<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
<font size="-1">
<div class="entry-date">November 13, 2013<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/11/13/why-israel-murdered-arafat/">http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/11/13/why-israel-murdered-arafat/</a><br>
<br>
<div style="float: right;"><br>
<div id="_atssh"
style="visibility: hidden; height: 1px; width: 1px; position: absolute; z-index: 100000;"><iframe
src="http://ct1.addthis.com/static/r07/sh142.html#"
style="border: 0px none ; height: 1px; width: 1px; position: absolute; z-index: 100000; left: 0px; top: 0px;"
title="AddThis utility frame" id="_atssh491"></iframe></div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="subheadlinestyle"><big><big><b>Another Covert Assassination</b></big></big></div>
<h1 class="article-title">Why Israel Murdered Arafat</h1>
<div class="mainauthorstyle">by JONATHAN COOK</div>
<div class="main-text"><big> </big>
<p><big><big><em>Nazareth.</em></big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>It seems there are still plenty of parties who would
prefer that Arafat’s death continues to be treated as a mystery rather
than as an assassination.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>It is hard, however, to avoid drawing the logical
conclusion from the finding last week by Swiss scientists that the
Palestinian leader’s body contained high levels of a radioactive
isotope, polonium-210. An inconclusive and much more limited study by a
Russian team published immediately after the Swiss announcement also
suggests Arafat died from poisoning.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>It is time to state the obvious: Arafat was killed. And
suspicion falls squarely on Israel.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Israel alone had the means, track record, stated intention
and motive. Without Israel’s fingerprints on the murder weapon, it may
not be quite enough to secure a conviction in a court of law, but it
should be evidence enough to convict Israel in the court of world
opinion.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Israel had access to polonium from its nuclear reactor in
Dimona, and it has a long record of carrying out political
assassinations, some ostentatious and others covert, often using
hard-to-trace chemical agents. Most notoriously, Israel tried to
quietly kill another Palestinian leader, Khaled Meshal of Hamas, in
Jordan in 1997, injecting a poison into his ear. Meshal was saved only
because the assassins were caught and Israel was forced to supply an
antidote.<br>
Israeli leaders have been queuing up to deny there was ever any malign
intent from Israel’s side towards Arafat. Silvan Shalom, the energy
minister, claimed last week: “We never made a decision to harm him
physically.” Shalom must be suffering from a memory lapse.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>There is plenty of evidence that Israel wanted Arafat – in
the euphemism of that time – “removed”. In January 2002, Shaul Mofaz,
Israel’s military chief of staff, was caught on a microphone whispering
to Israel’s prime minister, Ariel Sharon, about Arafat: “We have to get
rid of him.”</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>With the Palestinian leader holed up for more than two
years in his battered compound in Ramallah, surrounded by Israeli
tanks, the debate in the Israel government centred on whether he should
be exiled or killed.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>In September 2003, when Shalom was foreign minister, the
cabinet even issued a warning that Israel would “remove this obstacle
in a manner, and at a time, of its choosing.” The then-deputy prime
minister, Ehud Olmert, clarified that killing Arafat was “one of the
options”.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>What stayed Israel’s hand – and fuelled its equivocal tone
– was Washington’s adamant opposition. In the wake of these threats,
Colin Powell, the US secretary of state, warned that a move against
Arafat would trigger “rage throughout the Arab world, the Muslim world
and in many other parts of the world”.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>By April 2004, however, Sharon declared he was no longer
obligated by his earlier commitment to President George Bush not to
“harm Arafat physically”. “I am released from that pledge,” he
observed. The White House too indicated a weakening of its stance: an
unnamed spokesman responded feebly that the US “opposed any such
action”.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Unknown is whether Israel was able to carry out the
assassination alone, or whether it needed to recruit a member or
members of Arafat’s inner circle, with him inside his Ramallah
compound, as accomplices to deliver the radioactive poison.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>So what about motive? How did Israel gain from “removing”
Arafat? To understand Israel’s thinking, one needs to return to another
debate raging at that time, among Palestinians.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>The Palestinian leadership was split into two camps,
centred on Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas, Arafat’s heir apparent. The pair
had starkly divergent strategies for dealing with Israel.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>In Arafat’s view, Israel had reneged on commitments it
made in the Oslo accords. He was therefore loath to invest exclusively
in the peace process. He wanted a twin strategy: keeping open channels
for talks while maintaining the option of armed resistance to pressure
Israel. For this reason he kept a tight personal grip on the
Palestinian security forces.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Abbas, on the other hand, believed that armed resistance
was a gift to Israel, delegitimising the Palestinian struggle. He
wanted to focus exclusively on negotiations and state-building, hoping
to exert indirect pressure on Israel by proving to the international
community that the Palestinians could be trusted with statehood. His
priority was cooperating closely with the US and Israel in security
matters.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Israel and the US strongly preferred Abbas’s approach,
even forcing Arafat for a time to reduce his own influence by
appointing Abbas to a newly created post of prime minister.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Israel’s primary concern was that, however much of a
prisoner they made Arafat, he would remain a unifying figure for
Palestinians. By refusing to renounce armed struggle, Arafat managed to
contain – if only just – the mounting tensions between his own Fatah
movement and its chief rival, Hamas.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>With Arafat gone, and the conciliatory Abbas installed in
his place, those tensions erupted violently into the open – as Israel
surely knew they would. That culminated in a split that tore apart the
Palestinian national movement and led to a territorial schism between
the Fatah-controlled West Bank and Hamas-ruled Gaza.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>In Israel’s oft-used terminology, Arafat was the head of
the “infrastructure of terror”. But Israel’s preference for Abbas
derived not from respect for him or from a belief that he could
successfully persuade Palestinians to accept a peace deal. Sharon
famously declared that Abbas was no more impressive than a “plucked
chicken”.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Israel’s interests in killing Arafat are evident when one
considers what occurred after his death. Not only did the Palestinian
national movement collapse, but the Palestinian leadership got drawn
back into a series of futile peace talks, leaving Israel clear to
concentrate on land grabs and settlement building.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Contemplating the matter of whether Israel benefited from
the loss of Arafat, Palestinian analyst Mouin Rabbani observed: “Hasn’t
Abu Mazen’s [Abbas’] exemplary commitment to Oslo over the years, and
maintenance of security cooperation with Israel through thick and thin,
already settled this question?”</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Abbas’ strategy may be facing its ultimate test now, as
the Palestinian negotiating team once again try to coax out of Israel
the barest concessions on statehood at the risk of being blamed for the
talks’ inevitable failure. The effort already looks deeply misguided.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>While the negotiations have secured for the Palestinians
only a handful of ageing political prisoners, Israel has so far
announced in return a massive expansion of the settlements and the
threatened eviction of some 15,000 Palestinians from their homes in
East Jerusalem.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>It is doubtless a trade-off Arafat would have rued.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big><i><i><strong>Jonathan Cook</strong> won the Martha
Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His latest books are “<a
href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0745327540/counterpunchmaga"
onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.amazon.com']);">Israel
and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the
Middle East</a>” (Pluto Press) and “Disappearing Palestine: Israel’s
Experiments in Human Despair” (Zed Books). His new website is <a
href="http://www.jonathan-cook.net/"
onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.jonathan-cook.net']);">www.jonathan-cook.net</a>.</i></i></big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big><em> A version of this article first appeared in The
National, Abu Dhabi.</em></big></big></p>
</div>
</font>
<div class="moz-signature">-- <br>
Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
415 863.9977
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.freedomarchives.org">www.freedomarchives.org</a>
</div>
</body>
</html>