thedrifter
03-07-05, 07:56 AM
03-03-2005
Yasser Arafat’s Treacherous Legacy
Editor’s note: The ongoing U.S occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan clearly indicate that the United States will keep a significant military presence in the Middle East for the indefinite future. In that light, this analysis of the late PLO chairman’s true goals and the future of the Palestinian people is of direct significance to the men and women in U.S. military uniform serving in that tempestuous region now – and in years to come.
By Jim Simpson
The January elections in Iraq have awoken dormant aspirations for freedom all over the Middle East. From protests in Lebanon and the fall of Lebanon’s Syrian-backed government, to promised elections in Egypt, a bright flame of hope has been kindled. Adding to the optimism, the recent death of Yasser Arafat paved the way for election of a new Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, upon whom the world has pinned high hopes for a peaceful resolution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.
Since this conflict is said to be the epicenter of Middle Eastern turmoil, how realistic are hopes for its resolution? How much faith can we put in Mahmoud Abbas? To even begin to honestly evaluate these questions, we must first dispense with the myths and legends surrounding Arafat and make a full and honest disclosure of his record and the nature of the organization through whose ranks he rose. Such honesty has unfortunately been sorely lacking in public discourse over the past thirty years, but is essential if we are to accurately gauge Abbas’ prospects for success.
There was an outpouring of sympathy from leaders around the globe following Arafat’s death on Nov. 11, 2004. Typical was the remark by French President Jacques Chirac, who called him “a man of courage and conviction who for 40 years incarnated the Palestinians' fight for recognition of their national rights.”
Without doubt, Arafat is the person most often identified with the cause of Palestinian statehood. But this characterization, made popular by the mainstream Western media, and reflected in remarks by leaders such as Chirac, is so far off the mark one wonders how they could have remained so uniformly deluded for so long.
So who and what was Yasser Arafat really? We’ll start by defining what he was not.
What Yasser Arafat was not
Yasser Arafat was not a Palestinian. He was an Egyptian. He was born in Cairo Egypt, as Mohammed Abdel-Raouf Arafat As Qudwa al-Hussaeini, of a merchant father from Gaza who shuttled back and forth between the two cities. His mother was from Jerusalem. Now you might conclude from his parentage that this could still make him a Palestinian by heritage if not birth. But in fact – and this may shock you – there is no cultural, racial or national “Palestinian” identity except that invented by the PLO. Palestinians are simply Arabs who have lived for a time in the area generally regarded as “Palestine.”
Who could make such an audacious claim? Former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir did, for one. Perhaps however, it would be more credible coming from the PLO itself. Every now and then, such groups dispense with the propaganda and reveal what they are really up to. PLO executive committee member Zahir Muhsein made one such statement to a Dutch newspaper in 1977. He said:
“The Palestinian people does not [sic] exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct "Palestinian people" to oppose Zionism.
Going even further back, the PLO’s first leader, another Egyptian named Ahmed
Shukairy, said in 1956, before the PLO was even born: “It is common knowledge that Palestine is nothing but southern Syria.”
According to a 2001 article in WorldNetDaily by Joseph Farah: “Palestine is no more real than Never-Never Land.” The Romans first applied the name in 70 A.D. as an insult to the Jews, being derived from “Philistines,” a people conquered by the Jews centuries before. It was ruled alternately by Rome, by Islamic and Christian crusaders, by the Ottoman Empire and by the British after World War I, but there has never been a land known as Palestine governed by Palestinians. There is no identifiable Palestinian language or culture. Palestinians are Arabs, indistinguishable from Syrians, Lebanese, Jordanians Saudis and Iraqis.
Yasser Arafat was not a champion of Palestinian statehood. His purpose was the elimination of Israel as part of the larger goal of eliminating western influence in the region and creating one unified Arab nation throughout the Middle East. In Article 15, The PLO charter clearly states:
“The liberation of Palestine, from an Arab viewpoint, is a national (qawmi) duty and it attempts to repel the Zionist and imperialist aggression against the Arab homeland, and aims at the elimination of Zionism in Palestine.”
