it's wrong.
"Uri is not only blunt but scary. He talks about how, despite the crises between Israel and Palestine, a compromise situation would be the end result. If, however, it Arafat is assassinated, we can forget that. "We shall return to the stage of "all or nothing", he explains. "Greater Israel or greater Palestine, throwing the Jews into the sea or pushing the Palestinians out into the desert". "
Now avneri is the one who apparently saw all this forecast being played out in HIS crystal ball. He offers no substatiation. This guy is a fear monger and a bit of a provacateur, in a manner of speaking. This goes also for all the other passages...
Such dire and stern warnings were sounded many times before, such as over the several years before the Orient House in East Jerusalem was seized and shut down by Israel. Also, the Temple Mount was reopend for non-Muslim visitors a few weeks ago. Non of the ominious warnings came to pass in the aftermath of these two events. I'm allowing myself to be very doubtful of Avneri's predictions.
I have someone blabbering about "critical thought" in the Robert Fisk article, said someone belittling me because I admire him (as if I were an isolated species of one!)
And here we have you, as per expectations, doing your little best to vilify dear Uri, and, in turn, my little ole self.
I would not wish to know Sharon the Wicked. However, Uri does, and he has written about him extensively. In fact, did he not write an authorized biography about him? Perhaps I dreamt that or my crystal ball lef me down. Hell!
So when did Israel ever give a damn about international opinion? Or, for that matter, when did it ever give a damn about UN resolutions, peace accords, the 4GC? Jenin? (Oppps, that slipped out!)
In view of it having developed to a fine art form the ability to blame someone else for its misdeeds (and I'm being kind here), we can all expect some poor sap will be blamed for Arafat's removal from this earth.
It's always been a riveting aspect of this mess, lad. Who will Israel blame this time?
...trying to keepo from being annihilated to worry about "international opinion".
stealing their neighbors' land and killing anyone who resists.
In disguise.
When did Israel give a damn about international public opinion?... Take for example the period between 1993-2000 (the Oslo process). Go study it. I don't have to spell every damn thing out to you.
And UN resolutions? Take for instance resolution 242. In the aftermath of the Six Day War Israel offered the disputed territories minus Jerusalem back to the respective Arab states in return for real peace.
Peace accords? I did mention the Oslo process, didn't I?
Even the PA admitted there was no massacre in Jenin.
"In view of it having developed to a fine art form the ability to blame someone else for its misdeeds (and I'm being kind here), we can all expect some poor sap will be blamed for Arafat's removal from this earth."
Not only are you resorting again to crystal ball prophey, but you're also demonstrating your false prejudices by accuing Israel of having developed an "art" which is really practiced by thr Palestinians and other Arabs. There's NO moral problem with taking Arafat out. It should have been done long ago.
You should be asking who will the Palestinians blame this time.
You can'y fool me, gal. You're here to parade you're ignorance and be a mouthpiece for Avneri, Shamir and their likes.
When did Israel give a damn about international public opinion?... Take for example the period between 1993-2000 (the Oslo process). Go study it. I don't have to spell every damn thing out to you.
And UN resolutions? Take for instance resolution 242. In the aftermath of the Six Day War Israel offered the disputed territories minus Jerusalem back to the respective Arab states in return for real peace.
Peace accords? I did mention the Oslo process, didn't I?
Even the PA admitted there was no massacre in Jenin.
"In view of it having developed to a fine art form the ability to blame someone else for its misdeeds (and I'm being kind here), we can all expect some poor sap will be blamed for Arafat's removal from this earth."
Not only are you resorting again to crystal ball prophey, but you're also demonstrating your false prejudices by accuing Israel of having developed an "art" which is really practiced by thr Palestinians and other Arabs. There's NO moral problem with taking Arafat out. It should have been done long ago.
You should be asking who will the Palestinians blame this time.
You can'y fool me, gal. You're here to parade you're ignorance and be a mouthpiece for Avneri, Shamir and their likes.
Why do you always show up on this board at around my bed time?
If you wanted to rip a piece off me, why weren't you around earlier, so I wouldn't be here with my mouth open in a monstrous yawn, and I could devote some time to your prattle?
Thus, I will leave it 'til tomorrow. I have to be up in a few hours to return to Emergency, so sleep will be a minimum at any rate.
Slan leat!
If you wanted to rip a piece off me, why weren't you around earlier, so I wouldn't be here with my mouth open in a monstrous yawn, and I could devote some time to your prattle?
Thus, I will leave it 'til tomorrow. I have to be up in a few hours to return to Emergency, so sleep will be a minimum at any rate.
