Ted Belman has a solution for the Israel/(fake)Palestine
conflict that I find appealing. However, it’s solution that the Arabs
pretending to non-existent Palestinians and the Jordanian royal family will not
jump on board.
With a new U.S. president,
new ideas are emerging on how to resolve the Israel-Palestine debacle. One of
the most promising comes from the Jordanian Opposition Council who favor a new
Palestinian state — in Jordan.
The GOP unanimously approved a pro-Israel platform at their
convention in July 2016 which stipulated:
“The U.S. seeks to assist in the establishment of
comprehensive and lasting peace in the Middle East, to be negotiated among
those living in the region,”
David Friedman and Jason Greenblatt, representing Donald
Trump, participated in the drafting and were in complete agreement with the
final text.
Gone was any reference to the Palestinian people or to a
two-state solution. In addition, the platform included the words “We
reject the false notion that Israel is an occupier.” If not an “occupier,” then
presumably Israel is a sovereign.
Accordingly, the search is on for an alternate solution.
Such a solution could take inspiration from the short-lived Feisal/Weizmann Agreement of 1919.
The essence of this agreement was that Palestine as it then was, was to be
divided into two states, one for the Arabs and one for the Jews. Chaim Weizmann
on behalf of the Jews agreed to help develop the Arab state and Emir Feisal
agreed to welcome Jewish settlement in the Jewish state and favored friendly
cooperative relations.
Although the British didn’t breathe life into this
agreement, they did separate Trans-Jordan from Palestine in 1922 with the
Jordan River being the boundary between them. Trans-Jordan (Jordan) thus got
78% of the lands promised to the Jews. The remaining 22% consisting of the land
between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean was to be the Jewish state. This
was enshrined in the Palestine Mandate signed by the League of Nations in 1922.
On June 30, 1922, a joint resolution of both Houses of Congress of
the United States unanimously endorsed the “Mandate for Palestine,” confirming
the irrevocable right of Jews to settle in Palestine—anywhere between the
Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.
With respect to the Arabs living in Jewish Palestine, the Congressional Record contained
the following:
“(2) That if they will not consent
to Jewish government and domination, they shall be required to sell their lands
at a just valuation and retire into the Arab territory which has been assigned
to them by the League of Nations in the general reconstruction of the countries
of the east.
(3) That if they will not consent
to Jewish government and domination, under conditions of right and justice, or
to sell their lands at a just valuation and to retire into their own countries,
they shall be driven from Palestine by force.”
The US was not a member of the League of Nations at this
time. In order to be able to protect American interests in Palestine, she
entered into the 1924 Anglo-American Convention in
which the U.S. bound itself to the terms of the Mandate. This of course meant
the recognition of Jewish right to close settlement of Palestine and that all
of Palestine was to be the Jewish homeland.
Since then, there were a number of unsuccessful attempts,
contrary to the terms of the Mandate, to further divide Jewish Palestine into
two states. UN General Assembly Resolution 181, passed in 1947,
recommended partition, but was rejected by the Arabs. The Jews on the other
hand took advantage of it and declared their independence in 1948. Israel owes
its independence to that declaration and not to Resolution 181, which was only
a recommendation, precipitating the move.
Nothing has happened of any legal consequence since, to
cancel the right of the Jews to settle and be sovereign over all the land to
the Jordan River.
To date Israel has been reluctant to claim sovereignty over
these lands as the Arabs living there would then demand citizenship resulting
in a binational state. This is unacceptable to most Israelis. They also reject
the two-state solution.
So what is the alternative?
Consider for a moment, that if Jordan agrees to grant
citizenship to all Palestinians, as their law currently provides, and invites
the return of all of them to live and work in Jordan, the conflict would soon
be ended. While King Abdullah isn’t about to do so, the Jordan Opposition Coalition (JOC)
would. This coalition represents all opposition groups in Jordan that back a
secular state. The JOC since its creation six years ago has supported good
relations with Israel. It does not include groups that support terrorism. This
alliance has agreed to work together in order to form the government of Jordan
should King Abdullah abdicate. Although at least 75% of Jordanians are
Palestinians, the King has disenfranchised them to a great extent in favor of
the ethnic Hashemites and Bedouins.
The JOC has produced a detailed plan, Operation
“Jordan in Palestine,” which clearly identifies their goals and the
operational steps needed to implement their plan. Copies are available
upon request.
All that is necessary for this to come to pass is for the
U.S. to instruct the king, who currently spends most of his time outside
Jordan, to not return home. Then it would arrange for the Jordanian army, which
it controls, to support the next popular Palestinian uprising, and to designate
who among them would form the interim government.
The JOC, puts it this way:
This plan seeks to execute a
feasible two-state solution where Jordan is the natural homeland for all
Palestinians, and Israel becomes sovereign over all soil west to the River
Jordan. This could only happen if the corrupt, terror-supporting and
double-speaking Hashemite royal family leaves Jordan. The Palestinians often
revolt against the regime but the king’s police force puts them down. The
American media ignore this solution to the unrest in Jordan.
What is needed is for the U.S. to
influence the Jordanian army and security agency to stand with the revolution
the next time it breaks out. The security agencies and army are
already securing the country without any influence from the king who is mostly abroad. Under
these conditions, the king would not return. Once that happens an interim
government of secular Palestinians who want peace with Israel could be
appointed.
Once the interim government is
installed, it will strengthen the economy by stopping theft of government money
and ending corruption. It will fully enfranchise the Palestinians. All
Palestinians around the world would be welcomed to return to Jordan pursuant
the current Jordanian citizenship act, which already recognizes all Palestinians
as citizens of Jordan. Many Palestinians will emigrate to Jordan in part
because many have family members and friends living in Jordan. Work
opportunities as well as a rewarding benefits/welfare system will be made
available to them by the new interim government as further inducement.
Israel, with many international partners, including the
U.S., could finance the building of a new Jordanian city of 1 million people.
This would greatly stimulate the Jordanian economy and would provide work for
the returning Palestinians. The new homes could be made available to the
returnees and locals at subsidized prices further incentivizing people to
return. The ending of King Abdullah’s discrimination against Palestinians
living in Jordan, would also contribute to making Jordan a desired immigration
destination.
Michael Ross, a Republican, wrote after the election of
Donald Trump, “Trump Must Speak to Mudar Zahran” because
Zahran offers the alternate solution that Pres Trump is looking for.
As part of this solution, all Palestinian refugees enrolled
with UN Relief And Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East could
be repatriated to Jordan and given citizenship. Thus UNRWA could be wound up
and the current UNRWA funding could be transferred to Jordan to assist in the
resettlement.
According to Moshe Feiglin, the head of the Zehut Party in
Israel, the Oslo Accords have cost Israel over 1 trillion shekels since they
were signed. In addition, Israel has borne the cost of three military campaigns
in Gaza. Finally, Israel supplies to the Palestinians their energy, water and
sewage treatment for free or at greatly subsidized prices.
