>From: [log in to unmask] >Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list              <[log in to unmask]> >To: [log in to unmask] >Subject: Symbol of Palestinian identity embraced dream of a homeland (fwd) >Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 06:42:34 EST > >Attired in military uniform and his head wrapped in his trademark kaffiyeh, >Yasser Arafat stood out as leader of the Palestinians. > > >By John Roby >CNN > >(CNN) -- Yasser Arafat, known throughout the world as the face of the >Palestinian national movement, alternately played the roles of guerrilla, diplomat >and would-be peacemaker for more than five decades. > >He rose to prominence by waging war on Israel, and years later publicly >called for peace with his lifelong enemy. A Nobel Peace Prize winner, he began his >career by embracing violence. To Palestinians and supporters the world over, >he wore the mantle of a statesman. To his enemies and detractors, his name >became synonymous with the carnage of terrorism. For Arafat, it was all in the >name of establishing a Palestinian state. > >"The battle for peace is the most difficult battle of our lives," he said in >1993, in the hopeful aftermath of the Oslo peace accords. > >In the end, Arafat did not live to reach the goal he spent a lifetime >pursuing, unable either to defeat his enemy in his youth or establish a full peace in >his old age. > >"He actually didn't complete anything he started. This is his dilemma," Abdel >Bari Atwan, editor of the London-based Arabic-language newspaper al Quds, >said in an interview with CNN. "That's why Arafat will be remembered as an >indecisive man as a politician and also an indecisive man as a revolutionary." > >Rashid Khalidi, director of the Middle East Institute at Columbia University, >noted that though Arafat's legacy is a checkered one, he played a key role in >reshaping the Middle East's political landscape toward the end of the 20th >century. > >His most striking impact on history, Khalidi said, came in his early career, >when he elevated the Palestinian movement onto the world stage in spite of an >almost universal reluctance to deal with it. > >"What's good in his legacy is attached to his buildup of Palestinian >nationalism," Khalidi said. "In an environment of Arab intrigue, his achievement was >considerable." > >But for many Israelis, Arafat was always a terrorist whose ultimate goal was >to destroy Israel. > >"He's an arch-terrorist, he's a master terrorist," said former Israeli Prime >Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. "He's the one who brought to the world the - you >know, the terrorist start-up of producing airline hijackings, of taking people >hostage, of kidnapping and murdering diplomats. You name a terrorist >technique -- he has either thought about it or perfected it." >Making of a revolutionary >Arafat was born August 24, 1929, in Cairo, Egypt, though he has often said he >was born in Jerusalem. He was the sixth of seven children of a Palestinian >merchant and his wife, a member of a prominent Arab family in Jerusalem. > >As a boy, he spent a few years living with an uncle in Jerusalem, then the >capital of the British mandate of Palestine. > >After World War II, the United Nations voted to divide Palestine into Arab >and Jewish states. Arab nations rejected the plan, and on May 15, 1948, the day >after the Israeli state was declared, Arab armies invaded. > >Arafat had returned to Cairo in the 1940s and became involved in the >Palestinian cause, smuggling arms into Palestine before Israel's defeat of the Arab >states in the 1948 war. It would be the first of three major wars against >combined Arab forces that Israel would win in the 20th century. > >After the war, Arafat earned a degree in civil engineering at what is now >Cairo University. He worked for a time in Kuwait as a contractor. > >In 1959, he and several Palestinian comrades founded a group dedicated to >waging guerrilla war against Israel. They named the organization Fatah, a reverse >acronym of the Arabic for "Palestine National Liberation Movement," which by >itself means "conquest" or "opening." Arafat was the group's chief. > >Fatah achieved fame in the Arab world less than a decade later. Arafat had >set up his base for launching raids into Israel at the village of Karama, >Jordan. When Israel counterattacked in March 1968, Arafat urged his forces to stand >their ground. > >Fatah and Jordan lost about 150 men, while about two dozen Israeli soldiers >died. > >In his book "The Gun and the Olive Branch," David Hirst wrote, "From Fatah's >standpoint, Karama was a great triumph, a turning point in their fortunes." > >Within a year of the battle, Arafat had become chairman of the Palestine >Liberation Organization, and Fatah its main component. He was quoted at the time >as pledging to ramp up the armed revolution and rejecting any political >settlement with Israel. > >The PLO's guerrilla war gained international attention -- and condemnation -- >through two events in the coming years: the massacre of 11 Israeli athletes >and a West German police officer at the Olympic Games in Munich in 1972, and >the killing of the U.S. ambassador to Sudan, along with the deputy chief of >mission and a Belgian diplomat, the following year. > >The incidents helped raise the profile of the Palestinian cause and also >associated it and Arafat's PLO with terrorism. >A Sunni Muslim, Arafat attended Friday prayers in November 1994.  