It has been asserted that the correct translation for “elimination of Zionism” is “elimination of Israel.” The phrase “imperialist aggression,” as usual, refers to the Western powers in general and the United States in particular. Nothing in the PLO charter has changed to this day despite the many contradictory statements from Arafat and other PLO leaders suggesting they would settle for a “Palestinian state” coexisting side-by-side with Israel. A Palestinian state is not their goal, never has been.
The PLO sees Palestine and Palestinians as “an integral part of the Arab nation,” and that Palestinian “liberation” and “Arab unity” are complementary goals.
In Articles 13 and 14, the PLO charter states:
“13. Arab unity and the liberation of Palestine are two complementary objectives, the attainment of either of which facilitates the attainment of the other. Thus, Arab unity leads to the liberation of Palestine, the liberation of Palestine leads to Arab unity; and work toward the realization of one objective proceeds side by side with work toward the realization of the other.”
“14. The destiny of the Arab nation, and indeed Arab existence itself, depend upon the destiny of the Palestine cause. From this interdependence springs the Arab nation’s pursuit of, and striving for, the liberation of Palestine. The people of Palestine play the role of the vanguard in the realization of this sacred (qawmi) goal.”
To see this clearly, one must understand what they mean by “Arab unity.” As I have asserted in previous DefenseWatch articles (see “Regime Change Means Eradicating the Ba’ath Party,” DefenseWatch, Feb. 19, 2003), it is another phrase for the “single Arab nation” idea pursued by the Ba’athists of Iraq and Syria, which in turn is a twist on the familiar “unification” demands of communist movements all over the world as justification for aggression, including but not limited to Vietnam (“One Vietnam”), Korea (Unification), and Red China (Taiwan is a “breakaway” province which needs to be reunified with the mainland).
It is not surprising therefore that Yasser Arafat’s Fatah organization, and all the other Palestinian revolutionary movements for that matter, have received much of their support from Syria and (until Operation Iraqi Freedom), Iraq. For unlike the other nations of the Middle East, who would rather maintain national autonomy, the Ba’athists support the idea of a “Common Arab Homeland” (unified under the Ba’athist banner, of course).
This is not surprising either, given the fact that both the PLO and the Ba’athist movement were originally creations of the Soviet Union. From its inception, the PLO was a Soviet-inspired Communist movement.
This is evidenced in the Charter’s frequent use of familiar terms like “Imperialist” and “Imperialism” which are KGB-coined invectives for the United States, and others like “Vanguard” and “Progressive,” which are familiar Soviet terms applied to communists and communist movements.
But you need not decipher words in the charter to reach that conclusion. Former CIA Deputy Director Ray Cline provided ample proof in his 1984 book Terrorism, The Soviet Connection.
And there’s more. Ion Pacepa, acting chief of Romanian foreign intelligence, was the highest-ranking intelligence officer to ever defect from the Soviet Bloc. His group was tasked with training PLO leaders. In a recent interview with FrontPageMagazine.com, he recalled:
“The PLO was dreamt up by the KGB, which had a penchant for ‘liberation’ organizations. In 1964 the first PLO council, consisting of 422 Palestinian representatives handpicked by the KGB, approved the Palestinian National Charter – a document that had been drafted in Moscow.”
The most damning evidence against Arafat’s claimed aspirations for Palestinian statehood however, are his own words. In his FrontPage interview, Pacepa describes an exchange Arafat had with late Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu in 1978. Ceausescu had just informed him that Moscow wanted him to pretend that the PLO was willing to renounce terrorism in hopes of becoming a Palestinian state. Soviet General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev thought that then-President Carter would buy it:
“But we are a revolution,” Arafat exploded ... “We were born as a revolution and we should remain an unfettered revolution.” Arafat expostulated that the Palestinians lacked the tradition, unity and discipline to become a formal state [emphasis mine] ... and he was not willing to put any laws or other obstacles in the way of the Palestinian struggle to eradicate the state of Israel.
But Ceausescu prevailed on Arafat, Pacepa noted:
“Ceausescu ... told [Arafat] that, if he would transform the PLO into a government-in-exile and would pretend to break with terrorism, the West would shower him with money and glory. ‘But you have to keep on pretending, over and over’ ... in the shadow of your government-in-exile you can keep as many terrorist groups as you want, as long as they are not publicly connected with your name.
continued....
