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2003-08-22 Middle East

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Posted by Fred Pruitt 2003-08-22 00:05|| || Front Page|| [1 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 I have a hint to Mahmud:

You denied the holocast in your book.
It seems that you are much better at authoring non-sensical books than fighting terror, which was the first reason you were elected by the Americo-Israelis to be prime minister.
You are clearly being used by Arafat and the extremists to buy more time for them so that they can improve their devastated infrastructure.
Be honest! Be a man! resign now and show everyone the real authentic face of the Palestinian leadership!
Mahmud, your deliberate impotence is now publicly and internationally demonstated.

Let the guns speak !

Go home before they send a splodidope to send you to the 72 virgins.

Posted by The Dodo 2003-8-22 3:57:18 AM|| 2003-8-22 3:57:18 AM|| Front Page Top

#2 I think this is the 6th time that Abbas has threatened to resign, the 22nd time Powell has said 'keep to the road map' after a Paleoterror atrocity, the 302nd time the State Dept or White house has said 'work together against terrorism'.

Posted by mhw 2003-8-22 7:51:29 AM|| 2003-8-22 7:51:29 AM|| Front Page Top

#3 and in the past when Abbas was threatening to resign, he would get grudging concessions from Arafat - like letting him appoint Dahlan to control security forces. Of course then Arafat went and undermined what he had just done, by taking the lions share of the security forces away from Dahlans direct control.

So when Abbas says he doesnt have the force to beat Hamas, and when Israel says the PA security forces are quite enough to beat Hamas, theyre both right. Total PA forces ARE much larger than Hamas and IJ - but only a small part of them are actually under control of Dahlan (and thus Abbas) So Abbas tried to avoid direct confrontation with Hamas via the Hudna. Race was then on between Hamas to rebuild and Abbas to gain control over Pal security apparatus.

Looks like Hamas won - so they tried a string of attacks - if Abbas fought them, theyd beat him, and if he didnt, he's look weak, they'd look strong, etc. First 2 attacks killed "only" a couple of Israelis - so Israel didnt respond, but pressed for action, continuing only to go after "ticking bombs". Hamas was smart enough not to wait (and probably gambling nothing would happen to it) and used the latest israeli attack on a ticking bomb as an excuse for the attack that killed 20 on a bus.

So now Sharon kills a senior Hamas leader. Which is a signal to EVERYONE - to Abbas, to Arafat, to Bush and Powell, to Mubarak and Crown Prince Abdullah - the PA MUST crackdown, or I will move up my list. I will go after Rantissi, and then Yassin. And then all hell will break loose. And that hell will be much worse for you than it will be for me. So now you have a 24 window to do something.

But the obstacle isnt Abbas. Its Arafat, who really controls the lions share of the PA security forces. Thats why Powell, who had been ignoring Arafat, pressed him. One hopes that behind the scenes he made it clear that the US would back Israel in expelling or killing Arafat if he does not cooperate. One hopes that Mubarak has made it clear behind the scenes that Egypt wont object to strenously either.

Of course what theyre pressing the PA for wont be killing or imprisoning Yassin and Rantissi - the whole idea is for the PA to avoid hell, by acting instead of the Israelis. But they will have to make a significant number of arrests, and go after arms caches.

We'll know soon how they responded.

Posted by liberalhawk 2003-8-22 2:42:58 PM|| 2003-8-22 2:42:58 PM|| Front Page Top

#4 'Following an emergency cabinet meeting in Gaza late Wednesday, Abbas went to meet with Arafat to seek approval for a crackdown on Palestinian militant groups. âAbu Mazen (Abbasâs nom-de-guerre) will present Arafat and the Palestinian leadership with four demands,â a senior Palestinian official said on condition of anonymity ahead of the talks in Ramallah. âIf they donât get Arafatâs support, the cabinet will resign.â '

This is Abbas pressuring Arafat. What happens to Arafat if Abbas does resign. Who is his intermediary with the Americans the next time Sharon wants to kill him? Will another PM be put in Abbas's place? Marwan Bargouti perhaps - unlike Abbas, a man with a real local constituency, with no long history of companionship with Arafat, and a man who lives by the gun? Will that make Arafat feel more secure? The goal here is to get Arafat to think that his own survival depends on doing the right thing - thats never worked before, but you never know.....

Posted by liberalhawk 2003-8-22 3:07:58 PM|| 2003-8-22 3:07:58 PM|| Front Page Top

#5 Lhawk: Marwan Bargouti is known to hold a grudge with Arafat. Of course, by now, Abbas probably hates Arafat more than Marwan does.

Posted by mhw 2003-8-22 5:59:43 PM|| 2003-8-22 5:59:43 PM|| Front Page Top

#6 I hope Abbas has a word processing program that reminds him to resave each time he updates the file with his resignation or one of these times he will forget and print out an old form with the old date on it. I don't think Arafat will take the resignation threat very seriously after he figures out that its actually the same file and he doesn't have to retype the whole thing each and every time he resigns. Even a wwll written resignation loses some effect and becomes more like spam if it doesn't look like tis an original draft.

Posted by Steve D 2003-8-22 6:06:59 PM|| 2003-8-22 6:06:59 PM|| Front Page Top

#7 The White House urged Israel on Thursday to work with the Palestinian Authority to crack down on terrorism.

WTF does the White House think Israel was doing when it sent a missile into Shanab's car?????

Posted by Bomb-a-rama 2003-8-22 7:21:46 PM|| 2003-8-22 7:21:46 PM|| Front Page Top

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