Negotiating >success >Arafat demonstrated he could use his newfound notoriety to negotiate to his >benefit. > >Less than a decade after the gunfight at Karama, Arafat, wearing his >trademark fatigues and an empty holster, addressed the U.N. General Assembly. He >closed his remarks with the words: "I have come bearing an olive branch and a >freedom fighter's gun. Do not let the olive branch fall from my hand." > >The Arab League had previously declared Arafat's PLO the only representative >of the Palestinian people. After the speech, the PLO was allowed to become a >permanent observer at the United Nations, and the world body accepted the right >of Palestinians to self-determination. > >By then, Arafat, his head wrapped in his trademark kaffiyeh, had become >symbolic of the Palestinian push for statehood. > >"Arafat, both in his own mind and in the mind of many Palestinians, is the >personification of the Palestinian struggle," said Arthur Goldschmidt, a Penn >State University professor, Middle East historian and author of "A Concise >History of the Middle East." > >In 1982, Israel went after Arafat and the PLO, invading war-torn Lebanon >because the PLO was using it as a base for deadly attacks on Israel. Israeli >troops - led by then-Defense Minister Ariel Sharon -- pushed through South Lebanon >all the way to Beirut. > >Israeli forces were able to drive Arafat and the PLO out of Lebanon and >Sharon, who is now the Israeli prime minister, later told CNN he ordered Arafat's >assassination 13 times during the Lebanon campaign. Arafat survived but he and >the PLO were forced to flee to Tunis. > >Several years later, as Palestinians in Israeli occupied territories staged a >violent uprising independent of the PLO, Arafat finally indicated that the >PLO might be willing to compromise. At a special assembly of the UN in Geneva in >1988, Arafat renounced terrorism, acknowledged Israel's right to exist and >declared an independent Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank. > >As a spokesman for the plight of his people, Arafat played a critical role in >gaining international diplomatic support for his cause. > >"[Arafat] has on his side this absolutely amazing ability to get sympathy," >Barry Rubin, director of the Israel-based Global Research in International >Affairs Center and author of "Yasir Arafat: A Political Biography," said in an >interview. "The phrase coined by American intelligence people in the 1970s, that >Arafat was the 'Teflon terrorist,' has really borne out amazingly." > >1993 marked the high point for Arafat the diplomat when he shook hands with >Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin at the White House to seal the Oslo acco >rds, granting the Palestinians limited self-rule in the Israeli-occupied >territories. > >Six months later, he made a triumphant return to Gaza after a 27-year exile. >Shortly after, in 1994, he shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Rabin and Israeli >Foreign Minister Shimon Peres. But not everyone accepted Arafat as a >peacemaker. > >I think it was one of the low points of the Nobel Prize," Netanyahu said. > >The early 1990s were also a high point in Arafat's private life. He married >his wife, Suha, more than 30 years his junior, in secret in November 1991. >Their daughter, Zahwa, was born in 1995. > >Yet despite his public and private accomplishments, violence in the Middle >East never came to a complete halt. Attacks and counterattacks by both sides >continued. >Peace deal elusive >The Oslo accords turned out to be the zenith of Palestinian diplomacy under >Arafat. A 2000 meeting at Camp David between Arafat, who had been elected >president of the new Palestinian Authority in 1996, and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud >Barak, ended without a peace deal. > >Accounts at the time said negotiations snagged over the sensitive issue of >Jerusalem, which both Palestinians and Israelis claim as their capital. > >"The popular statement is that Arafat was offered almost everything he wanted >at Camp David in July 2000 and he rejected this because he didn't have the >courage to accept these terms that Barak offered to him at that time," said >Goldschmidt, the Penn State professor. > >By then, Arafat was no longer the sole spokesman of the Palestinian people. >Other groups had gained prominence, most notably Hamas, the organization that >has claimed responsibility for dozens of terror attacks against Israeli >civilian and military targets. The group's prominence rose during the intifada of the >1980s, a popular uprising that grew outside of Arafat's control. > >"Certainly Hamas would not have supported him," if he had accepted the Camp >David