Arafat - Should I stay or should I go?

[Nader]

Drop "daisy cutters" on Palestinian REFUGEES? Who are you? You should be ashamed of yourself.

Wayne, be careful when introducing topics like this. Many of those who are vocal about the topic are obviously not qualified to make comments. But it's a free country and it's your board.

[Roland Kunz]

Hello

Is there a alternative to Arafat ?

Sharon and Arafat share the same problem, they are warheads ( heros ? ).
Both need a enemy to get power by there people.

If you remove the enemy you will see that they have no
answers for the real live problems from there people.

Both share also the "all or nothing" attitude and are not willingly to lose their face.

Arafat might not be clean electet ( is Bush clean electet ? Every vote counts ? ) and he is double tounged ( like most politicians ) but he is able to have most palestinains behind him and had enough respect to keep some control over the crowd.

If you pull Arafat out off the game ( he is far out allready ) what will fill up the vacuum ? And if the palestinians are pushed more when will they reach the final boil point ?

As far I see it Clinton and his political backbone made some clever moves and made the best out from the situation. The Problem was that after Rabin was shoot the political atmosphere in Isreal changed to a more conservative way and Israel startet to be double tounged or picking splinters in other eyes.

Grüsse

[MRM]

Arafat is a corrupt terrorist who survives on the blood of innocent people. You cannot compare anything the Israelis have done to his campaign of death against innocent civilians.

So Sharon "triggered" the latest Palestinian Intafada by a visit to the Temple Mound? Excuse me, but since when does visiting a Holy shrine (Holy in three religions, no less) that should be open to the public amount to a triggering of a genocidal campaign? Same question goes for theterrorists who occupied the Church of the Nativity. Sharon can't visit a public site without starting (carefully controlled by Arafat) riots, but Arab gunmen can occupy Christianity's most Holy site with impunity and great public sympathy?

The answer is that Arafat maintains his position by manipulating the Palestinians into violence against Israel, and the Arab nations do the same. Why doesn't Syria give the Palestinain refugees a home? Or Egypt, Lybia, Iran, Iraq, etc? It's because if they ever became something other than displaced people who focused their rage at Israel, they would turn on the corrupt dicaters like those that run the Arab states. Meanwhile, Arafat gets rich. Know who runs the duty free shops in the Arab world? The PLO. Know who gets a cut of every deal? Arafat and his cronies.

It is difficult for Americans to understand Arafat. of The closest analogy would be that of a Godfather or warlord. He is simply the head of the most powerful crime family in the Mid East. He does not deal in good faith. He takes what he can and kills as he wants or needs to maintain his position.

I agree with Sharon about how Isreal should have dealt with Arafat when they had the chance. As for someone worse coming after him, deal with him in the same way until a Palestinian Attaturk arrises. Until then, there will be no peace in the Middle East because the ones who can stop the violence are the ones who profit by creating it.

[Roland Kunz]

Hello

Yeah I´m the bad evil german

Roland's remark is typical of Euro-weenie sentiment, sorry can´t find weenie in my dictionary but if weenie is peaceloving then i thank you. Normaly we huns are wardrivers and our neighbours have to fear us which holds that the source of Israel's problems with terrorism is...Israel and the Jews, whatever they do

OH did I say that ?. First there is a difference between jews and israel. One of my friends is a jew and he is very ashamed about what is going on in Israel. Yet Israel isn´t a pure jewisch nation, a large minority are cristians or muslems.
Funny thing is they belive in the same god just read different books. So a Translationerror drives the world most wars.
I don´t like if religion and politcs get mixed together. This is mostly done by people who are very fundamental. Mostly they claim to be on god`s side or that god is with them ( or bless them ). They use god as a shield to justify cruels and to avoid answering earthy questions.

Sometimes I think the always claim the cashgod ( may be the money with me and the profits return the investment )

)Ah yes, Roland, you must have it--it's the Israeli politicians who are responsible for nail bombs that tear children apart in restaurants! great analysis!

Sure I´m responsible for that, forgive me that I forget that.
( it is hard to be a god see also the book from the Strugatzkys)
Fact is physical laws apply also to politics. Actio is followed by reactio. The more force you use the more feedback can be thrown back. However this is relatet to the thing you use as punching ball.