Slan leat!
I do not and cannot arrange my daily agenda around the wee Angie's demands and convenience. You would be so lucky to have your prattle elevated to the level of my "prattle". Perhaps Freedom can help you in this regard.
Hahaha.
I'm out of here for now, but I will take your suggestion re Freedom under advisement.
PS Your "prattle" will NEVER reach the level of my "prattle", lad!
I'm out of here for now, but I will take your suggestion re Freedom under advisement.
PS Your "prattle" will NEVER reach the level of my "prattle", lad!
Your delusions and hallucinations go on ad nauseum.
The following info is from a CNN link;
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/clinton/timelines/timelines.html
June 26,1993
Clinton orders a missile attack against Iraqi intelligence headquarters in Baghdad in retaliation for alleged Iraqi plot to assassinate former President George Bush.
October 7, 1993
Clinton orders military reinforcements to Somalia after an attack on U.N. peacekeeping troops leaves 18 U.S. soldiers dead. Nearly all U.S. forces are withdrawn from Somalia over the next six months.
September 3, 1996
Clinton orders missile strike on Baghdad after Saddam Hussein's forces attack the Kurdish-controlled city of Irbil.
August 20, 1998
The U.S. fires cruise missiles at targets in Sudan (right) and Afghanistan in response to what Clinton calls an "imminent" terrorist threat from a network run by Osama bin Laden. The strikes follow attacks on U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania earlier in the month.
December 16, 1998
Britain and the United States launch four days of airstrikes against Iraq. In a televised address, Clinton says the attacks come after Baghdad's failure to cooperate with U.N. weapons inspectors.
Pardon me and all that. Just saw your one-liner there and acknowledge receipt of same.
I mentioned to Freedom your suggestion that he help me with "my prattle". The boy was not impressed. Hissed and spit he did. Guess he's got more insight into humankind than his "Momma" does.
YOU presume to talk to me "about delusions and hallucinations ad nauseum". You shouldn't do that, Anti Angie. You see, he who is without delusions and hallucinations shall throw the first stone.
A wee bit of paraphrasing there, but I am sure no one objects.
The world can wait and watch as true democracy goes full throttle in Israel. No other place I would rather live than in that bastion of freedom and egalitarianism.
Let the sheep in the United States cry for democracy for the world. Do you really think any other semitic nation such as Iraq would want to be democratic?
As the former mayor of NYC said, "We value life more than they do." Sure we do.
Let the sheep in the United States cry for democracy for the world. Do you really think any other semitic nation such as Iraq would want to be democratic?
As the former mayor of NYC said, "We value life more than they do." Sure we do.
Yassir Arafat: 1929-2004
HonestReporting's biography, with links to important sources
EARLY LIFE
It's ironic that the man who personified the Palestinian movement was neither born in the region it claims, nor conforms to his own organization's definition of Palestinian identity. Yassir Arafat, whose real name is Abdel-Rahman Abdel-Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini, was born in August 1929 in Cairo, son of an Egyptian textile merchant. He was sent to Jerusalem as a small child after his mother died, then returned to Egypt via Gaza.
Throughout his career, Arafat's Egyptian background was a political impediment and source of personal embarrassment. One biographer notes that upon first meeting him in 1967, 'West Bankers did not like his Egyptian accent and ways and found them alien,' and to the very end Arafat employed an aide to translate his Egyptian dialect into Palestinian Arabic for conversing with his West Bank and Gaza subjects.
As a young man, Arafat took no part in the formative experience of the Palestinian movement ― the 1948 Arab-Israeli war ― but he would nonetheless claim refugee status throughout his life: 'I am a refugee,' he cried out in a 1969 interview, 'Do you know what it means to be a refugee? I am a poor and helpless man. I have nothing, for I was expelled and dispossessed of my homeland.' (Arafat's congenital lying would continue for decades.)
FATAH AND THE PLO
In the mid-1950s, Arafat joined the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, then rose to the head of the Palestine Student Union at the University of Cairo. In the late 1950s Arafat moved to Kuwait, where he co-founded Fatah ('Palestine National Liberation Movement' ― an acronym meaning 'conquest'), the faction that would later gain control over the entire Palestinian movement. Fatah's motley ranks of Islamists, communists and pan-Arabists expanded via brute violence. 'People aren't attracted to speeches, but rather to bullets,' Arafat quipped at this stage. (At right: Fatah logo of rifles and grenades over Israel)
Fatah began military-style training in Syria and Algeria in 1964, and the following year tried unsuccessfully to blow up a major Israeli water pump. Fatah's stated goal was the obliteration of the State of Israel, and well before the 1967 war would supply a pretext, Arafat's organization repeatedly attacked Israeli buses, homes, villages and rail lines.