Yasser Arafat’s Treacherous Legacy
Editor’s note: The ongoing U.S occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan clearly indicate that the United States will keep a significant military presence in the Middle East for the indefinite future. In that light, this analysis of the late PLO chairman’s true goals and the future of the Palestinian people is of direct significance to the men and women in U.S. military uniform serving in that tempestuous region now – and in years to come.
By Jim Simpson
The January elections in Iraq have awoken dormant aspirations for freedom all over the Middle East. From protests in Lebanon and the fall of Lebanon’s Syrian-backed government, to promised elections in Egypt, a bright flame of hope has been kindled. Adding to the optimism, the recent death of Yasser Arafat paved the way for election of a new Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, upon whom the world has pinned high hopes for a peaceful resolution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.
Since this conflict is said to be the epicenter of Middle Eastern turmoil, how realistic are hopes for its resolution? How much faith can we put in Mahmoud Abbas? To even begin to honestly evaluate these questions, we must first dispense with the myths and legends surrounding Arafat and make a full and honest disclosure of his record and the nature of the organization through whose ranks he rose. Such honesty has unfortunately been sorely lacking in public discourse over the past thirty years, but is essential if we are to accurately gauge Abbas’ prospects for success.
There was an outpouring of sympathy from leaders around the globe following Arafat’s death on Nov. 11, 2004. Typical was the remark by French President Jacques Chirac, who called him “a man of courage and conviction who for 40 years incarnated the Palestinians' fight for recognition of their national rights.”
Without doubt, Arafat is the person most often identified with the cause of Palestinian statehood. But this characterization, made popular by the mainstream Western media, and reflected in remarks by leaders such as Chirac, is so far off the mark one wonders how they could have remained so uniformly deluded for so long.
So who and what was Yasser Arafat really? We’ll start by defining what he was not.
What Yasser Arafat was not
Yasser Arafat was not a Palestinian. He was an Egyptian. He was born in Cairo Egypt, as Mohammed Abdel-Raouf Arafat As Qudwa al-Hussaeini, of a merchant father from Gaza who shuttled back and forth between the two cities. His mother was from Jerusalem. Now you might conclude from his parentage that this could still make him a Palestinian by heritage if not birth. But in fact – and this may shock you – there is no cultural, racial or national “Palestinian” identity except that invented by the PLO. Palestinians are simply Arabs who have lived for a time in the area generally regarded as “Palestine.”
Who could make such an audacious claim? Former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir did, for one. Perhaps however, it would be more credible coming from the PLO itself. Every now and then, such groups dispense with the propaganda and reveal what they are really up to. PLO executive committee member Zahir Muhsein made one such statement to a Dutch newspaper in 1977. He said:
“The Palestinian people does not [sic] exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct "Palestinian people" to oppose Zionism.
Going even further back, the PLO’s first leader, another Egyptian named Ahmed
Shukairy, said in 1956, before the PLO was even born: “It is common knowledge that Palestine is nothing but southern Syria.”
According to a 2001 article in WorldNetDaily by Joseph Farah: “Palestine is no more real than Never-Never Land.” The Romans first applied the name in 70 A.D. as an insult to the Jews, being derived from “Philistines,” a people conquered by the Jews centuries before. It was ruled alternately by Rome, by Islamic and Christian crusaders, by the Ottoman Empire and by the British after World War I, but there has never been a land known as Palestine governed by Palestinians. There is no identifiable Palestinian language or culture. Palestinians are Arabs, indistinguishable from Syrians, Lebanese, Jordanians Saudis and Iraqis.
Yasser Arafat was not a champion of Palestinian statehood. His purpose was the elimination of Israel as part of the larger goal of eliminating western influence in the region and creating one unified Arab nation throughout the Middle East. In Article 15, The PLO charter clearly states:
“The liberation of Palestine, from an Arab viewpoint, is a national (qawmi) duty and it attempts to repel the Zionist and imperialist aggression against the Arab homeland, and aims at the elimination of Zionism in Palestine.”
It has been asserted that the correct translation for “elimination of Zionism” is “elimination of Israel.” The phrase “imperialist aggression,” as usual, refers to the Western powers in general and the United States in particular. Nothing in the PLO charter has changed to this day despite the many contradictory statements from Arafat and other PLO leaders suggesting they would settle for a “Palestinian state” coexisting side-by-side with Israel. A Palestinian state is not their goal, never has been.
The PLO sees Palestine and Palestinians as “an integral part of the Arab nation,” and that Palestinian “liberation” and “Arab unity” are complementary goals.
In Articles 13 and 14, the PLO charter states:
“13. Arab unity and the liberation of Palestine are two complementary objectives, the attainment of either of which facilitates the attainment of the other. Thus, Arab unity leads to the liberation of Palestine, the liberation of Palestine leads to Arab unity; and work toward the realization of one objective proceeds side by side with work toward the realization of the other.”
“14. The destiny of the Arab nation, and indeed Arab existence itself, depend upon the destiny of the Palestine cause. From this interdependence springs the Arab nation’s pursuit of, and striving for, the liberation of Palestine. The people of Palestine play the role of the vanguard in the realization of this sacred (qawmi) goal.”
To see this clearly, one must understand what they mean by “Arab unity.” As I have asserted in previous DefenseWatch articles (see “Regime Change Means Eradicating the Ba’ath Party,” DefenseWatch, Feb. 19, 2003), it is another phrase for the “single Arab nation” idea pursued by the Ba’athists of Iraq and Syria, which in turn is a twist on the familiar “unification” demands of communist movements all over the world as justification for aggression, including but not limited to Vietnam (“One Vietnam”), Korea (Unification), and Red China (Taiwan is a “breakaway” province which needs to be reunified with the mainland).
It is not surprising therefore that Yasser Arafat’s Fatah organization, and all the other Palestinian revolutionary movements for that matter, have received much of their support from Syria and (until Operation Iraqi Freedom), Iraq. For unlike the other nations of the Middle East, who would rather maintain national autonomy, the Ba’athists support the idea of a “Common Arab Homeland” (unified under the Ba’athist banner, of course).
This is not surprising either, given the fact that both the PLO and the Ba’athist movement were originally creations of the Soviet Union. From its inception, the PLO was a Soviet-inspired Communist movement.
This is evidenced in the Charter’s frequent use of familiar terms like “Imperialist” and “Imperialism” which are KGB-coined invectives for the United States, and others like “Vanguard” and “Progressive,” which are familiar Soviet terms applied to communists and communist movements.
But you need not decipher words in the charter to reach that conclusion. Former CIA Deputy Director Ray Cline provided ample proof in his 1984 book Terrorism, The Soviet Connection.
And there’s more. Ion Pacepa, acting chief of Romanian foreign intelligence, was the highest-ranking intelligence officer to ever defect from the Soviet Bloc. His group was tasked with training PLO leaders. In a recent interview with FrontPageMagazine.com, he recalled:
“The PLO was dreamt up by the KGB, which had a penchant for ‘liberation’ organizations. In 1964 the first PLO council, consisting of 422 Palestinian representatives handpicked by the KGB, approved the Palestinian National Charter – a document that had been drafted in Moscow.”
The most damning evidence against Arafat’s claimed aspirations for Palestinian statehood however, are his own words. In his FrontPage interview, Pacepa describes an exchange Arafat had with late Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu in 1978. Ceausescu had just informed him that Moscow wanted him to pretend that the PLO was willing to renounce terrorism in hopes of becoming a Palestinian state. Soviet General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev thought that then-President Carter would buy it:
“But we are a revolution,” Arafat exploded ... “We were born as a revolution and we should remain an unfettered revolution.” Arafat expostulated that the Palestinians lacked the tradition, unity and discipline to become a formal state [emphasis mine] ... and he was not willing to put any laws or other obstacles in the way of the Palestinian struggle to eradicate the state of Israel.
But Ceausescu prevailed on Arafat, Pacepa noted:
“Ceausescu ... told [Arafat] that, if he would transform the PLO into a government-in-exile and would pretend to break with terrorism, the West would shower him with money and glory. ‘But you have to keep on pretending, over and over’ ... in the shadow of your government-in-exile you can keep as many terrorist groups as you want, as long as they are not publicly connected with your name.
continued....