| Israeli troops stormed Chairman-for-Life Yasser Arafat (1929-2002?)'s headquarters early Thursday, blew up three buildings in the sprawling compound and shelled the Palestinian leader's living area in response to a Palestinian suicide attack on an Israeli bus that killed 17 passengers. A shell or rocket hit about five feet from Arafat's bed, punching a hole into the wall dividing his bedroom and an adjacent bathroom. Pointing to his dust-covered bed, broken bedroom mirror and shattered bathroom tiles, Arafat suggested Israel was trying to harm him. "I was supposed to sleep here last night but I had some work downstairs," he said. "Of course they (the Israelis) knew where I was. Everybody knows this is my bedroom." An Israeli army spokesman, Capt. Jacob Dallal, said Arafat was not the target of the operation. "If there had been any intention of harming Arafat, it would not have been a problem," Dallal said. Thursday's assault with bulldozers and tanks came just a month after troops withdrew from the compound following a 34-day siege that confined Arafat to several rooms. Though Israel's stated goal at the time was to isolate Arafat and remove him from contacts with the outside world, the virtual house arrest turned him into a heroic figure in the eyes of Palestinians and much of the Arab world. There has been speculation that another major Palestinian terror attack would prompt Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to expel Arafat. The Palestinian leader shrugged off such a scenario Thursday. "Expel me?" he said. "I will die here." The Israeli daily Maariv wrote in an editorial Thursday that "the blood-boiling spectacle of the people who were burned to death in a bus ... needs to bring us very close to a decision to rid the region of Arafat's presence." |
 Yasser: "That was when I crapped myself..." I can't get this vision out of my mind: Yasser, in his sweaty gold lame Dictator's Pyjamas, with the medal embroidered on the chest, and his nitey-nite headscarf, snuggled down next to a 12-year-old (just practicing for when he's a martyr, see?) suddenly leaping 4 feet into the air as the tank round goes by, taking the covers with him. The kid's sitting up in bed, buck (or maybe doe) nekkid, shrieking. The autographed copy of Zabibah and the King falls from the nightstand. The bodyguards come barging in to see if the Chief's alright, holding their large-caliber Fearless Fosdick automatics. One of them trips over the book, falling across the bed and accidentally plugging Yasser... Is this how it will all end? Not with a bang, but with a snicker? |