This violence against Israeli civilians was a pillar of the Palestinian National Covenant (the foundational charter of the Palestinian Liberation Organization - PLO), which states that 'the liberation of Palestine will destroy the Zionist and imperialist presence' and that 'armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine and is therefore a strategy and not a tactic.' (Despite repeated Palestinian commitments in the late 1990s to annul these sections of the covenant, it was never officially changed.)
Arafat's public profile got a boost in 1968, when the IDF raided a Fatah terrorist stronghold in the Jordanian village of al-Karameh. The uniformed, keffiyah-clad Arafat took this opportunity to project himself as a fearless Arab leader who, despite the post-Six Day War gloom, dared to confront the Israelis. The image stuck, and Fatah's numbers swelled with new recruits.
Arafat and Fatah consolidated power through bribery, extortion and murder, and at the Palestinian National Congress in Cairo in February 1969, Arafat was appointed head of the PLO ― a position he would never relinquish.
JORDAN, LEBANON AND TUNISIA
By the late 1960s, heavily-armed, Arafat-led Palestinians had formed a terrorist 'state within a state' in Jordan, not only attacking Israeli civilian targets, but also seizing control of Jordanian infrastructure.
The tension reached a height during late 1970, when Jordan's King Hussein cracked down on the Palestinian factions. During this bloody conflict, known as 'Black September', Palestinians hijacked four Western airliners and blew one up on a Cairo runway (pictured at right), to both embarrass the Egyptians and Jordanians and, in their words, 'teach the Americans a lesson for their long-standing support of Israel.' With the broad publicity this generated, Arafat had hit the world stage.
When King Hussein drove Arafat's faction out of his Jordanian kingdom (causing thousands of civilian deaths), they relocated in Lebanon. As in Jordan, Arafat soon triggered a bloody civil war in his previously stable host country. Simultaneously, the PLO launched intermittent attacks on Israeli towns from southern Lebanese positions.
Yassir Arafat then brought the high-profile terrorist act to western soil. In Sept. 1972, Fatah-backed terrorists kidnapped and murdered 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympic games. And in 1973, Arafat ordered his operatives in the Khartoum, Sudan office of Fatah to abduct and murder US Ambassador Cleo Noel and two other diplomats. (In 2004, the FBI finally opened an official investigation against Arafat for the Khartoum murders.)
The wanton violence fueled Arafat's political goals, as his presence on the world stage grew: In 1974, he became the first representative of a nongovernmental organization to address a plenary session of the UN General Assembly (pictured at left) In the speech, with a gun holster strapped to his hip, Arafat compared himself to George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Arab heads of states declared the PLO the sole legitimate representative of all Palestinians, the PLO was granted full membership in the Arab League in 1976, and by 1980 was fully recognized by European nations.
In 1978-82, the IDF invaded Lebanon to root out PLO groups that had continually terrorized the northern Israeli populace. The U.S. brokered a cease-fire deal in which Arafat and the PLO were allowed to leave Lebanon; Arafat and the PLO leadership eventually settled in Tunisia, which remained his center of operations until 1993.
During the 1980s, Arafat received financial assistance from Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, which allowed him to rebuild the battered PLO. This was particularly useful during the first Palestinian intifada in 1987 ― Arafat took control of the violence from afar, and it was mainly due to Fatah forces in the West Bank that the anti-Israel terror and civil unrest could be maintained. Arafat would then become nearly the only world leader to support Saddam Hussein in the 1991 Gulf War. (Saddam would later repay this loyalty by sending $25,000 checks to families of Palestinian suicide bombers.)
THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY
In the early 1990s, the U.S. led Israel and the PLO to negotiations that spawned the 1993 Oslo Accords, an agreement that called for the implementation of Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank and Gaza Strip over a five-year period. The following year Arafat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize along with Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin.
In 1994, Arafat moved his headquarters to the West Bank and Gaza to run the Palestinian Authority, an entity created by the Oslo Accords. Arafat brought with him from Tunisia an aging PLO leadership that would bolster his ongoing monopoly over all Palestinian funds, power and authority. Elections in 1996 extended Arafat's control over the PA, but under the Oslo agreement, the term of that candidacy ended in 1999. Arafat never allowed new elections to take place.
While Israel went about implementing its side of the Oslo agreements ― removing troops from nearly all Palestinian areas, recognizing the PA, and educating for peace ― the PA utterly failed to live up to its commitment to renounce and uproot anti-Israel terrorism. Instead, unprecedented incitement from Arafat's official PA media and school textbooks, and active and passive PA support for terrorist groups led to a string of suicide bombings in the mid-1990s that killed scores of Israeli civilians. In October, 1996, at the height of the Oslo years, Arafat cried out to a Bethlehem crowd, 'We know only one word - jihad! Jihad, jihad, jihad! Whoever does not like it can drink from the Dead Sea or from the Sea of Gaza.' [For more on the failure of Oslo, see HonestReporting's documentary film, Relentless.]
In July 2000, U.S. president Bill Clinton attempted to keep the Oslo Accords viable by convening a summit at Camp David between Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. There, Barak offered Arafat a Palestinian state in Gaza and 92% of the West Bank, and a capital in East Jerusalem ― the most generous offer ever from an Israeli government. Yassir Arafat rejected the offer and ended negotiations without a counteroffer. As American envoy Dennis Ross concluded, 'Arafat could not accept Camp David... because when the conflict ends, the cause that defines Arafat also ends.' [See also this interview with Ross on Oslo.]
Immediately following this breakdown, the PA media machine under Arafat's control ramped up the war rhetoric, and preparations were made for riots that were unleashed following Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount. The Arafat-supported 'al Aqsa intifada' would continue for four years. This unprecedented wave of anti-Israel terrorism, which would result in over 1,000 Israeli deaths, was marked by over 120 Palestinian suicide bombers and the growth of an Islamic martyrdom cult.
This stage of violence revealed that Arafat and the PA had never abandoned their longstanding plans to liquidate the Jewish state. Arafat had told an Arab audience in Stockholm in 1996, 'We plan to eliminate the State of Israel and establish a purely Palestinian state. We will make life unbearable for Jews by psychological warfare and population explosion... We Palestinians will take over everything, including all of Jerusalem.' Likewise, Arafat explained to a South African crowd in 1994 that the Oslo agreement was merely a tactical ruse in the larger battle to destroy the Jewish state ― a modern version of the Muslim prophet Mohammed's trickery against the ancient tribe of Quraysh. Arafat's colleague Faisal al-Husseini was even more explicit, describing the Oslo process as a 'Trojan Horse' designed to promote the strategic goal of 'Palestine from the [Jordan] river to the [Mediterranean] sea' ― that is, a Palestine in place of Israel.
TERRORIST TO THE END
The final phase in Arafat's life-long commitment to organized terror was channeled through the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, a Fatah group that was responsible for many of the most deadly attacks against Israeli civilians between 2000-2004. Though many media outlets described a mere 'loose affiliation' between Arafat and this terrorist group, the evidence clearly indicated a direct financial and organizational bond between the two:
▪ In November, 2003 a BBC investigation found that up to $50,000 a month was funneled by
An ammunition bill for the terrorist Al Aqsa Brigade, signed by Yassir Arafat - see larger version
Fatah, with Arafat's approval, directly to the Al Aqsa Brigades, for the purpose of organizing bombings, snipings and ambushes against Israeli civilians.
▪ Documents captured by the IDF in 2002 indicated Fatah's 'systematic, institutionalized and ongoing financing' of the Al Aqsa Brigades. (See Arafat's signature on the weapons budget, and this full report from Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs.)
▪ The leader of the Al Aqsa Brigades in Tulkarm told USA Today on March 14, 2002: 'The truth is, we are Fatah, but we didn't operate under the name of Fatah...We are the armed wing of the organization. We receive our instructions from Fatah. Our commander is Yasser Arafat himself.'
[For more on the Arafat-Al Aqsa connection, click here.]
In addition, Arafat granted free rein to the radical Islamic terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad to perpetrate dozens of horrific acts of civilian murder between 2000-2004. (At left: Arafat with Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin, 2003)
DELEGITIMIZATION
In January 2002, the Israeli Navy seized a Gaza-bound, PA-owned freighter ― the Karine A ― that was loaded with more than fifty tons of Iranian ammunition and weapons, including dozens of surface-to-surface Katyusha rockets. (See more on the Karine A.)
In June 2002, upon recognizing Arafat's ongoing financing and abetting of terrorism, U.S. President Bush called for Arafat's removal from power. Progress toward peace required, according to Bush, 'a new and different Palestinian leadership...not compromised by terror.' Release of a U.S.-backed 'road map' for settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was therefore delayed until such a new Palestinian leader emerged. On its part, the Israeli government chose to isolate Arafat in his Ramallah compound, the 'Muqata', where he would remain from early 2002 until his final days, and where he was buried.