Last summer, Feiglin proposed a Solution in which Israel
extends Israeli law from the Mediterranean to the Jordan:
We will give the Arab population in
those territories three options: The first is voluntary emigration with the aid
of a generous emigration grant. The second is permanent residency, similar to
the “Green Card” status in the US – not like what is currently the practice in
East Jerusalem. This status will be offered to those Arabs who publicly declare
their loyalty to the State of Israel as the state of the Jewish Nation. We will
safeguard their human rights and will not do anything like we did to ourselves
in Gush Katif. The third option will be reserved for relatively few Arabs, and
only in accordance with Israeli interests. Those who tie their fate to the fate
of the Jewish Nation, like the Druze, can enter a long-term process of
attaining citizenship.
Martin Sherman has published a similar plan which he calls
the “Humanitarian Solution” as opposed to a strictly political solution. He
summarized all his writings in support of such a plan and published them here.
With an estimated $300,000 per family grant, both he and
Feiglin have estimated that incentivized compensated emigration will cost
Israel over $200 billion USD but both argue it is feasible and worth doing.
The repatriation of Palestinians to Jordan, as proposed by
JOC, would greatly facilitate the Palestinian emigration and greatly reduce the
grants needed to incentivize it. UNRWA and the Palestinian Authority would both
be wound up.
1.75 millionPalestinians live in
Judea and Samaria (West Bank). The 800,000 Arabs in Hebron, Nablus, Ramallah,
and Bethlehem could remain there as Jorandian citizens. Ramallah is only 42
miles from Amman, the capital of Jordan. A new highway could be built
connecting all these cities to Amman. The rest would have to be transferred to
Jordan.
The 1.8 million Palestinians living in Gaza, of which 1.3
million are registered as refugees, would be incentivized to emigrate to
Jordan. After enough leave, Israel could extend its sovereignty to Gaza thereby
ending that perennial problem.
Considering the subsidies that the West provides to UNRWA,
Gaza and the PA, this would be a bargain. Given that JOC has tied its fate to
Israel, Israel would be happy to contribute to such a solution as the present
conflict costs her hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
It really is that simple. There is much more that can
be said in support of it.
Prof. Hillel Frisch, a senior research associate at the
Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies and Yitzhak Sokoloff, a fellow of the
Ingeborg Rennert Center for Jerusalem Studies at Bar-Ilan University recently
wrote Trump and the Jordanian Option.
The inauguration of an American
administration uncommitted to the principle of an independent Palestinian state
provides Israel with the opportunity to advocate a long-term strategic vision
of building up a prosperous Jordan that could provide an alternative to the
model of a two-state solution based on the Palestinian Authority.
They are wrong to suggest that this can be done with King
Abdullah. I believe, as does the JOC, that the king is part of the problem and
must be replaced by Palestinians.
Gideon Saar, a touted future Prime Minister of Israel, in
his recent article, Goodbye Two-State Solution, wrote:
A Jordanian-Palestinian federative
solution would offer the Palestinians space in addition to their autonomy. We
could also consider adopting a joint Israeli-Jordanian-Palestinian economic
framework. And there are many other ideas that could be constructed as a result
of quiet, serious work with the backing of a supportive US administration.
He is right but the ultimate alternate solution is the one
put forward by the JOC.
If anyone wants more information or can help this solution
get traction, please write me (tbelman3@gmail.com).
Addendum
David Singer suggested drawing a new border in the Israel
Jordan peace agreement. I suggest it should be here.
Shiloh and Beit El must remain in Israel yet they lie east
of the new road. In some place the new road can be moved a little to the west
if there are significant Arab populations to be included. And look at
Ariel. It too must be kept on the Israeli side. A very crooked road.
That’s why I came to the conclusion that maybe it’s better to move them all
out.
On second thought I have an alternate suggestion:
Rather than draw a new border,
transfer the 1.7 million Arabs in J&S and perhaps 100,000 from Jerusalem to
Jordan.
But leave the Arabs in Gaza.
Israel should put Jordan in power there even if she has to defeat Hamas to do
so.
Thus only 1.8 million Arabs from
J&S and east Jerusalem would have to move.
One more thing. We could build a
highway from Gaza to Jordan. This highway could be open to Egyptian traffic and
thus Egypt would finally have a land bridge to Jordan which they want. Jordan
would thus gain a port on the Mediterranean.
I have typically been a supporter of Israel’s Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu. In part because Netanyahu has stood up to America’s
Leftist-in-Chief Barack Hussein Obama. That drove BHO and his Leftist minion
Democrats nuts. I am still okay with that. I am on the Historical and Investigative Research
(HIR) email list. I finally took the opportunity to read an August 31 email
from HIR which highlighted some disturbing news about Iran, Judea/Samaria, the
Palestinian Authority (PA) and unfortunately Benjamin Netanyahu.
This email provides an understanding of a possible reason
Netanyahu may face some hostility from the further Right Wing of his
Conservative base. In summary the more Conservative faction is a bit upset
their Prime Minister that Iran has a path to acquire
nuclear WMD which will be used against Israel but still supports the idea (at
least publically) for the existence of Palestinian State in which the PA
leadership is receiving clandestine financial and military aid from Iran. The
more Conservative Israel Right is seeing a big load of hypocrisy from Benjamin
Netanyahu.
It is my humble opinion though that Netanyahu is dealing with the
realities of a rock and a hard place.
Obama is willing to throw Israel under the bus either under
the delusion of peace in our time (can
you say Neville Chamberlain?). OR Obama is embarking on a more nefarious
agenda of disrupting the current global power structure which includes
weakening the USA, to usher in a more Left Wing globalist power structure
paradigm. Either way Obama sells out both America and our closest ally in the
Middle East – Israel.
I am still convinced Netanyahu is the best man for the job
in Israel. He is simply being forced into a geopolitical game in which
Netanyahu is waiting to see who the next U.S. President will be, with the hope
the new President understands the danger of a nuclear armed Iran and proceeds
accordingly.
On the other hand, if Netanyahu’s geopolitical gamesmanship
fails between Obama and Israel’s Jewish Left then followed by Iran actually
acquiring nuke WMD resulting in a Palestinian State carved out of Israel’s
heritage with Iran as hegemonic master and the new Palestinian State the new
client. The next domino would be the destruction of Israel and a second modern
Holocaust so devastating that Hitler’s final solution look like a picnic.
An important Israeli
politician, Moshe Feiglin, has reposted on his Facebook
Pagean Arutz 7 articlewritten by Rob Muchnick, his US
director, asking the question:
Will the Israeli government give Judea and Samaria to
Iran?
The article makes reference to HIR's short documentary
film: PLO/Fatah and Iran: The Special Relationship (on Vimeo,
on YouTube),
which tells the story documented in an earlier HIR piece.
This is exciting, because it is the beginning of political awareness on this
crucial issue.
I wholeheartedly support this very important article from
our US Director, Rob Muchnick.
Please read it and demand that Bibi answer the questions
that Rob poses.
Dear Friends,
I wish to ask you a question.