proposal, Goldschmidt said. "But even a lot of Palestinians who were not >backers of Hamas were very anxious that he should not accept those terms." > >Rubin disputed the notion that Hamas had any serious sway over Arafat and >noted that the Oslo agreement, signed seven years before, allowed ample time to >prepare for concessions. > >Thousands have died "because this man refused to make peace in the year >2000," he said. "He could've done it. He didn't do it. The cost has been >horrendous." > >Ken Stein, professor of Middle East history and political science at Emory >University, said Arafat was never willing or able to separate himself from the >Palestinian nationalist movement. > >"He is probably typical of Arab leaders of a certain age cohort that came out >of the post-colonial period," Stein said. "He saw his struggle as a very >parochial one, and he didn't put it in the broader context of what was going on in >the rest of the world." > >In that sense, Arafat's style of rule was ill-suited to negotiation, Stein >said. "In the negotiations, he sort of let everyone go their own way but never >gave anyone all the information they needed to create a deal." > >Ending in isolation > > >After Camp David, Arafat was increasingly isolated from the peace process. >Under pressure from the United States, he ceded some power over the Palestinian >Authority's day-to-day workings and allowed a prime minister to be appointed. > >Twice in 2002, Israel besieged his West Bank headquarters in Ramallah in >response to an escalation in Palestinian terrorist attacks. >Israeli forces raze the area around Arafat's compound in Ramallah in 2002. >"Arafat has established a coalition of terrorism against Israel," Sharon said >in March 2002, shortly after an all-night Cabinet meeting. "He is an enemy >and at this stage he will be isolated." > >Arafat responded defiantly, saying said no one in the Arab world would >"surrender or bow" to Israel. > >"They either want to kill me, or capture me, or expel me," Arafat said, >speaking March 29, 2002, by telephone to Al-Jazeera television from his >headquarters in Ramallah. "I hope I will be a martyr in the Holy Land. I have chosen this >path and if I fall, one day a Palestinian child will raise the Palestinian >flag above our mosques and churches." > >One more attempt at brokering peace came during this time, when the United >States, Russia, the European Union and United Nations created what diplomats >described as a "road map" for peace. The plan called for Arafat's dream of a >Palestinian state by 2005. But the plan stalled within months, in the face of >ongoing Palestinian attacks against Israeli civilians and Israeli incursions. > >In the year of his death, Arafat's world had shrunk to the size of his >compound in Ramallah. The Palestinian leader feared exile by Israel if he were to >leave. > >Meanwhile, Israel announced unilateral plans to pull out of Gaza and part of >the West Bank, and rejected Palestinian demands for the right for refugees to >return to former lands inside Israel. > >Even before Arafat's death, there were symbolic signs of change, like >Arafat's empty chair at the executive meeting of the PLO. The two men who are now >running the government - former Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas and the current >Prime Minster Ahmed Qorei, have reputations as moderates. Activists outside the >Palestinian leadership were looking at Arafat's death as an opportunity to push >for reforms -- open and accountable government, elections, and reforming of >the Palestinian security services - that Arafat fought against for years > >"If this is the only opportunity offered to us as Palestinian reformers and >as democrats, then we have to grasp that opportunity and build on it," said >Riad El-Malki, a Palestinian political activist. > >Palestinian legislator Hanan Ashrawi acknowledged that a post-Arafat >government would have to change, saying Palestinians viewed Arafat differently from >any other leader and accepted from him things they would not accept from others. > > >"The decision making will be shared and there will be closer accountability >because of all the things that people accepted from Arafat, or even gave Arafat >because of his stature, his historical standing, his revolutionary image, his >national identification, they will not forgive anyone else." > >In one of his last addresses to the Palestinian people, Arafat echoed themes >that harkened back over five decades. Israel cannot gain security, he warned, >until there is an independent Palestinian homeland "free from occupation, free >from settlements, free from the Israeli siege." > >いいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいい >To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface >at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html > >To Search in the Gambia-L archives, go to: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/CGI/wa.exe?S1=gambia-l >To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to: >[log in to unmask] >いいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいいい