The Prisoner Of Ramallah

Avnery.

The Prisoner Of Ramallah
No one symbolizes the condition of the Palestinian
people, its suffering, determination and courage,
more than Yasser Arafat in the besieged compound -
a prison within a prison (Ramallah) within a prison
(the Palestinian territories as a whole).

Every television viewer recognizes the bridge between the last
two buildings left standing among the ruins of the Mukata'ah
(compound) in Ramallah.

During one of my last visits, a Palestinian officer pointed to a
simple table and chair near one of the windows of this bridge.
Through this window a stretch of the Palestinian landscape
beyond the town is visible. "Here Abu-Amar likes to sit between
meetings and look out," he explained. Abu-Amar is the
affectionate name for Yasser Arafat.

21 years ago, when I went to Beirut and met him for the first time,
he was one of the most mobile leaders in the world, if not the
most mobile of all. Once he told me that during the last five days
he had visited seven countries, sleeping on the plane between
destinations. At the time, his neck was in a surgical collar.

OutlookIndia

to give Arafat much more latitude than Edward Said. Himself a Palestinian Said is much harder on Arafat than Uri. Said insists Arafat abandoned the Palestinian cause in favor of his own Power. Perhaps, Uri is speaking purely in symbolic terms.

It is good to remember that, and that is why I posted this piece.

I cannot address the contrast you point out other than to suggest
they have quite different agendas, and I don't know enough about
either to run my mouth about it.

I have read more Said than Uri, Said does site actualities that occcurred during the oslo process. Facts like Arafat having jailed palestinian dissidents those who criticized Arafat and his handling of the process. Uri paints him it seems in more romantic terms. I will find you a Said essay wherein he focuses his criticism on Arafat.

Yassir's undemocratic methods are one of the more persistent
and credible complaints I hear, and I personally don't care
for him, as I've said here a number of times. In his defense
on that account, one sees few rulers anywhere in the World who
like democracy and free speech, its so "inefficient"; and fewer
still that do not resort to the same methods under duress, some
more egregiously than others.

Bemildred & Herschel

I have a handful of essays in this book, some are on the internet, but the ones I am referring to are not. In attempting to find the ones I want, I found this. In this essay Said reflects the same opinion as Uri. I guess they are both speaking of Arafat in relation to Sharon tactics whose aims are to ostrasize Arafat. Neither feel Sharon's boycotting of Arafat is based in any reality that he is the "terrorist" the propaganda has him pencilled in as (at least that is my take on both of these author's opinions). Neither, in this instance speak of him in those critical terms that I have read more than once Said hone in on (criticism which reflect on Arafat's negotiating tactic, ineptness, disorganization, and lack of commitment to the Palestinian Cause). I am still looking for those examples, but in the meantime here is this.

snip

Uri Avnery is right: Arafat is being murdered. And with him, according to Sharon, will die the aspirations of the Palestinians. This is an exercise short of complete genocide to see how far Israeli power can go in sadistic brutality without being stopped or apprehended. Today Sharon has said that in the event of a war with Iraq, which is definitely coming, he will retaliate against Iraq, thus no doubt causing Bush and Rumsfeld the nightmares they rightly deserve. Sharon's last attempt at regime change was in Lebanon during 1982. He put Bashir Jemayel in as president, then was summarily told by Jemayel that Lebanon would never be an Israeli vassal, then Jemayel was assassinated, then the Sabra and Shatila massacres took place, then after 20 bloody and ignominious years the Israelis sullenly withdrew from Lebanon.

more...

http://www.counterpunch.org/said1005.html

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

another one that I was not thinking of but will suffice until I find the essays I had actually intended to place.

snip

There has been much talk of vast sums coming for development: one prominent Arab daily reported that Arafat was bringing $ 2.7 billion to the deal. The West Bank is supposed to get an additional $ 800 million. The Scandinavian governments are said to have pledged considerable amounts for West Bank and Gaza development; Arab governments and the US are expected to be asked for money, although given the unfulfilled promises of the past, Palestinians are justifiably sceptical.

The PLO has transformed itself from a national liberation movement into a kind of small-town government, with the same handful of people still in command. PLO offices abroad - all of them the result of years of costly struggle whereby the Palestinian people earned the right to represent themselves - are being closed, sold off, left to neglect. For the more than 50 per cent of the Palestinian people not resident in the Occupied Territories - 350,000 stateless refugees in Lebanon, twice that number in Syria, many more elsewhere - the plan may be the final dispossession. Their national rights as people made refugees in 1948, solemnly confirmed and reconfirmed for years by the UN, the PLO, the Arab governments, indeed most of the world, now seem to have been annulled.

All secret deals between a very strong and a very weak partner necessarily involve concessions hidden in embarrassment by the latter. Yes, there are still lots of details to be negotiated, as there are many imponderables to be made clear, and even some hopes either to be fulfilled or dashed. Still, the deal before us smacks of the PLO leadership's exhaustion and isolation, and of Israel's shrewdness. Many Palestinians are asking themselves why, after years of concessions, we should be conceding once again to Israel and the US in return for promises and vague improvements in the occupation that won't all occur until "final status" talks three-to-five years hence, and perhaps not then.

We have not even had an explicit agreement from Israel (which has yet to admit that it is an occupying power) to end the occupation, with its maze of laws and punitive apparatus. Nothing is said about the 13,000 political prisoners who remain in Israeli jails. We must put into whatever is going to be signed (no one is sure by whom) that Palestinians have a right to freedom and equality and will concede nothing from that right. Can the Israeli army march in at will? Who decides and when? After all, limited "self-rule" is not something around which to mobilise or give long-term hope to people. Above all, Palestinians now must have the widest possible say in their future as it is largely about to be settled, perhaps irrevocably and unwisely. It is disturbing that the National Council has not been called into session, and that the appalling disarray induced by Arafat's recent methods has not been addressed.

snip

With the PLO in decomposition and conditions in the territories abysmal, there never was a worse internal crisis for Palestinians than the one that began this past summer - that is, until Arafat fled into the Israeli plan, which in one stroke propels him on to centre stage again and rids the Israelis of an unwanted insurrectionary problem that Arafat must now work at solving for them. I admire those few Palestinian officials who bravely aver that this may be the first step toward ending the occupation, but anyone who knows the characteristic methods of Arafat's leadership is better advised to start working for a radical improvement in present conditions.

more...
http://www.mideastfacts.com/esaid-arf.html

The above article is more indicative of the kinds of criticisms Said expresses. His criticisms seem to focus primarily on Arafat's undemocratic process, his autocracy, as well as what Said claims was Arafat's unpreparedness and sometimes incompetence in regards to his ineptness at negotiating with Israel and the US during the Oslo process afterwhich Said meticulously documents, it in fact only got worse for the Palestinian people, with none of the important issues that were placed on final status (as they remain today with this roadmap) ever being addressed, let alone resolved or reconciled.


HERSCHEL --- This begins to explain what I meant when I said Arafat sold the Palestinian Cause down the river. There are other Said essay's that illustrate this better. I will place those in this thread as well. I just have to locate them.

I've bookmarked this. I'll have to let it stew a bit, and give
it a close reading. There seem to be a number of ways to go with
it, and I have other business that is going to keep me busy for a
couple weeks. Regards.

I finally got around to these.
The bit on Oslo was fascinating, in retrospect.

I don't think I'll go over the arguments about
Arafat again, although he make some cogent observations.

Thanks for posting.

I dig Uri Avnery.

;-)

I dont know where he keeps it but i know where
he should shove it.

Dont feel too sorry....looks like he has his retirement
pretty well taken care of. Unfortunately he is still
around.

I'm curious.

to a footnote to history. My favorite part..

"But not the slightest hint of suspicion ever attached itself to Yasser Arafat himself. While Ariel Sharon is sinking in a morass of corruption affairs and world leaders like Helmut Kohl in Germany and Jacques Chirac in France have starred in major scandals, Arafat has remained above suspicion. Neither his opponents at home nor the Israeli intelligence agencies have succeeded in discovering any spots."

I wonder...did Uri swallow??

Forgive me for not asking you in return...

what did you think of the article??

I won't make a snide remark about swallowing.

I think that Uri is trying to see things from a different perspective. I believe he is trying to tell us about a different Arafat. One that we don't see. One with out the sensational news stories. Stories of terrorism or other misdeeds are not his point. We might see him as a terrorist but as Uri notes in his article, the Palestinians do not. They see him as a hero. Who's right? Who's wrong? Well that's all a matter of opinion. Prior to reading the article, I didn't care for Arafat all to well. I had the opinion that he did what he had to do and thought what was right for his people. I also had the opinion that he fell well short of being a good man. After reading the article, however, I have come to realize that I fall well short of being a good man, myself. How am I going to judge this guy? Well, I still have not so great opinions but again, I think the point of the article was to see a different perspective. Not one through Israeli or American eyes, but one through the eyes of the people he has led. I can still judge him in my own opinion as I can judge his counterpart, Sharon, but something about this article led me to believe that maybe all negatives about Arafat aren't necessarily correct or true.

Now, can I get a genuine answer from you? Not one about swallowing, but how you interpret Uri's goal of the article or about the cause and life of Arafat himself - are you able to disengage from your everyday person and truly see from a different perspective?

Keep in touch as I'm still curious.

Please be as forthcoming as you please.

i was real busy yesterday.

I'm afraid i'm going to disappoint you and say i
have no idea what uri's "goal" is.

As for being "able to disengage from my everyday person and truly see from a different perspective" , sorry ....I see
nothing in arafat but a hapless lying terrorist
who when given a chance for peace, failed his own
people.

Sorry.

as to the Palestinians as a whole seeing Arafat as a hero. while he might appear more intrinsic to the cause (and not a pawn for the US-brokers which actually debatable -- as there are some that were not happy with his negotitating skills during Oslo -- and I feel rightly so), I am just wondering if there exist statistics on how pleased the Palestinians are with Arafat and his performance during, after, and since Oslo. Have you ever run across any?

outside of the fact that Arafat has always had some level of popularity. Some times more than others. I have heard that prior to the Intifada, his popularity was pretty low. Then the GOI had to go and make him all popular again. Go figure...

I guess Sharon's plan to boycott him had the opposite effect - eh?

I just started a search to pull together perhaps some statistic on what the Palestinian people feel about Arafat. I literally just started...

my words were literal: what do Palestinians feel about Arafat AND statistics...

look what came up top of the search...:eyes: and they have pulled together Arab quotes... lovely stuff...

snip

The bare basics:
There is no Palestinian culture, language, nor cuisine. There has never been a land called "Palestine" ruled by "Palestinians." There has never been a Palestinian president or Prime Minister or government or military. This whole notion of there being a Palestine is a recent and false invention, based on lies and violence, with NO intention for peaceful co-existence with Israel, or any other nation who won't kowtow to them. Since the 1880's, it was the Jewish pioneers who began to redeem the land, Israel, from wilderness. Only thereafter, did the Arabs come from other lands to benefit from what the Jews built and try to take it away from them.

According to G-d, the land of the Israelites/Hebrews/Jews, is:
"Gilead as far as Dan; all Naphtali; the land of Ephraim and Manasseh; the whole land of Judah as far as the Western Sea (Mediterranean) the Negev; and the Plain - the Valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees as far as Zoar. And the Lord said to him (Moses), "This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, 'I will assign it to your offspring.' I have let you see it with your own eyes..."(Exodus 34) In Joshua 1, it is written: ..."Every spot on which your foot treads I give to you, as I promised Moses. Your territory shall extend from the wilderness and the Lebanon to the Great River, the River Euphrates (on the east) - the whole Hittite country - and up to the Mediterranean Sea on the west. No one shall be able to resist you as long as you live. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will not fail you or forsake you."

more...

http://www.vibrani.com/Palestinians.htm

okay I am going to go back and see if I can find information from the real world on what do palestinians feel about Arafat... I know what Said feels and Uri... but I'd like to get a better and real world sense of what the palestininas feel (unspun).

I will keep you posted.

I can't stand those fundamentalist extremist fools who follow the credo of "God gave us this land, I don't care about you, we'll take it." As bad as the Christian right.

It is as abrasive as those antisemtic spook sites that come up every now and then... one came up recently. I forget what I was searching... basically it had a collection of actual articles... but the site was so off putting it even had end of the world type music on it... very anti-semitic spin on the articles... the articles were actual news article they were anti-nothing... but the way the articles were being used within the message of the site. This site to me is the equavilent of that...

goes to show you people are people are people... none all good or all bad...

anyway I have a couple of different searches going right now... my biz day is over. I am going to get off the computer for a while.

in this thread I am looking for stats on what the palestinian people feel about arafat. The other thread is getting a better handle on this russian communist parallel... I wish tinnypriv or standwatie would come back and expound a bit more on that and the significance in their opinion of the parallel. anyway.

"Who's right? Who's wrong? Well that's all a matter of opinion." Arafat is a murderer. He is wrong. There is no room for opinion about that.

Did you notice herschel I finally answer your question regarding a comment I made about Arafat selling out the Palestinian cause... Post #13... it is just a small amount... I am not sure whether you'd waste much time on it... but Said is quite the critic of Arafat during and after Oslo... you can do more of a search... if you are really interested... Arafat Oslo Said... would probably pull up enough stuff...

no biggy... just thought I 'd let you know.

Well, thanks for making an absolute out of something that just might be subjective. I didn't realize you had such power.

1. What brand of cell phone batteries does he use?
2. How did a man who has never worked a day in his life become a multi-millionaire?
3. I bet his wife prays daily he stays were he is so she can enjoy her life in the villa outside Paris, this "poor" man bought.

Just wondering out loud. It has the same relevance he does, nothing.

and arafat boycotting and demonizing it actually seem he is very relevant. Especially since so much energy has been expended in an attempt to push him out of the picture. So far it seems those attempts have been fruitless.