Will the Israeli government — the government of the
Jewish State — give Judea and Samaria to Iran?
That may seem impossible.
First, because our prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, daily
warns that Iranian leaders wish to destroy us.
Second, because the media, although they discuss the
connection between Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran, never mention the deeper ties
that bind Iran and PLO/Fatah (better known as the ‘Palestinian Authority’).
And what is not in the news goes to sleep in the mind.
But a few days ago, Iran’s official news agency brought this
connection back into view by reporting that PLO/Fatah and Iran have signed an
“all-out cooperation agreement.”
In the Second Intifada, the Iranian ayatollahs were running
PLO/Fatah’s deadliest terrorists, the Al Aqsa Martyrs, and mobilized them to
ensure that Mahmoud Abbas became Yasser Arafat’s replacement. At the same time,
Iran also sent the Karin a freighter with 50 tons of weapons to the PLO/Fatah.
Thankfully, this ship was intercepted by Israel.
But the relationship is older.
In 1979, when the Iranian Islamist regime came to power, the
New York Times reported on its front page that PLO/Fatah had been architect of
that revolution:
• Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud
Abbas armed and trained Ayatollah Khomeini’s troops;
• Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud
Abbas were invited, before any others, to celebrate with Khomeini in Teheran;
and then
• Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud
Abbas helped created the Iranian security services and the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard.
As they celebrated in Teheran, Arafat declared that
PLO/Fatah and Iranian aims were identical: the violent destruction of the
Jewish people and State.
Meanwhile, Mahmoud Abbas explained to Arab reporters how it
would be done:
First, promise peace. Then, gain some territory. And last:
annihilate Israel. Abbas called it the ‘Plan of Phases’; the media called it
the ‘Peace Process.’
So far, all goes according to plan. But will they conclude
it?
Will we let them?
Join me, as Israeli citizens and Jews worldwide, in
demanding from our prime minister answers to these questions:
Why is PLO/Fatah still in Israel?
Will our government give Judea and Samaria to Iran?
PLO/Fatah, now better known as the “Palestinian Authority,” will govern a
Palestinian State in the militarily strategic territories of Judea and Samaria
(or “West Bank”) if the Middle East “peace process” concludes with a “Two-State
Solution.” Given that Iranian leaders daily promise the destruction of Israel,
most people assume that PLO/Fatah has nothing to do with Iran. It would be
absurd, they implicitly reason, for Israeli leaders to give strategic territory
to an Iranian proxy. And yet, it is a historical fact that PLO/Fatah helped
install Ayatollah Khomeini in power and helped create the current Iranian
Islamist regime. It has maintained a close relationship with this regime ever
since. This short film documents that relationship.
Short Preface
The Obama
administration, like any government, routinely makes public statements about
its intentions, values, and policy imperatives. For example, the Obama
administration claims publicly to be enemy of Iran[1] and
friend of Israel. In fact, the US government claims that “‘concerning policy,
we have done everything that we can that is in Israel’s security – and
long-range interests.”[2]
But what if PLO/Fatah, also known as the
‘Palestinian Authority,’ is a proxy of Iran?
The US government
pushes veryhard for Israel to give strategic
territory to PLO/Fatah in exchange for a promise of ‘peace.’ So if
PLO/Fatah is helping Iran destroy Israel, the US government’s
behavior is quite interesting.
About the future
PLO/Fatah state, the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
states: “I think it's important to make peace with the Palestinians. And I’m
prepared to negotiate that peace right away. ...They should have their own
independent country.” Consistent with this, Netanyahu is rushing to give PLO/Fatah its
independent state, and has even put Jerusalem on offer. But Netanyahu has also
said: “We should be assured that this country [the future PLO/Fatah state]
is not used as a staging ground for Iranian-sponsored terrorist attacks on us.”
So if PLO/Fatah is a proxy of Iran, the Israeli government’s
behavior is also quite interesting.[3]
One should then
ask: What in the world are the US and Israeli governments doing?
This must be answered, becausePLO/Fatah, like Hamas and Hezbollah, is indeed part of an
Iranian offensive to destroy Israel.
We will show here
that PLO/Fatah has always been and continues to be very closely
allied with Iran.
PLO/Fatah’s role in Ayatollah Khomeini’s coup
The regime that
still rules Iran was inaugurated by Ayatollah Khomeini (see pictures, top
right), a ferocious Islamist terrorist who led the 1979 Iranian Revolution to
depose the previous ruler, the Shah of Iran. With whom did the Ayatollah
Khomeini want to celebrate, right away and before sharing the joy with anybody
else?
With Yasser Arafat,
then head of PLO/Fatah.
It was just
two weeks after the Ayatollah Khomeini returned to Iran and took power
that the New York Times reported how Yasser Arafat had
accepted an invitation to visit Teheran. Why so soon? Why so much deference?
Because the Ayatollah Khomeini was grateful: “Palestinian sources said that Mr.
Arafat’s group had sent arms to the [Iranian] revolutionary forces in the last
four months and had trained Iranian guerillas since the early 1970s.”[4] Only four days later Arafat was already
in Teheran, celebrating the Iranian theocratic Islamist revolution, and
promising to help export it everywhere. Wrote the New York Times:
“Bantering and grinning, the guerrilla leader declined to furnish details about
support the PLO had given to various Iranian guerrilla organizations.”[5]
Fact: PLO/Fatah played a key role in the
Iranian revolution, arming and training Khomeini’s troops.
Naturally, PLO/Fatah expected
the favor to be repaid, and the Iranians rushed to state that they would honor
their debts. The Globe and Mail reported:
[Quote from Globe and Mail begins here]
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat said yesterday that Iranian guerrillas
would fight alongside Palestinian forces against Israel.
... Mr. Arafat, the first prominent visitor to Iran since the
revolution, said the Palestinian and Iranian aims were identical. “We will
continue our efforts until the time when we defeat imperialism and Zionism,” he
said.
A close aide of Ayatollah Khomaini, Deputy Premier Ibrahim Yazdi, also
attended the inauguration of the PLO office and referred to the identity of the
two causes and the large number of Palestinian sacrifices in the PLO's struggle
against Israel.
... The son of Ayatollah Khomaini, Seyyed Ahmad Khomaini, a Moslem
clergyman who also spoke at the inauguration of the new PLO office, pledged
Iran would continue its revolutionary struggle until all Islamic countries had
been set free.
The bearded, black-turbanned Seyyed Khomaini said: “We will continue our
struggle until we free all Islamic countries and hoist the Palestinian flag
together with ours.”[6]
This makes it rather
obvious that the PLO was very powerful in Iran.
In fact, the New
York Times wrote in November of 1980 that “The P.L.O. currently enjoys
close ties with some of the Iranian revolutionary leaders who rose to power
with the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini,” including the Defense Minister Mustafa
Chamran and the leader of the Revolutionary Guards Abu Sharif. “Like Yasir
Arafat,” wrote the New York Times,“both Abu
Sharif and Mustafa Chamran are fervent advocates of exporting Iran’s Islamic
revolution to the rest of the Middle East - in particular, to the conservative
states of the Arab Gulf” (emphasis added). The Times also
explained that PLO/Fatah had played a role in the creation of the
Revolutionary Guards (for it trained Abu Sharif) and in creating the new
Iranian secret police: SAVAMA (because Sharif and Chamran “relied heavily on
their P.L.O. contacts” in setting it up). The Times added:
“The current head of the P.L.O. network in Iran is Hani al-Hassan, alias
Abu Hassan, a Jordanian citizen who belongs to Arafat's inner circle of
advisers. Before he was sent to Teheran, Abu Hassan served as deputy chief of
Fatah’s security department. He enjoys a remarkable entree to Khomeini
and other key members of the Iranian regime -- so much so that one Western
diplomat suggests that the P.L.O. envoy should be counted as one of the most
influential men in Teheran.”[6b] [(HIR)
emphasis added]
The picture is clear.
1) PLO/Fatah played
a key role in the creation of the Iranian Islamist terror state.
a) It armed and trained
Khomeini’s troops for his revolution.
b) It helped create the
all-important Revolutionary Guards.
c) It helped create the Iranian
secret service SAVAMA.
2) The idea of spreading Iranian
Islamist terror everywhere was closely associated with “the PLO’s struggle
against Israel.”
a) Iran pledged itself to
assist PLO/Fatah against Israel.
b) PLO/Fatah pledged
itself to export the Iranian Islamist Revolution.
For years now PLO/Fatah has
been represented not only as unlinked to Iran, but also as a secular organization,
to be distinguished from the ‘fundamentalists’ and ‘Islamist’ Iranian terror
proxies of Hamas and Hezbollah. Most people accept this, and that is a
testament to how a media barrage can alter the perception of history. It is
obvious, however, that if Yasser Arafat’s ideology was to spread the Iranian
Revolution, then he was an Islamist. Historian Howard Sachar, writing in 1982,
agreed with how the New York Times represented things back
then: “from the outset... the Fatah’s reputation depended largely upon
the success of its Moslem traditionalist approach of jihad against
Israel.”[6c]
Not just any kind of jihad: Iranian
jihad.
PLO/Fatah’s alignment during the Iran-Iraq
war
To understand just
how intimate the relationship between the Islamist Iranian government and PLO/Fatah,
one must take into account that such a strong alliance with the Iranian Shiites
angered almost every Arab government that was supporting PLO/Fatah. One
cannot imagine that they were pleased to hear Arafat announce his goal of
exporting the Iranian revolution to the Gulf States (see above), because this
would mean deposing the governments in the Gulf States. And yet Yasser Arafat
remained close to his friend Khomeini.
A month after the
Iran-Iraq war broke out in late 1980, the Arab governments had sided with Iraq
and the situation had become politically dangerous for Arafat. So much so that
Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf states cracked down on their Palestinian
populations. “The reason,” reported the Globe and Mail, “is that
the authorities are suspicious of Palestinian ties to the militant Shiite
Moslems in Iran, who have vowed to export their Islamic revolution.” And it
observed: “Palestinian opinion, while reflecting the PLO’s reluctance to choose
sides in a war between its two allies, appears much more pro-Iranian than
that of conservative Gulf governments” (emphasis added).[7]
That was October
1980. In December, this was the situation:
[Quote from Washington Post begins here]
Dependent on fellow Arab governments for virtually everything -- physical
protection, diplomatic backing, arms, money -- Arafat has had to watch
helplessly as the Persian Gulf war split his benefactors into antagonistic
blocs with the PLO caught uncomfortably in the middle.
More damaging was the way the PLO’s much advertised independence crumbled
under the arm-twisting pressures of the two camps. When the showdown came
before last month’s divided Arab summit meeting, Arafat and the PLO were forced
by Syrian President Hafez Assad, leader of the pro-Iran axis, to join a boycott
of a summit whose aim was to organize a long-term strategy for the
Palestinians’ crusade against Israel.[8]
[Quote from Washington Post ends here]
I would call this
remarkable. Even though the PLO was dependent on Arab states for everything,
when these states got together to plan a long-term strategy for the PLO’s fight
with Israel, the PLO sides with Iran. It was “uncomfortable,” sure,
but it sided with Iran.
In March 1981 Arafat
had a sympathetic meeting with Iraqi Shiites allied with Iran, as reported by
Tehran’s news service.[9]
‘Estrangement’ leads to renewed love
But this could not
last. As observed above, the PLO’s entire infrastructure was based in the Arab
states. Soon the PLO was forced to take a more pro-Arab position. And then, as
the Iran-Iraq war was ending with the cease-fire in 1988, the prelude to the
Oslo ‘Peace’ Process was getting into high gear. This process quite suddenly
represented the terrorist PLO/Fatah as a moderate organization
that wanted to make peace. So to keep matters propagandistically consistent,
Iran just had to accuse Arafat of ‘treason’ against the
Palestinian cause, while Arafat just had to pronounce himself
in public against Iranian terrorism.
Thus, for example,
when a bomb exploded in Tel Aviv in 1996, the Egyptian news agency MENA
reported that Arafat was blaming the Iranians: “Nabil Abu Rudaynah, adviser to
Palestinian President Yasir Arafat, ...accused foreign, non-Palestinian, elements
in the region of being behind these terrorist incidents to wreck the peace
process. He specifically accused Iran...”[10] Shortly
before that, Arafat had claimed that two Palestinians working for Iran had
tried to assassinate him.[11] This
is how a story of ‘estrangement’ between Arafat (formerly Khomeini’s best
friend) and the Iranian regime was built.
But was it true?
Just one year later,
the Palestinian daily Al Quds reported that a top PLO/Fatah leader
had come back from Iran with a renewed relationship. What’s an assassination
attempt between friends? But in fact this made perfect propaganda sense, because
the newly elected Iranian president Mohammad Khatami was supposed to be an
Iranian Gorbachev pushing liberal reforms, and Arafat was ‘making peace’ with
Israel. Under this guise, an open friendship could resume.[12]
Israeli officials said documents captured last year in a massive military
raid on the West Bank after a series of suicide bombings inside Israel showed
the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, which carried out many of the attacks, was an arm
of Fatah, Arafat’s political organisation. They also said the documents proved
the Palestinian Authority’s intelligence apparatus, also headed by Arafat, was
involved in planning terror activity.
Israeli officials said the documents showed Arafat had personally
authorised fund transfers for such activity. ‘Arafat views terrorism as a
legitimate tool for obtaining the Palestinian national goal,’ said one
official.[15]
[Quote from The Australian ends here]
In the Second
Intifada, behind PLO/Fatah, was Iran. Here is the Christian
Science Monitor,writing in January 2002 under the headline:
“Palestinian ties to Iran, Hizbullah look firmer”:
[Quote from the Christian Science Monitor begins here]
... [T]he once-frosty relationship between Iran and Arafat appears to
have thawed since the outbreak of the [second] intifada in September 2000.
Iran, which opposes Israel's very existence, is a staunch backer of the
intifada, opening its hospitals to wounded Palestinians, training fighters, and
rallying support for the uprising.
In April last year, Tehran hosted a conference for 34 Arab and Islamic
countries and organizations. All the hard-line Palestinian groups were there as
well as Hizbullah. But also attending was a representative of the Palestinian
Authority, Salim Al Zeenoun, who admitted that the Oslo Accords had turned out
to be a “sandcastle of illusion.”
Two months later, Arafat sent a telegram to Iranian President Mohammed
Khatami to congratulate him on his re-election.
“We look to all the people of the Islamic world, foremost among them the
Muslim Iranian people and their faithful leadership, to support, aid, and
assist [Palestine],” Arafat said. He also asked Iran to “work fast to end this
bloody and savage war which the Israeli government has been waging for eight
solid months.”
Israel says that the military alliance between Iran and Arafat and the
scheme to smuggle a shipload of [Iranian] weapons to the Palestinian Authority
[the famous Karine A incident] was born at around this time. [13]
[Quote from the Christian Science Monitor ends here]
So PLO/Fatah, once installed inside Israel thanks to the
Oslo ‘Peace’ Process, began functioning as a terrorist proxy of Iran.
At the same time,
however, the road was being prepared for Mahmoud Abbas to posture as the
anti-terror ‘peacemaker.’ Notice what The Australian wrote in September
2003:
“Palestinian prime minister Mahmoud Abbas resigned last month after
Arafat refused to hand over control of the security forces Abbas said he needed
to make Hamas and Islamic Jihad halt their suicide bombings.”[15]
So, yes, the
terrorist activity is all being directed by Arafat, but when Abbas takes over
there will be peace, became the media message. In fact, the mainstream Western
media went quite out of its way to laud Mahmoud Abbas (alias Abu Mazen) as a
supposed arch moderate.
Only one problem
with this. The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades -- the most violent Palestinian
terrorists, and the ones most involved in the Second Intifada that Iran was
sponsoring -- in fact preferred Abbas to their own Tanzim boss
Barghouti as a replacement for Arafat when the latter died. An Associated
Press wire dated December 2004 reports that:
“Abbas already has been nominated as Fatah’s presidential candidate, so
Barghouti must run as an independent. But as a leading Fatah member, he would
likely undermine Abbas’ prospects… Zakaria Zubeidi, the 29-year-old West Bank
leader of the Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, a violent group linked to Fatah, said
he would back Abbas. ‘Barghouti … should resign from Fatah,’ he told The
Associated Press.”[16]
It is already clear
that Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades was linked to Iran, because Iran was sponsoring
the Second Intifada, which was being waged especially by the brigades. In fact,
only two months earlier, with Arafat still alive, the Daily Telegraph had
reported: “Israel believes that much of the Fatah-affiliated armed faction,
calling itself the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, has now come under Iran's sway,
especially in the West Bank.” Who were they directly working with? None other
than Hezbollah, the Iranian proxy Fatah is supposedly so different from:
“Scores of Palestinian attacks, accounting for roughly a third of the 98
Israelis killed so far this year, are believed to have been orchestrated by the
Lebanese Hizbollah movement.” Arafat did not deny this, though he tried to give
it a different spin: he claimed to be upset, and accused Iran of trying to
“infiltrate Fatah.”[17]
The upshot is that nobody was denying that Iran was
heavily involved with the PLO/Fatah terrorists, the same terrorists
who pushed for Mahmoud Abbas becoming the new PLO/Fatah leader.
Oh wait. Somebody would deny
the link between PLO/Fatah and Iran. Guess who? The Israeli government.
As Frontpage magazine
explained in 2007:
“Iran’s direct connection to Hamas is openly discussed and widely
acknowledged. Where Fatah is concerned, the issues are more complex; but the
link has been established. In March, Brig. Gen. (res.) Shalom Harari, a Senior
Research Scholar with the Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) at the
Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, wrote an Issue Brief for the Jerusalem
Center for Public Affairs in which he noted: ‘There is a growing strategic
alliance between Iran and the radical Palestinian forces in the territories.
Iran is involved in supporting both the Islamic factions and Fatah, as well.
Today, at least 40 percent of Fatah’s different fighting groups are also paid
by Hezbollah and Iran.’
Corroborating Harari’s analysis, Maj.-Gen. Yoav Galant, head of the IDF
Southern Command, wrote an Issue Brief for the JCPA one month later in which he
observed: ‘A few years ago, Fatah’s Al Aqsa Brigade in Judea and Samaria was
bought out by Iran.’Checks with various security and intelligence
sources have provided additional confirmation of this information. Iranian
funding of Fatah is not direct, but comes through the conduit of Hezbollah and
goes in the main to Al Aqsa Brigades.
The government of Israel... maintains that Al Aqsa, although originally a
spin-off from Fatah, is no longer part of Fatah and no longer answers to Abbas.
This spin makes it possible to continue to promote Fatah as potentially
moderate, in spite of Al Aqsa’s very radical connections. Experts refute this
scenario, however. Said one security source who provided background
information: ‘Abbas is formally the commander of Al Aqsa…he has little to do
with them to ensure deniability…but privately supports Al Aqsa. US money to PA
security agencies go to Al Aqsa people as well. Indeed, Abbas has ensured that
most of the Al Aqsa people are on the payroll.’”[17a]
The Israeli
government goes out of its way to pretend that Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades is not
part of Al Fatah, thus supporting Abbas, who pretends that he has nothing to do
with them in order “to ensure deniability” for Al Aqsa’s murders of Israeli
civilians. The Israeli government is covering for those who murder
Israeli citizens. We have already seen above how absurd the Israeli
government’s position, for Abbas owes his position to Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades:
they were the ones lobbying for him—marching in the streets, in fact—and
intimidating his competition.
So PLO/Fatah (or
the ‘Palestinian Authority’) is allied with Iran to destroy the State of
Israel.
But the US
government wants PLO/Fatah to inherit strategic Israeli territory.
And the Israeli government is cooperating. What are they doing?
What are the US and Israeli governments doing?
It is now probably a
good idea to review HIR’s First Principles, in order to do some hard thinking
about US geopolitics.
ARGUMENT A.
Premise 1. The way to do better geopolitics is to
have a more accurate representation of the intentions and capabilities of other
players in the international system.
Premise 2. The Government of the United States,
the most important geopolitical player, has the strongest motivation to do
better geopolitics.
Therefore: The Government of the United States
works very hard to obtain a better understanding of the intentions and
capabilities of other players in the international system.
Fact: CIA director George Tenet said in the
year 1998 that the budget on that year had been a little under 27 billion.
Recently, a US Intelligence official said in a press conference that the yearly
budget was now 44 billion. But the truth is that nobody knows for sure,
because the
budget for US Intelligence is a state secret.
Hypothesis: The Government of the United States has
very good information—definitely better than my own—on which to base its
geopolitical decisions.
ARGUMENT B.
Premise 1. The Government of the United States,
for many years running, has been the most powerful in the world.
Premise 2. Idiots don’t become the most powerful
people in the world.
Therefore: The Government of the United States is
not run by idiots.
Hypothesis: If the Government of the United States
behaves in ways that seem idiotic to me, then a) there is something I don’t yet
understand; or b) this government has different values than my own.
Or both. (And I have yet to accept this, which is why I think the behavior is
idiotic.)
ARGUMENT C.
Premise 1. The true preferences of someone are
revealed in his/her expensive behaviors.
Premise 2. Saying “My intentions are X” is not
expensive but cheap.
Therefore: Speech acts (e.g. public and official
declarations) don’t necessarily convey information about the true intentions of
a government.
Hypothesis: If the Government of the United States
consistently, year after year, spends billions of dollars and achieves always
similar results, and if these results contradict the government’s publicly
declared intentions, the publicly declared intentions must be deliberate
deceptions.
US Intelligence
knows perfectly well everything that I have documented in this article. And it
knew it long before I did. Hence, the US Government is applying very strong
pressure on Israel to create a ‘Palestinian State’ run by PLO/Fatah on
strategic Israeli territory knowing full well that PLO/Fatah is
allied with Iran to destroy Israel.
Is this consistent
with other expensive US Government behaviors? It is.
On the basis of this
evidence we may conclude that when President Obama’s chief of staff Rahm
Emmanuel states to a group of rabbis that “ ‘concerning policy, we have done
everything that we can that is in Israel’s security -- and long-range
interests,’ ” the Obama administration is lying.[2] If the US government is lying, then we
must consider the alternative hypothesis: that the US Government -- not the
American people, but the US Government -- is an enemy of Israel.
Israeli leaders are
cooperating with this process, because they have not yet expelled PLO/Fatah from
Israel. On the contrary. Though they pretend to drag their feet, they are
engaged in an on-again, off-again process with PLO/Fatah that
(let’s face it) is designed to give it everything it wants, in exchange for...
Well, for nothing, because PLO/Fatah has not laid down its arms and
does not intend to.
The Israeli
government is also much better informed than I am, and likewise knew everything
I have reviewed here long before I did. After all, the documentation I use is
publicly available, and one of the main targets of Israeli intelligence-gathering
is, naturally, PLO/Fatah.
So what are
Israeli leaders doing? It
is an important question.
Any effort to begin
answering this question must examine what certain important Jewish leaders did
in the prelude to, and during, World War II. HIR has much documentation on this
topic, but two articles in particular offer a good place to start.
First, to examine
the behavior of (soon-to-be) Israeli leaders during the Holocaust, please read:
► “The responsibility of the
mainstream (Labor Zionist) Israeli leaders during the Shoah ('Holocaust')”;
from THE PROBLEM OF JEWISH SELF-DEFENSE: An HIR series; Historical and
Investigative Research; 21 February 2007; by Francisco Gil-Whitehttp://www.hirhome.com/israel/leaders4.htm
Then, to examine the
behavior of a string of Israeli prime ministers, consistent with the history
documented above, please read:
►”Leaders Lied, Jews died: Why
have Israeli leaders been lying to their fellow citizens about the PLO/Fatah?;
Historical and Investigative Research; 10 July 2007; by Francisco Gil-White
(with the editorial assistance of Ted Belman)
If History is indeed
repeating itself, then the Jewish people is in great peril, for when the causes
recur, so do the consequences. And if the Jewish people is in peril, then so
are ordinary people all over the West, because 2500 years of Western history
show conclusively that periods of Jewish persecution coincide with periods of
savage oppression against non-Jews (a recent and dramatic example is the 20th
c. Holocaust). www.hirhome.com/colapso/colapso_eng.htm
Footnotes and Further Reading
[1] Last Friday it was reported that
“Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is pushing for another round of United
Nations sanctions against Iran.”Here, the
US government is projecting that Iran is the bad guys and that the US will work
to undermine Iran.
SOURCE: “Obama the
appeaser; The transnational dove has left a vacuum that Iran is filling”; The
Washington Times, May 21, 2010 Friday, B, COMMENTARY; Pg. 3, 777 words, By
Jeffrey T. Kuhner SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON TIMES
[2] A
week ago, President Obama’s chief of staff Rahm Emmanuel stated to a group of
rabbis that “‘concerning policy, we have done everything that we can that is in
Israel’s security – and long-range interests. Watch what the administration
does.’ ”Here, the US government is projecting
that Israel is the good guys and will work to strengthen Israel.
SOURCE: “US ‘screwed
up’ message on Israel, Emanuel tells rabbis. Officials deny administration
changing view on Israeli nuclear policy”; The Jerusalem Post, May 16, 2010
Sunday, NEWS; Pg. 1, 1197 words, HERB KEINON, JTA contributed to this report.
[4] “The PLO announced today that its
chairman, Yasser Arafat, had accepted an invitation to visit Teheran soon. It
also said that followers of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini had seized the former
Israeli diplomatic mission in Teheran, and the PLO had accepted an offer to
turn it into a Palestinian embassy.
Wafa, the
Palestinian press service, reported that the Ayatollah’s forces had contacted
Mr. Arafat by telephone yesterday and proclaimed their solidarity and gave
their thanks.
Palestinian sources
said that Mr. Arafat’s group had sent arms to the revolutionary forces in the
last four months and had trained Iranian guerillas since the early 1970s.”
SOURCE: P.L.O. Is Cool to Dayan Remarks; Statements Given Prominence; By
MARVINE HOWE Special to The New York Times. New York Times (1857-Current file).
New York, N.Y.: Feb 15, 1979. p. A12 (1 page)
[5] “An
exultant Yasir Arafat, leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization,
proclaimed here today that the Iranian revolution had ‘turned upside down’ the balance
of forces in the Middle East.
‘Today Iran,
tomorrow Palestine,’ he said.
Mr. Arafat received
a pledge from Ayatollah Khomeini that the Iranians would ‘turn to the issue of
victory over Israel’ after Iran had consolidated its strength, the Teheran
radio reported.
…Bantering and
grinning, the guerrilla leader declined to furnish details about support the
PLO had given to various Iranian guerrilla organizations, saying:
‘It is enough that
we are here, and no matter how much we have helped we cannot offer as much back
as the Iranian people have offered us. It is enough for us to be among the
Iranian people.
Asked whether the
Palestinian movement felt ‘stronger’ since the Iranian uprising, he said:
‘Definitely. It has
changed completely the whole strategy and policy in this area. It has been
turned upside down.’ ”
SOURCE: Arafat, in Iran, Reports Khomeini Pledges Aid for Victory Over
Israel; Visit a Sign of Iran's Sharp Turn; ARAFAT, IN TEHERAN, PRAISES THE
VICTORS; By JAMES M. MARKHAM Special to The New York Times. New York Times
(1857-Current file). New York, N.Y.: Feb 19, 1979. p. A1 (2 pages)
[6] “Four
more generals executed; PLO, Iran will fight Israel, Arafat says”; The Globe
and Mail. Toronto, Ont.: Feb 20, 1979. p. P.10
[6a] “Grand Theater: The US, The PLO, and
the Ayatollah Khomeini: Why did the US government, in 1979, delegate to the PLO
the task of negotiating the safety of American hostages at the US embassy in
Tehran?”; Historical and Investigative Research; 10 December 2005; by Francisco
Gil-White http://www.hirhome.com/iraniraq/plo-iran.htm
[6b] “The P.L.O. currently enjoys close ties
with some of the Iranian revolutionary leaders who rose to power with the
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. One of the most intriguing delegates at the Fatah
conference in Damascus at the end of May, for example, was Arbas-Agha Zahani
whose nom de guerre is Abu Sharif. He was then the head of the Ayatollah's
Revolutionary Guards, or Pasdaran Enghelab, a post he resigned in a power play
in June that was designed to weaken the position of the relatively ''moderate''
President Abolhassan Bani-Sadr. (Abu Sharif was subsequently reappointed deputy
chief of the Pasdaran Enghelab.) Abu Sharif rose to a position of influence
thanks to the patronage of the present Iranian Defense Minister, Mustafa
Chamran. Like Yasir Arafat, both Abu Sharif and Mustafa Chamran are
fervent advocates of exporting Iran’s Islamic revolution to the rest of the
Middle East - in particular, to the conservative states of the Arab Gulf.
Abu Sharif's links
with Arafat, Abu Jihad and other key figures in the P.L.O. leadership date back
to the early 1970’s, when he attended a guerrilla training course at a Fatah
camp in Lebanon. After the downfall of the Shah, Abu Sharif and Mustafa Chamran
relied heavily on their P.L.O. contacts for help in setting up a new secret police
to replace the Sha's notorious Savak. A special P.L.O. unit, whose members had
received intelligence training in the Soviet Union, was dispatched to Teheran
to assist in rooting out ‘counterrevolutionaries.’ Abu Sharif repaid his
personal debt to the P.L.O. by successfully lobbying -- with the backing of,
among others, one of the Ayatollah's grandsons -- for a big Iranian
contribution to the Palestinian war chest and for the dispatch of more than 200
Iranian ‘volunteers’ to fight with the P.L.O. in southern Lebanon
The current head of
the P.L.O. network in Iran is Hani al-Hassan, alias Abu Hassan, a Jordanian
citizen who belongs to Arafat's inner circle of advisers. Before he was sent to
Teheran, Abu Hassan served as deputy chief of Fatah’s security department. He
enjoys a remarkable entree to Khomeini and other key members of the Iranian
regime -- so much so that one Western diplomat suggests that the P.L.O. envoy
should be counted as one of the most influential men in Teheran.” [(HIR)
emphasis added]
SOURCE: “TERROR: A SOVIET EXPORT”; New York Times. (Late Edition (East
Coast)). New York, N.Y.: Nov 2, 1980. pg. A.42; by Robert Moss
[6c] Sachar,
H. 1982. A history of Israel: From the rise of Zionism to our time. New York:
Knopf. (pp. 698)
[7] MANAMA BAHREIN -- MANAMA, Bahrain (AP)
- Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf states have tightened restrictions on an
estimated 400,000 Palestinians since the outbreak of the Iran-Iraq war,
diplomatic sources say.
A ban on political
gatherings by Palestinians has been imposed and strict visa requirements are
being rigidly enforced. The reason is that the authorities are suspicious of
Palestinian ties to the militant Shiite Moslems in Iran, who have vowed to
export their Islamic revolution.
Other sources said
that Yasser Arafat, head of the Lebanon-based Palestine Liberation
Organization, has reassured Persian Gulf governments that his guerrilla
movement would never upset the stability of the oil- rich area and ordered his
representatives in Gulf capitals to remain neutral in the Iran-Iraq conflict.
“The PLO has been treading a delicate path of neutrality between Iraq and Iran
and that has not been easy,” one Arab diplomat said. “Iraq, and all other Arab
powers, insist that the PLO must put its political cards on the table and
declare its unchangeable commitment to the Arab cause against that of the
(non-Arab) Persians.” At the same time, Iranian leaders are reported to have
asked the Palestinians to support Iran in return for their support of the
guerrilla movement.
Palestinian opinion,
while reflecting the PLO’s reluctance to choose sides in a war between its two
allies, appears much more pro-Iranian than that of
conservative Gulf governments.” [(HIR) emphasis added]
SOURCE: “Gulf states tighten hold on Palestinians”; The Globe and Mail.
Toronto, Ont.: Oct 23, 1980. p. P.14
[8] “War,
arab Feuding Leave Arafat, PLO in Disarray; Gulf War and Arab Feuding Leave
Arafat and PLO in Disarray”; The Washington Post, December 14, 1980, Sunday,
Final Edition, First Section; A1, 1487 words, By Loren Jenkins, Washington Post
Foreign Service
[9] “Arafat's Meeting with Iraqi Da'wah
Party Delegation”; BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, March 3, 1981, Tuesday,
Part 4 The Middle East and Africa; A. THE MIDDLE EAST; ME/6663/A/8; , 395
words.
TEXT:
BBC Summary of World
Broadcasts
March 3, 1981, Tuesday Arafat's Meeting with Iraqi Da'wah Party Delegation
SOURCE: Tehran in Arabic for abroad 1430 gmt 1 Mar 81
Excerpt from abroad
SECTION: Part 4 The Middle East and Africa; A. THE MIDDLE EAST; ME/6663/A/8;
LENGTH: 395 words
A delegation
representing the Da'wah Islamic Party in Iraq met with Brother Yasir Arafat the
Chairman of the PLO Executive Committee and member of the delegation
commissioned to study the issue of the war that has been imposed on Iran by the
Iraqi regime, at noon today.
The spokesman for
the Iraqi Da'wah Islamic Party briefed Brother Arafat on the measures of
suppression, oppression and banishment that have been carried out by the
infidel Tikriti regime against the Iraqi Mujahidin. The spokesman, who
supported his statement with pictures, statistics and documents, added that
during the past year alone, Saddam's regime had killed and executed 100,000
Iraqi strugglers. The spokesman added that the Iraqi regime's suppressive
measures have escalated to the extent that even women, children and old men are
not spared. They, too, have been subjected to tyranny, injustice, imprisonment
and execution.
The spokesman
stressed that the stance of the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran did
not represent the stance of the Government and people of Iran alone, but also
the claims of more than 60,000 exiled Iraqis and the claims of the help- less
Iraqi people. Speaking to Brother Arafat, the Iraqi spokesman added: We ask
you, as a true revolutionary, not to deal with us in terms of international
political principles and international relations; we call upon you to help our
voice of truth be heard through- out the world and to pressure Saddam's bloody
infidel regime to change its position on the oppressed Iraqi people and end the
war he has imposed on both of the Muslim peoples in Iraq and Iran.
Then one of the
Iraqi mujahidin spoke and said to Brother Arafat: O Brother Abu Ammar, I am a
struggler and revolutionary just as you are, and my duty is to fight at your
side against the Zionist regime and for the liberation of Palestine and not to
be exiled by Saddam's regime to Iran after a period of torture. Then the
struggler showed the marks that remained on his body after being tortured by
the Iraqi regime to Brother Arafat, and said that the torture carried out by
Saddam's gang against the Iraqi mujahidin was much more than that carried out
by the Zionist entity against the Palestinian combatants. Seeing and hearing
all this, Brother Arafat could not prevent his tears of sympathy for the Iraqi
brothers from falling. . .
[10] “PALESTINIAN
REACTION; Arafat's adviser accuses Iran of sheltering terrorism”; BBC Summary
of World Broadcasts, March 5, 1996, Tuesday, Part 4 The Middle East; THE MIDDLE
EAST; AFTERMATH OF TEL AVIV BOMBING; EE/D2553/ME, 326 words
[11] “ ‘SABOTAGE’ ATTEMPT; Two pro-Iran
Palestinians reported arrested for plotting to kill Arafat”; BBC Summary of
World Broadcasts, February 21, 1996, Wednesday, Part 4 The Middle East; THE
MIDDLE EAST; ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN AFFAIRS; EE/D2541/ME, 79 words
[12] “Bethlehem: Brig-Gen Abu Khalid
al-Lahham, who recently returned from Iran, said that Hojjat ol-Eslam Mohammad
Khatami is considered a close friend of Palestine and the Palestinian people,
as well as a personal friend of President Yasir Arafat. Moreover, he called him
the Iranian Napoleon and described him as Iran's saviour.
In an exclusive
interview, Lahham said... the new Iranian leadership will strive to refute its
image of exporting revolution and interfering in the internal affairs of other
people.
On the internal
level, the new leadership will engage in building a free economy and will allow
freedom of thought and faith and the formation of political parties.
Lahham, who arrived
in Iran 10 days before the elections on an assignment by President Yasir
Arafat, added that the new leadership will support the Palestinian people with
all their leaders and inclinations, including the peace process, but it will
fight to defend its role and presence as a major Middle Eastern state. The
Palestinian people will be able to ask for Iran's support”
SOURCE: “Arafat adviser visits Iran, brings message of support for
Palestinians”; BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, June 12, 1997, Thursday, Part 4
The Middle East; THE MIDDLE EAST; ISRAEL; ME/D2943/MED, 428 words
[13] “Palestinian
ties to Iran, Hizbullah look firmer”; Christian Science Monitor (Boston, MA),
January 18, 2002, Friday, WORLD; Pg. 08, 1353 words, Nicholas Blanford Special
to The Christian Science Monitor
[14] “A bitter taste for vengeance”; Sunday
Times (London), April 7, 2002, Sunday, Features, 2938 words, Marie Colvin in
Ramallah
[15] “Arch-terrorist or hero of peace:
Arafat's enduring image”; The Australian, September 25, 2003 Thursday All-round
Country Edition, WORLD-TYPE- FEATURE-BIOG- YASSER ARAFAT; Pg. 8, 1079 words,
Abraham Rabinovich
[16] Barghouti Seeking Palestinian
Presidency, Associated Press Online, December 1, 2004 Wednesday, INTERNATIONAL
NEWS, 836 words, MOHAMMED DARAGHMEH; Associated Press Writer, RAMALLAH, West
Bank
[17] “Israel believes that much of the
Fatah-affiliated armed faction, calling itself the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades,
has now come under Iran's sway, especially in the West Bank.
Scores of
Palestinian attacks, accounting for roughly a third of the 98 Israelis killed
so far this year, are believed to have been orchestrated by the Lebanese
Hizbollah movement.
The Shia group
pioneered the use of suicide bombings in the 1980s, kidnapped westerners and
successfully drove the Israeli army out of south Lebanon in 2000. Hizbollah is
now a political party in Lebanon.
‘Hizbollah is a
finger of Iran's hand,’ the senior Israeli security source said. ‘In the past
year we can see increasing Iranian influence in Palestinian attacks on Israel.
‘The same people
sometimes receive money both from Arafat's headquarters and from Hizbollah. If the
attack succeeds in causing fatalities, they get a bonus from Hizbollah.’
Another security
source said Hizbollah rewards Palestinian cells to the tune of $5,000 (pounds
2,900) for each Israeli killed.
Israel regards
Teheran as its mortal enemy, and has every interest in presenting Iran as a
dangerous state sponsor of international terrorism. But on the issue of
penetrating Fatah, Israel is in unusual agreement with Palestinian leaders.
Yasser Arafat, the
Palestinian ‘president’ who has been confined to his Ramallah headquarters for
more than three years, said this week that Hizbollah was trying to infiltrate
Fatah.
He said Iran was
financing radical Islamist groups, and denounced Iran's spiritual leader, Ali
Khamenei.
He said: ‘Khamenei
is working against us. He is giving money to all these fanatical groups.
Khamenei is a troublemaker.’ ”
SOURCE: “Iran ‘in control of terrorism in Israel’; Hizbollah, described
as a ‘finger of Teheran's hand,’ is said to be paying $5,000 for every Israeli
killed.” Anton La Guardia reports from Tel Aviv; THE DAILY TELEGRAPH (LONDON),
October 15, 2004, Friday, 803 words, by Anton La Guardia
[18] The Israeli soldiers were under orders
to protect civilians (apparently no matter the cost, because they defended
themselves, at first, with non-weapons such as paint-ball guns). It
was only after one of the wounded Israeli soldiers was thrown from the upper
deck and the lethal weapons of the soldiers were taken from them by the
attackers, that their fellow soldiers opened fire to protect them. The result
was that some of the attackers died.
The images of the
brutal attack against the Israeli soldiers—a blood curling lyinching (sic)—are
available to the public. http://www.vimeo.com/12555636
[20] “How did the ‘Palestinian movement’
emerge? The British sponsored it. Then the German Nazis, and the US”; from
UNDERSTANDING THE PALESTINIAN MOVEMENT: An HIR Series, in four parts;
Historical and Investigative Research; 13 June 2006; by Francisco Gil-White http://www.hirhome.com/israel/pal_mov4.htm
Francisco Gil-White has a
Masters in Social Sciences from the University of Chicago and a PhD in
biological and cultural anthropology from UCLA. His PhD thesis work was in
rural Western Mongolia, where he did 14 months of fieldwork studying the mutual
ethnic perceptions of neighboring Torguud Mongol and Kazakh nomadic
herders. Until June 2006, he was Assistant Professor of Psychology at the
University of Pennsylvania. Today he teaches at ITAM, in Mexico City. His
research is broadly concerned with the evolution of the proximate mechanisms
responsible for social learning and social perception and cognition. His main
interests are the evolution of ethnic processes, with a special focus on
racism, and particularly anti-Semitism; prestige processes; the evolution of
language; the structure of narrative memory; the structure and interaction of
media and political processes; the laws of history; Western geopolitics; and
the political history of the West.