And sure Arafat was also responsible for the Shabra and Shatila Massacre in 1982. He moved out but Sharon just wantet to go sure. Now that generation is grown up and returns the friendly attention Sharon was giving them.

Roland, what do you think about the incitement and anti-semitism in the Arab press, and the anti-semitic speeches given by Arafat, and the calls for the complete murder of all Jews that are so common and forcefully delivered in the Arab world?

Oh well those things are known in germany and we are aware off it. But also Sharon and Likud doesn´t seem to have friendly words to palestineans or arabs. Right now I remeber that Sharon regrets that he didn´t killed Arafat, but I never heard that Arafat regeretet not to have killed Sharon. Sure both have tried hard, risking ( or shreeding ) many lives to aproach there goals.

But to make it clear the Israel nation is closer to me as the arabic nations. Most Israelis sharing the same idears and way to live. they act more human then the arabic nations. Israel is a true democratie and women have the same rights. Also the Israel nation is spliting religon from staate buisness ( official ) and keeps attention to the human rights. This all can´t be said to arabic organized nations yet as long they sit on the oil the US and the UK will whipe the ass from there "god given" leaders who use the oil money to keep the war aginst Israel going.

Do you think that those facts have anything to do with arab terrorism?

Fact is that Sharon and Arafat are big double tounged guys and use every oportunity to gain power.
Now terroismen is a fashionable word especially used from people who are not willing to show or even see the backgrounds.

[/b]Or is it, like the Nazis said in the 1930s, all just the Jews' fault? [/b]
The nazis didn´t claimed the jews alone make the problems.
The main fault was the socialismen and the degeneration from the societiy. Now socialismen was a "jewisch" idear ( You know: Marx, Engels, Trotzki all born jews ). Hitler just needed a enemy to focus the attention . Enemys where: jews, socilists, gays, lesbians, roma/sinti, disabled persons and worthless slavic/arabic or black people.

Arafat and his style of leadership is the problem, because he is a terrorist.
Well from my view i see no difference in the leaderships from Sahron and Araft so Sharon must be a terrorist too.

But apparently people like Ralph and Roland think that all of that is OK, because he has the support of the Palestinian people.
I don´t think that all palestinean people are terrorists, they are just on the wall facing a enemy and try to defend themself. If you give them no reason to fight for there lives and support them to a normal live things will stop over the next years. If you ain´t see a future in living but a future in killing then your perspective is very narrow.

Hey, like I said above (are you paying attention Roland?), Hitler was elected democratically and had the support of his people. So Roland, judging by your logic about Arafat, I assume you would have supported the legitimacy of the Hitler presidency?

UH strange:
Sharon was elected democratically and had the support of his people. So Noah, judging by your logic I assume you would have supported the legitimacy of the Hitler presidency.

When Hitler was electet he didn´t make a secret about who he is going to fight and what he will do. he didn´t saied I will sent all jews into a concentrationcamp and use them like animals.

He said: I will fight our enemys and try to get the lost countrys back to reunite the nation and I will be a strong hand not giving up those goals becourse we then have a better live and not to fear the enemys inside germany nor on the border. if you vote for me you vote for a strong powerfull germany who will stop the socialistic underminimg and the jweisch bankrobbery to our healthy volksbody.

Yeah Hitler was the first propagandic Politician using Radio, Movies and TV to impress people.

Even more strange like Hitler, Sharon was supportet by the industrie amd his goal is to recoup lost land ( or anex fresh land ) and he will not stop untill he has all ( or nothing ).

Oh btw on the secound election Hitler lost and then he burnt the Reichstag and pushed the Notstandsgesetze to become a dictator.

So Roland, judging by your logic about Arafat, I assume you would have supported the legitimacy of the Hitler presidency

I would have supportet Hitler the same way I support Sharon or Bush. I just don´t like there way of politics and what is behind them. In fact my Grandfathers had been socialists and my grandoncel had the opportunity to work 3 years in a concentration camp to pay back his duty to the third reich even before "just" jews arrived into them. In fact he had been released as they needed the place for new "hosts" and he was to weak to do any usefull work. He didn´t survived very long.
Killed by exhaustive working.

My father was sent to the Hitlerjugend to save the ass from my grandfahter and he was sent into war without any choice.
There was no way to leave germany. Every boader was closed and the border countrys sent the refugees back to the Reich. Guess what happend to them. The only way out was to pay the big bill and travel out with a bit more then a suitcase into a unknown country. Now jewisch people had friends who invitet them and payed there passage, but socialists where only welcomed in the CCCP and Stalin was not a friendly guy.

Just imagen how the palestineans feel right now, and where should they go ?

Now coming to hard facts:

A Petition for International Investigation Committee on Yasser Arafat and his co-conspirators for Crimes of Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity http://www.petitiononline.com/770MN1/petition.html


A Petition for International Investigation Committee on Ariel Sharon’s crimes against humanity http://www.petitiononline.com/warcrime/petition.html

Sharon regrets not killing Arafat during Israeli invasion of Lebanon
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,642881,00.html

Israel's Sharon Accused As War Criminal http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2001/2825_sharon_criminal.html

[Roland Kunz]

Breakaway Ally: How Reagan's
1982 Peace Was Drowned In Blood
by Michele Steinberg


On Oct. 12, 2001, when Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's spokesmen attacked President George W. Bush for speaking of a "vision" of a Palestinian state, they were implicitly warning that the radical forces in Israel's military will massacre civilians by the hundreds if that's what it takes to stop a U.S. peace initiative.

However implicit the threat, that is exactly Sharon Cabinet Minister Dan Nevah meant when he said that Israel will not accept "ideas which include at their core the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.... All history shows that when the Americans put a plan on the table, like the famous Reagan plan, the programs did not achieve their aims" (emphasis added). The same day, Raanan Gissin, Sharon's spokesman and ardent defender of the "preventive assassination" program, added: "Jerusalem will remain the capital of the Jewish people.... The United States will never submit to Israel, by surprise, a plan for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The United States has never imposed a plan that both sides have not accepted." Sharon has demanded to clear any U.S. plans in advance.

A retired U.S. diplomat confirmed to EIR that there was a Ronald Reagan peace plan issued in September 1982, which had been worked out primarily in discussions between the Reagan Administration and Arab leaders, including Jordan's King Hussein. On Sept. 1, 1982, in a national address, President Reagan presented the plan to the American public without having allowed the Israelis to "censor" what they didn't like.

According to Washington sources, because Reagan violated this "rule," the plan was "Dead on Arrival," with Gen. Ariel Sharon's massacre of 800 Palestinian civilian men, women and children at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Lebanon weeks afterward—Sept. 18, 1982. According to another high level U.S. source, who has spent two decades working on a Middle East peace initiative, it was the bombing of the U.S. Marines barracks in Beirut in October 1983, in which over 200 Marines were killed, that was the "final nail in the coffin" for the Reagan peace initiative. By March 30, 1984, under intense Congressional pressure, Reagan pulled the United States out of the UN multinational force that he had helped create.

Without these specific war and terrorist actions, said this source, a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians could well have been finalized a decade ago.

This story—the 1982 "breakaway ally scenario"—should be a bitter reminder to Washington officials and others, that the right-wing pro-Likud party faction in Washington, especially among the "Wolfowitz cabal" (named for Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz) lie when they try to link Ariel Sharon to the "Reagan tradition," to manipulate President Bush and Republicans.

The LaRouche Factor
The bloody attacks on the Reagan peace plan are a chilling parallel with today's events, a parallel which has been uniquely identified by Lyndon LaRouche, the 2004 Democratic Presidential pre-candidate. Specifically, the Oct. 17, 2001 assassination of Israeli Minister of Tourism Rehavam Ze'evi, and the June 1982 attempt on the life of Israeli Ambassador to London Shlomo Argov, served as identical ruses, used by right-wing forces in the Israeli military to stop any peace initiative.

On June 8, 1982, LaRouche—who had been a 1980 Democratic Presidential contender—announced that "Israeli and other sources" had provided corroborated intelligence to him indicating that "British intelligence services orchestrated the Abu Nidal gang's assassination attack" against Argov. LaRouche noted that Argov's "security screen" was dropped in London "precisely at the time the attack was deployed," and that the British government had "stripped" Argov of his security forces prior to the attack. LaRouche exposed that then-Defense Minister Ariel Sharon—who promptly used the attack on Argov to invade Lebanon—had "secret agreements" with controllers of the Abu Nidal organization to facilitate Israel's occupying Lebanon. Most importantly, LaRouche revealed that "Prime Minister Menachem Begin had been attempting to prevent an Israeli military invasion of Lebanon" under agreements with Reagan, while "Sharon and U.S. Secretary of State [Alexander] Haig, London and Paris have been conniving behind the backs" of Reagan and Begin to get their invasion.

To stop the impending disaster that began with Sharon's green light to invade Lebanon on June 8, 1982, LaRouche said that Reagan, then on a "useless protracted junket" arranged by Haig, "must come home immediately, fire Haig, [Defense Secretary] Weinberger, [Fed Chairman Paul] Volcker, and a few others, and for the first time since he became President, actually begin to take charge of the situation." In fact, Haig was ousted as Secretary of State in short order, due to a combination of his secret deal with Sharon over invading Lebanon, and his collusion with British Foreign Secretary Lord Peter Carrington's preparations, in early 1982, for the British war with Argentina over the Malvinas.

But the bloodletting in Lebanon was fully under way, and would get even worse, as Reagan failed to unconditionally defeat Sharon's "breakaway ally scenario" in Lebanon, or its authors in London and Washington.

Precursor To A Palestinian State
But on Sept. 1, 1982, despite the months of bloody battles in Lebanon after the Israeli invasion, and despite the attempt by the Israelis and the Lebanise Phalangist militias to wipe out the Palestine Liberation Organization, headed by Yasser Arafat, Reagan deployed U.S. Marines to protect the PLO fighters evacuating Lebanon for Tunisia. It was not the finest strategy, but it was clear that Reagan intended that the place for Palestinians to be was not Lebanon, Jordan, or some other country—but Palestine; and he had been vigorously discussing this option with leaders in the Middle East and Washington.

In Reagan's Sept. 1, 1982, national address, he said, quoting Scripture, that it was "time to follow after the things which make for peace," and laid out an "initiative for a far-reaching peace effort." "The war in Lebanon," said the President, "has demonstrated many things, but two consequences are key to the peace process. First, the military losses of the PLO have not diminished the yearning of the Palestinian people for a just solution of their claims; and second, while Israel's military successes in Lebanon have demonstrated that its armed forces are second to none in the region, they alone cannot bring just and lasting peace to Israel and her neighbors."

Reagan said the evacuation from Lebanon "dramatizes more than ever the homelessness of the Palestinians"; the Palestinians' "legitimate rights" and "just requirements" must be resolved "at the negotiating table" in the framework of Camp David where the return of the Sinai to Egypt had just been effected in April 1982, Begin and Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak. In his speech, Reagan revealed that it was the Israeli invasion of Lebanon that had stymied taking the Camp David process between Egypt and Israel to his intended next step: Israel and Palestine.

The main points of Reagan's five-page speech are much in accord with the proposals of the Mitchell Commission of 2001; especially, on the question of Israeli settlements. Reagan specified:

* Palestinian inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza must have "full autonomy over their own affairs ... [with] due consideration to the principle of self government";

* "a five-year period of transition, which would begin after free elections for a self-governing Palestinian authority"; This would prove that "Palestinian autonomy poses no threat to Israel's security";

* "The United States will not support the use of any additional land for the purpose of [Israeli] settlements during the transitional [five-year] period. Indeed, the immediate adoption of a settlement freeze by Israel, more than any other action, could create the confidence needed";

* "further settlement activity is in no way necessary for the security of Israel," but in fact diminishes the confidence needed for negotiations.

The President explicitly said that he was not supporting a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, but also that he "will not support annexation or permanent control by Israel" of those territories. Rather, said Reagan, he envisioned "self-government by the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza in association with Jordan," and the full adherence by Israel to the "withdrawal provision of UN Security Council resolution 242" as it applies to "all fronts, including the West Bank and Gaza."

He proudly announced that the preparation of this proposal had been accomplished "for once" with "no premature leaks" as U.S. "Ambassadors in Israel, Egypt, Jordan, and Saudia Arabia ... presented to their host governments the proposals in full detail." He also called for direct negotiations between the Palestinians and Israelis, and said that the "final status" of Jerusalem "should be decided through negotiation."

The proposal was greeted with enthusiasm by Lebanese leaders, and by the Mayor of Bethlehem, a Palestinian. But, secretly, the Begin government went into fits, special meetings, and sabotage. By Sept. 18, the hoped-for the peace initiative was killed. The White House issued a terse sentence that accompanied an official Presidential statement. "On Sept. 17, hundreds of Palestinian men, women, and children had been murdered in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps south of Beirut," noted the White House.

[Roland Kunz]

snip some 1000 words
---

On June 17, 2001, British Broadcasting Corporation's television show "Panorama," reopened the issue of the Lebanon war, and particularly the Sabra and Shatila massacres, pointing the finger at current Prime Minister Sharon in a broadcast entitled "The Accused." Witnesses from the United States, Israel and Lebanon, made clear that Sharon knew that the Phalange militia were going to conduct "revenge" murders of civilians—the Israelis had told the Americans as much one day before the massacre. Morris Draper, the U.S. envoy to Lebanon told BBC's reporter Fergal Keane, that there was more at play than just Sharon's brutality.

Draper told BBC, "America said that the women and children and others left behind [when the PLO evacuated] would be able to live in peace, as long as they obeyed the law and Lebanese jurisdiction. It was as simple as that—a very simple document. I wrote it." Israel signed it, and then violated the promise to President Reagan.

President Bush should be armed with the real history of Reagan's peace effort—not with the lies from the Sharon gang in Israel, and the treasonous Wolfowitz cabal in Washington.
http://www.larouchepub.com/pr/site_packages/2002/sharon/2843drown_rr_plan_in_blood.html

Arafat: Flawed symbol of Palestine http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/middle_east/newsid_87000/87713.stm

Who or what, will replace Yasser Arafat? http://www.israelinsider.com/channels/diplomacy/articles/dip_0132.htm

Ariel Sharon, Role Profile (Spring 1993)
http://inic.utexas.edu/menic/oil/game/simulation/profiles/sp1993/0015.html

Isolate Ariel Sharon Now


By Avi Mograbi, first published in die tageszeitung (Berlin), 4/2/02

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



I am sitting in front of my television set watching the broadcast of Al-Jazeera the Katar based satellite channel. I don’t understand a word they say, they speak Arabic and I don’t, but I fully understand the images. The Israeli (our) tanks have put a siege on the compound of Yasar Arafat in Ramalla and have penetrated into the compound creating unbelievable damage.

Last night the Israeli (our) government has decided on a large scale operation (that will demand extra forces, so 20,000 reserve soldiers have been recruited) to diminish terror.

I am not a great supporter of the Israeli (our) prime minister but let us say I am and that I too think that terror can be diminished by force. Now I ask myself why should the isolation of Mr. Arafat in his headquarters do just that? Would this stop the next suicide bomber who’s already been detonated from going out to a crowded place and blow himself up? Does the isolation of the president of the Palestinian Authority bring back any hope to those who have lost it and have made up their minds to turn our life as miserable as theirs? If Mr. Sharon would have commanded the Israeli (our) military to find the operation bases, to locate the explosives storages, to put into captivity the operators and the executioners of the terrorist acts, then those who believe terror can be won by force might have had the hope that he will succeed in reducing the number of terror acts. But in putting Arafat in a cage (our) prime minister Sharon has only given the next suicide bomber the incentive to go out and create more grief.

The sad truth is that Mr. Sharon has no hope to give to Palestinians and Israelis alike. In 29 years of political career Mr. Sharon has not given a clue to how he would solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in peaceful ways nor did he support any of the peace agreements already signed with Egypt and Jordan. He can’t give a clue because if your life’s work is the creation of the chain of Jewish settlements in the occupied territories, you have nothing to contribute to settling a conflict that is based around the existance of those very settlements. And indeed this is Mr. Sharon’s life’s work. No other political figure in Israel has contributed more to settling Jews in the occupied territories than Mr. Sharon. From his first days in the ministery of agriculture in 1977 he has been the generator behind confiscating lands in the west bank and Gaza strip and building settlements for Israelis who think that this land is their (our) land.

So I doubt if Mr. Sharon’s true aims are to stop terror and bring to the renewal of peace talks between Israel and Palestine. If the negotiations start Mr. Sharon will be faced with the crucial and almost sole issue that has to be resolved and that is the future of the settlements he has given his best years to create, his life’s work. I believe that Mr. Sharon’s true aim is to find ways to avoid facing this question.

It's funny nobody mentions it anymore, but the settlements in the occupied territories are in themselves war crimes. In the fourth Geneva Convention (part 3 section 3) it says "The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies". And when last year Israel was asked to join the new international war crimes tribunal in the Hague it approved its participation with exclusion of the section dealing with settlement of civilian population of the occupyer in occupied territories. Because Israel has indeed settled around 200,000 (two hundred thousand) Jews in the occupied territories, and this is what the Israeli (our) prime minister is out to defend.

Mr. Sharon declares his actions in the past year aim to prevent the killings of Israeli citizens by Palestinian terrorists. During his one year in office more than 300 Israelis were murdered in terrorist acts, more than in any other year since the creation of the state of Israel 54 years ago. Which is only a reminder to the fact that in the 11 months prior to Mr. Sharon’s initiation of the Lebanon War in 1982, not even one Israeli was killed on the border of Israel and Lebanon. Yet during the 18 years Israel has occupied parts of Lebanon since 1982 until May 2000 more than 1000 (one thousand) Israelis were killed in combat and in terrorist attacks in Lebanon and the northern part of Israel. Even if one is a supporter of Mr. Sharon’s ideals one must doubt his capability to prevent bloodshed of Jews. Needless to say that in the course of his futile actions to defend Israelis during the Lebanon War and the current Intifada many more (in unbelievable proportions) Palestinians and Lebanese were killed.

So if our wish is to prevent more bloodshed of both Israelis and Palestinians, maybe it is Mr. Sharon that should be isolated, removed away from a position of power, in a democratic way needless to say.

I call on the next prime minister of Israel (I have no hope that Mr. Sharon will do as I suggest) to declare that within 12 months from his election he will remove all Israeli settlements and military from the occupied territories, no matter what.

During those 12 months he should do his best to negotiate with the Palestinian leadership as to the relationship the two countries will establish after the retreat of the Israeli forces to the 1967 border. If the negotiation will prove futile it will not affect the Israeli complete evacuation of the occupied territories including East Jerusalem.

Avi Mograbi

http://www.frif.com/new2002/mograb.html

[Roland Kunz]

Twenty Years On, Sharon Is Up To No Good
By Robert Fisk
Independent
June 27, 2001
Ariel Sharon is telling the Americans some very old stories. The Palestinians are involved in "international terrorism". The south of Lebanon is a "centre of international terror". There are 2,000 long-range missiles in Lebanon.

This is what he's been telling his American friends in Washington. And it's exactly what he told Ronald Reagan's administration in 1981 and early 1982. Then, he was looking for a "green light" for a major military adventure. Is he doing the same again today? Mr Sharon's first accusation was at the expense of Lebanon. The Iranians, he announced two months ago, had shipped through Lebanese airports 2,000 missiles that were capable of hitting central Israel.

But there are no such missiles in Lebanon. Beirut airport is one of the most secure in the Middle East and not a single satellite picture has been produced to support this nonsense. Then last week, Mr Sharon was telling the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, that the south of Lebanon has been "infiltrated by Iran" and is a "centre of international terror". The Lebanese government, he announced, would be held "responsible".

Which is even more perverse. For, despite several attacks in the past 12 months, southern Lebanon is quieter now than it has been for 25 years. Israeli and Lebanese casualties in the border area have been the lowest for a quarter of a century. Not surprisingly - because they've been through this before - the Lebanese are asking if the Israeli Prime Minister is preparing the ground for another conflict. So are the Palestinians. And it's worth going back to the record to recall how Mr Sharon, then Defence Minister in Menachem Begin's Likud government, said almost exactly the same things about the same people 20 years ago, before a bloodbath that ended in the camps of Sabra and Chatila.

In 1981, the UN had brokered a ceasefire between the Israelis and Palestinians along the south Lebanese border. If there were no Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel, there would be no Israeli air raids on Lebanon, not unlike the current US-brokered truce. Then in 1982, Abu Nidal's anti-Arafat extremist group tried to murder the Israeli ambassador to London. Mr Sharon blamed Yasser Arafat and started bombing Beirut. The Palestinians fired back across the border and the Israelis blamed the Palestinian leader for breaking the ceasefire. Sound familiar? Then Israel invaded Lebanon. In Israel today, where many on the right are urging the Israeli army to invade Palestinian towns and cities after the wicked suicide -bombing in Tel Aviv, the same Mr Arafat is being accused by the Defence Minister, Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, of having "links" with the Saudi militant Osama bin Laden. There is no more proof that Mr Arafat is connected to Mr bin Laden than there was that he had "links" with Abu Nidal. In fact, Abu Nidal hated Mr Arafat. And Mr bin Laden always opposed Mr Arafat's policies. But with Mr bin Laden, and Iran, variously blamed by America for bombing attacks against US embassies, military bases and a warship in Yemen, Mr Sharon is using a formula calculated to have wide appeal to the Bush administration.

Back in 1982, he went to see Alexander Haig for a "green light" to invade Lebanon. So the Arab press are asking if he is not now seeking a "green light" for an offensive against the Palestinians from the US Defense Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld. For it's also worth remembering just what the Israelis did when they reached Beirut in 1982; they surrounded it with gunboats and tanks and bombed it from the air. Mr Sharon's men have already done the same, on a smaller scale, against Gaza. The story of Gaza in 2001, complete blockade, attacks with F-16s and gunboats and tanks, is exactly the same story as Beirut in 1982.

And, of course, it was Mr Sharon in 1982 who invented the 2,000 "terrorists" in Sabra and Chatila - in reality packed with unarmed civilians - before sending the Phalange into the camps. And we all know what happened then. Today, instead of 2,000 fantasy "terrorists", he's invented 2,000 fantasy missiles and has been telling the Americans the same rubbish about Arafat's "terror" links. In all seriousness, the Los Angeles Times yester- day carried a headline that Mr Sharon was "pitching retaliation" as a possible policy. Pitching? Policy?

If Mr Sharon is looking for a "green light", he may get it.

http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/israel-palestine/2001/0627shar.htm

[Roland Kunz]

Lebanon and Limits, Politics & Spirit

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow *

The precipitate withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon brought the Barak government greater support numbers in Israeli polls for fulfilling an election promise and preventing future soldier deaths in the "security zone."

At the same time, it -- and its acompanying sudden appearance in Israel of many thousands of panicky Southern Lebanese seeking asylum, and the swoop of Hezbollah into control of South Lebanon -- was an agonizingly sad demonstration of the importance of having a spiritually rooted politics, and of how destructive it is to think that sheer power -- i.e. "politics" -- can be divorced from spiritual truths.

On the contrary, one of the primary teachings of spirituality -- as Pirkei Avot says, "The greatest hero is the one who can master HIMSELF" -- applies with special force to politics, advising that we always limit the use of the fullest power and control we have.

Hubris in politics is the fullest use of one's own power to control others -- and the result is usually self-destruction. What is spiritually unwise is politically self-destructive.

What were the origins of the events of the last several days?

In 1982, the Israeli army invaded Lebanon, beginning with a PLO-controlled strip in the South. For at least a year before the 1982 invasion, there had been very few cross-border raids by the PLO, and rather a de facto cross-border cease-fire had been observed. At the time, the casus belli alleged by the Begin-Sharon govt was not cross-border attacks but an assassination attempt on an Israeli diplomat in London.

At the time, claiming this as reason to attack the PLO enclave in South Lebanon seemed a transparent falsehood, since everyone knew that the assassination had been carried out by a rogue Palestinian group that hated the PLO as well as Israel and had murdered or tried to murder Palestinians from the PLO who were pioneering in efforts to make peace with Israel (e.g. Dr. Issam Sartawi, zichrono l'vracha).

It seemed much more likely that the attack was a response to a growing wave of demonstrations and deepening resistance to the occupation from Palestinians on the West Bank & Gaza, which Begin & Sharon thought could be undermined by smashing the PLO enclave in Lebanaon.

Plus -- perhaps only Sharon's secret intention, perhaps Begin's as well -- an effort by Israel to take control of all of Lebanon thru supporting a Maronite government, naming as the next president of Lebanon a friend (puppet?) of Israel, and besieging Beirut.

The Maronite whom Israel named was however assassinated within a week, and it became clear that while the Lebanese public might reluctantly stomach suzerainty by Syria they would not stomach suzerainty by Israel.

Instead of the whole 1982 invasion, what would have made most sense to do, from the standpoint of a "practical politics with a spiritual root"? -- Perhaps, calming the West Bank by beginning serious negotiations with the West Bank Palestinians toward a Palestinian state living in peace with Israel.

The invasion -- this vaunted use of unilateral power -- led to debacle. -- Under pressure from both Lebanese resistance and Israeli and world public opinion, especially after the massacres of Palestinians at Sabra and Shatila (carried out by Maronites while Israeli troops watched and did nothing) -- Israel withdrew to the southern enclave.

And THEN what might have made most sense? From the standpoint of a practical politics rooted in spiritual wisdom, perhaps an attempt to protect Israel by seeking a broad shield in which Israel's own power would be limited while the power of others to attack Israel would also be limited.

-- Specifically, perhaps a strong multinational peacekeeping force on the Lebanese-Israeli border, able to prevent cross-border attacks in either direction.

But Israel chose instead to assert its own power in a unilateral way -- occupy the southern enclave, while presumably trying to strengthen the "South Lebanese Army" -- the Maronites in a new guise.

But Hezbollah was able to root itself in the South-Lebanese population as guerrillas , to attack Israeli soldiers -- more and more effectively and bloodily -- and occasionally (to little effect) bombard Israelis acrosss the border. And retaliatory attacks by Israel tended to antagonize the Lebanese even more, so that Hezbollah's support grew.

Finally, Israeli society said "Genug -- Dayenu" and insisted on bringing the troops home.

The continuing thread, up to the withdrawal itself, seems to be a constant mis-estimate by Israeli officials of the "guerrilla as a fish swimming in the midst of the sea of the people" -- their over-estimate of the effectiveness, moral, and popular support possible for the "South Lebanese Army" -- and therefore their under-estimate of the time it would take for the SLA to collapse once the Israelis withdrew -- a collapse that came because the SLA knew they had little support among the population.

The news stories of ululating, celebrating Lebanese returning to their towns in the south would seem to bear this out.

It is profoundly sad to see that Israel -- whose own history should teach the lesson of both how strong a deeply rooted popular movement is and how weak a seemingly invincible imperial govt is when it faces such a popular movement -- as when the British Empire faced the Zionist yishuv -- should so misinterpret the lesson of its own success.

That is why it seems to me that one of the primary teachings of spirituality -- "The greatest hero is the one who can master HIMSELF" -- applies to politics.

From 1982 on, Israeli policy in Lebanon has ignored this -- and has instead been filled with the hubris of depending totally on Israel's untrammeled use of its own power to control others. The result has been self-destructive. What is spiritually unwise is politically self-destructive.

http://www.shalomctr.org/html/peace06.html

Why Sharon is a War Criminal
An eye-witness report of the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacre
http://www.mediamonitors.net/drbenalofs1.html
http://www.globalpolicy.org/intljustice/general/2001/sab&shat.htm


OK most was about Sahron and i doubt there will be peace even when Arafat retires.

So now Noah it is on you to tell me what will change if Arafat is pulled out of the game.
Also think about what will change if we pull both warheads out of the game ?

Grüsse