In April 2003, hours after Mahmoud Abbas assumed the role of Palestinian prime minister, the official road map was released and diplomatic progress began. But Arafat consistently undercut the authority of Abbas, leading to Abbas' resignation and the halting of the road map peace process.
CORRUPTION, AUTOCRACY, JIHAD
Over the course of his 'revolutionary' career, Arafat siphoned off hundreds of millions of dollars of international aid money intended to reach the Palestinian people.
Estimates of the degree of Arafat's wealth differ, but are all staggering: In 2003, Forbes magazine listed Arafat in its annual list of the wealthiest 'Kings, Queens and Despots,' with a fortune of 'at least $300 million.' Israeli and US officials estimate Arafat's personal holdings between $1-3 billion.
And while the average Palestinian barely subsisted, Arafat's wife Suha (at left) in Paris received $100,000 each month from PA sources as reported on CBS' 60 Minutes. That CBS report also noted that Arafat maintained secret investments in a Ramallah-based Coca Cola plant, a Tunisian cellphone company, and venture capital funds in the U.S. and the Cayman Islands.
Arafat also used foreign aid funds to pay off cronies who bolstered his autocracy: An International Monetary Fund report indicated that upwards of 8% ($135 million) of the PA's annual budget was handed out by Arafat 'at his sole discretion.' And Arafat's select PA policemen, far from keeping the peace, were repeatedly among the suicide bombers and snipers.
Money was just one method of strengthening Arafat's power apparatus. Critics of his PA government were routinely imprisoned, tortured or beaten. One example: In 1999, Muawiya Al-Masri, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, described Arafat's corruption to a Jordanian newspaper. For this, he was attacked by a gang of masked men and shot three times. Al-Masri survived the ordeal and described Arafat's grip on PA power: 'There is no institutional process. There is only one institution ― the Presidency, which has no law and order and is based on bribing top officials.'
From 2000-2004, Arafat permitted Muslim imams to incite unprecedented anti-Israel and anti-American violence from their mosques and through official PA media. Arafat's Religious Affairs Ministry employed preachers who regularly called for children to 'martyr themselves', and PA television glamorized the act of suicide bombing.
Under Arafat, the Palestinian Authority school textbooks denied Israel's very existence, and jihad was presented to Palestinian children as an admirable course of action. The Jewish people, meanwhile, was represented to schoolchildren as a tricky, greedy and barbarous nation.
Freedom of the press was virtually non-existent during Arafat's reign in Gaza, Jericho and Ramallah ― if it didn't speak favorably of Arafat, it didn't get printed in the PA-controlled media. Moreover, the PA enacted a systematic policy of intimidation of foreign journalists. One case among many: When an AP cameraman captured footage of Palestinian street celebrations following the 9/11 attacks, he was kidnapped, brought to a PA security office, and Arafat's cabinet secretary threatened that the PA 'cannot guarantee [his] life' if the footage was broadcast.
Yet beyond the terrorism, extortion, embezzlement and intimidation lies Arafat's most unfortunate ongoing impact: The inculcation of murderous values in an entire generation of Palestinians, who have been educated ― under Arafat's direction ― to continue the fight of jihad against Israel, rather than compromise to end the decades-long conflict.
How many generations will it take to undo Arafat's dark legacy?
http://www.honestreporting.com/SSI/printVersion.asp?PageURL=/articles/45884734/critiques/Yassir_Arafat_1929-2004.xml&teaser=HonestReporting%26%2339%3Bs+biography%2C+with+links+to+important+sources
HonestReporting's biography, with links to important sources
EARLY LIFE
It's ironic that the man who personified the Palestinian movement was neither born in the region it claims, nor conforms to his own organization's definition of Palestinian identity. Yassir Arafat, whose real name is Abdel-Rahman Abdel-Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini, was born in August 1929 in Cairo, son of an Egyptian textile merchant. He was sent to Jerusalem as a small child after his mother died, then returned to Egypt via Gaza.
Throughout his career, Arafat's Egyptian background was a political impediment and source of personal embarrassment. One biographer notes that upon first meeting him in 1967, 'West Bankers did not like his Egyptian accent and ways and found them alien,' and to the very end Arafat employed an aide to translate his Egyptian dialect into Palestinian Arabic for conversing with his West Bank and Gaza subjects.
As a young man, Arafat took no part in the formative experience of the Palestinian movement ― the 1948 Arab-Israeli war ― but he would nonetheless claim refugee status throughout his life: 'I am a refugee,' he cried out in a 1969 interview, 'Do you know what it means to be a refugee? I am a poor and helpless man. I have nothing, for I was expelled and dispossessed of my homeland.' (Arafat's congenital lying would continue for decades.)
FATAH AND THE PLO
In the mid-1950s, Arafat joined the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, then rose to the head of the Palestine Student Union at the University of Cairo. In the late 1950s Arafat moved to Kuwait, where he co-founded Fatah ('Palestine National Liberation Movement' ― an acronym meaning 'conquest'), the faction that would later gain control over the entire Palestinian movement. Fatah's motley ranks of Islamists, communists and pan-Arabists expanded via brute violence. 'People aren't attracted to speeches, but rather to bullets,' Arafat quipped at this stage. (At right: Fatah logo of rifles and grenades over Israel)
Fatah began military-style training in Syria and Algeria in 1964, and the following year tried unsuccessfully to blow up a major Israeli water pump. Fatah's stated goal was the obliteration of the State of Israel, and well before the 1967 war would supply a pretext, Arafat's organization repeatedly attacked Israeli buses, homes, villages and rail lines.
This violence against Israeli civilians was a pillar of the Palestinian National Covenant (the foundational charter of the Palestinian Liberation Organization - PLO), which states that 'the liberation of Palestine will destroy the Zionist and imperialist presence' and that 'armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine and is therefore a strategy and not a tactic.' (Despite repeated Palestinian commitments in the late 1990s to annul these sections of the covenant, it was never officially changed.)
Arafat's public profile got a boost in 1968, when the IDF raided a Fatah terrorist stronghold in the Jordanian village of al-Karameh. The uniformed, keffiyah-clad Arafat took this opportunity to project himself as a fearless Arab leader who, despite the post-Six Day War gloom, dared to confront the Israelis. The image stuck, and Fatah's numbers swelled with new recruits.
Arafat and Fatah consolidated power through bribery, extortion and murder, and at the Palestinian National Congress in Cairo in February 1969, Arafat was appointed head of the PLO ― a position he would never relinquish.
JORDAN, LEBANON AND TUNISIA
By the late 1960s, heavily-armed, Arafat-led Palestinians had formed a terrorist 'state within a state' in Jordan, not only attacking Israeli civilian targets, but also seizing control of Jordanian infrastructure.
The tension reached a height during late 1970, when Jordan's King Hussein cracked down on the Palestinian factions. During this bloody conflict, known as 'Black September', Palestinians hijacked four Western airliners and blew one up on a Cairo runway (pictured at right), to both embarrass the Egyptians and Jordanians and, in their words, 'teach the Americans a lesson for their long-standing support of Israel.' With the broad publicity this generated, Arafat had hit the world stage.
When King Hussein drove Arafat's faction out of his Jordanian kingdom (causing thousands of civilian deaths), they relocated in Lebanon. As in Jordan, Arafat soon triggered a bloody civil war in his previously stable host country. Simultaneously, the PLO launched intermittent attacks on Israeli towns from southern Lebanese positions.
Yassir Arafat then brought the high-profile terrorist act to western soil. In Sept. 1972, Fatah-backed terrorists kidnapped and murdered 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympic games. And in 1973, Arafat ordered his operatives in the Khartoum, Sudan office of Fatah to abduct and murder US Ambassador Cleo Noel and two other diplomats. (In 2004, the FBI finally opened an official investigation against Arafat for the Khartoum murders.)
The wanton violence fueled Arafat's political goals, as his presence on the world stage grew: In 1974, he became the first representative of a nongovernmental organization to address a plenary session of the UN General Assembly (pictured at left) In the speech, with a gun holster strapped to his hip, Arafat compared himself to George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Arab heads of states declared the PLO the sole legitimate representative of all Palestinians, the PLO was granted full membership in the Arab League in 1976, and by 1980 was fully recognized by European nations.
In 1978-82, the IDF invaded Lebanon to root out PLO groups that had continually terrorized the northern Israeli populace. The U.S. brokered a cease-fire deal in which Arafat and the PLO were allowed to leave Lebanon; Arafat and the PLO leadership eventually settled in Tunisia, which remained his center of operations until 1993.
During the 1980s, Arafat received financial assistance from Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, which allowed him to rebuild the battered PLO. This was particularly useful during the first Palestinian intifada in 1987 ― Arafat took control of the violence from afar, and it was mainly due to Fatah forces in the West Bank that the anti-Israel terror and civil unrest could be maintained. Arafat would then become nearly the only world leader to support Saddam Hussein in the 1991 Gulf War. (Saddam would later repay this loyalty by sending $25,000 checks to families of Palestinian suicide bombers.)
THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY
In the early 1990s, the U.S. led Israel and the PLO to negotiations that spawned the 1993 Oslo Accords, an agreement that called for the implementation of Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank and Gaza Strip over a five-year period. The following year Arafat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize along with Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin.
In 1994, Arafat moved his headquarters to the West Bank and Gaza to run the Palestinian Authority, an entity created by the Oslo Accords. Arafat brought with him from Tunisia an aging PLO leadership that would bolster his ongoing monopoly over all Palestinian funds, power and authority. Elections in 1996 extended Arafat's control over the PA, but under the Oslo agreement, the term of that candidacy ended in 1999. Arafat never allowed new elections to take place.
While Israel went about implementing its side of the Oslo agreements ― removing troops from nearly all Palestinian areas, recognizing the PA, and educating for peace ― the PA utterly failed to live up to its commitment to renounce and uproot anti-Israel terrorism. Instead, unprecedented incitement from Arafat's official PA media and school textbooks, and active and passive PA support for terrorist groups led to a string of suicide bombings in the mid-1990s that killed scores of Israeli civilians. In October, 1996, at the height of the Oslo years, Arafat cried out to a Bethlehem crowd, 'We know only one word - jihad! Jihad, jihad, jihad! Whoever does not like it can drink from the Dead Sea or from the Sea of Gaza.' [For more on the failure of Oslo, see HonestReporting's documentary film, Relentless.]
In July 2000, U.S. president Bill Clinton attempted to keep the Oslo Accords viable by convening a summit at Camp David between Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. There, Barak offered Arafat a Palestinian state in Gaza and 92% of the West Bank, and a capital in East Jerusalem ― the most generous offer ever from an Israeli government. Yassir Arafat rejected the offer and ended negotiations without a counteroffer. As American envoy Dennis Ross concluded, 'Arafat could not accept Camp David... because when the conflict ends, the cause that defines Arafat also ends.' [See also this interview with Ross on Oslo.]
Immediately following this breakdown, the PA media machine under Arafat's control ramped up the war rhetoric, and preparations were made for riots that were unleashed following Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount. The Arafat-supported 'al Aqsa intifada' would continue for four years. This unprecedented wave of anti-Israel terrorism, which would result in over 1,000 Israeli deaths, was marked by over 120 Palestinian suicide bombers and the growth of an Islamic martyrdom cult.
This stage of violence revealed that Arafat and the PA had never abandoned their longstanding plans to liquidate the Jewish state. Arafat had told an Arab audience in Stockholm in 1996, 'We plan to eliminate the State of Israel and establish a purely Palestinian state. We will make life unbearable for Jews by psychological warfare and population explosion... We Palestinians will take over everything, including all of Jerusalem.' Likewise, Arafat explained to a South African crowd in 1994 that the Oslo agreement was merely a tactical ruse in the larger battle to destroy the Jewish state ― a modern version of the Muslim prophet Mohammed's trickery against the ancient tribe of Quraysh. Arafat's colleague Faisal al-Husseini was even more explicit, describing the Oslo process as a 'Trojan Horse' designed to promote the strategic goal of 'Palestine from the [Jordan] river to the [Mediterranean] sea' ― that is, a Palestine in place of Israel.
TERRORIST TO THE END
The final phase in Arafat's life-long commitment to organized terror was channeled through the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, a Fatah group that was responsible for many of the most deadly attacks against Israeli civilians between 2000-2004. Though many media outlets described a mere 'loose affiliation' between Arafat and this terrorist group, the evidence clearly indicated a direct financial and organizational bond between the two:
▪ In November, 2003 a BBC investigation found that up to $50,000 a month was funneled by
An ammunition bill for the terrorist Al Aqsa Brigade, signed by Yassir Arafat - see larger version
Fatah, with Arafat's approval, directly to the Al Aqsa Brigades, for the purpose of organizing bombings, snipings and ambushes against Israeli civilians.
▪ Documents captured by the IDF in 2002 indicated Fatah's 'systematic, institutionalized and ongoing financing' of the Al Aqsa Brigades. (See Arafat's signature on the weapons budget, and this full report from Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs.)
▪ The leader of the Al Aqsa Brigades in Tulkarm told USA Today on March 14, 2002: 'The truth is, we are Fatah, but we didn't operate under the name of Fatah...We are the armed wing of the organization. We receive our instructions from Fatah. Our commander is Yasser Arafat himself.'
[For more on the Arafat-Al Aqsa connection, click here.]
In addition, Arafat granted free rein to the radical Islamic terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad to perpetrate dozens of horrific acts of civilian murder between 2000-2004. (At left: Arafat with Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin, 2003)
DELEGITIMIZATION
In January 2002, the Israeli Navy seized a Gaza-bound, PA-owned freighter ― the Karine A ― that was loaded with more than fifty tons of Iranian ammunition and weapons, including dozens of surface-to-surface Katyusha rockets. (See more on the Karine A.)
In June 2002, upon recognizing Arafat's ongoing financing and abetting of terrorism, U.S. President Bush called for Arafat's removal from power. Progress toward peace required, according to Bush, 'a new and different Palestinian leadership...not compromised by terror.' Release of a U.S.-backed 'road map' for settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was therefore delayed until such a new Palestinian leader emerged. On its part, the Israeli government chose to isolate Arafat in his Ramallah compound, the 'Muqata', where he would remain from early 2002 until his final days, and where he was buried.
In April 2003, hours after Mahmoud Abbas assumed the role of Palestinian prime minister, the official road map was released and diplomatic progress began. But Arafat consistently undercut the authority of Abbas, leading to Abbas' resignation and the halting of the road map peace process.
CORRUPTION, AUTOCRACY, JIHAD
Over the course of his 'revolutionary' career, Arafat siphoned off hundreds of millions of dollars of international aid money intended to reach the Palestinian people.
Estimates of the degree of Arafat's wealth differ, but are all staggering: In 2003, Forbes magazine listed Arafat in its annual list of the wealthiest 'Kings, Queens and Despots,' with a fortune of 'at least $300 million.' Israeli and US officials estimate Arafat's personal holdings between $1-3 billion.
And while the average Palestinian barely subsisted, Arafat's wife Suha (at left) in Paris received $100,000 each month from PA sources as reported on CBS' 60 Minutes. That CBS report also noted that Arafat maintained secret investments in a Ramallah-based Coca Cola plant, a Tunisian cellphone company, and venture capital funds in the U.S. and the Cayman Islands.
Arafat also used foreign aid funds to pay off cronies who bolstered his autocracy: An International Monetary Fund report indicated that upwards of 8% ($135 million) of the PA's annual budget was handed out by Arafat 'at his sole discretion.' And Arafat's select PA policemen, far from keeping the peace, were repeatedly among the suicide bombers and snipers.
Money was just one method of strengthening Arafat's power apparatus. Critics of his PA government were routinely imprisoned, tortured or beaten. One example: In 1999, Muawiya Al-Masri, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, described Arafat's corruption to a Jordanian newspaper. For this, he was attacked by a gang of masked men and shot three times. Al-Masri survived the ordeal and described Arafat's grip on PA power: 'There is no institutional process. There is only one institution ― the Presidency, which has no law and order and is based on bribing top officials.'
From 2000-2004, Arafat permitted Muslim imams to incite unprecedented anti-Israel and anti-American violence from their mosques and through official PA media. Arafat's Religious Affairs Ministry employed preachers who regularly called for children to 'martyr themselves', and PA television glamorized the act of suicide bombing.
Under Arafat, the Palestinian Authority school textbooks denied Israel's very existence, and jihad was presented to Palestinian children as an admirable course of action. The Jewish people, meanwhile, was represented to schoolchildren as a tricky, greedy and barbarous nation.
Freedom of the press was virtually non-existent during Arafat's reign in Gaza, Jericho and Ramallah ― if it didn't speak favorably of Arafat, it didn't get printed in the PA-controlled media. Moreover, the PA enacted a systematic policy of intimidation of foreign journalists. One case among many: When an AP cameraman captured footage of Palestinian street celebrations following the 9/11 attacks, he was kidnapped, brought to a PA security office, and Arafat's cabinet secretary threatened that the PA 'cannot guarantee [his] life' if the footage was broadcast.
Yet beyond the terrorism, extortion, embezzlement and intimidation lies Arafat's most unfortunate ongoing impact: The inculcation of murderous values in an entire generation of Palestinians, who have been educated ― under Arafat's direction ― to continue the fight of jihad against Israel, rather than compromise to end the decades-long conflict.
How many generations will it take to undo Arafat's dark legacy?
http://www.honestreporting.com/SSI/printVersion.asp?PageURL=/articles/45884734/critiques/Yassir_Arafat_1929-2004.xml&teaser=HonestReporting%26%2339%3Bs+biography%2C+with+links+to+important+sources
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