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Jewish World Review July 25, 2001/ 5 Menachem-Av, 5761

Jackie Mason & Raoul Felder

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Yasser, it's time to say good riddance to Arafat


http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- WHY are we still negotiating peace with Arafat, if he already admitted that he can't be held responsible for the killing of Israelis on a daily basis?

We have decided long ago that Arafat was the man in charge of our enemies in the Middle East, but almost every time an Israeli life is snuffed out, Hamas takes the credit and Arafat either claims that he can't help it because the Israelis caused it by their "intransigence." Otherwise, he claims that he can't be held responsible for everything Hezbollah or Hamas does, especially when they kill people.

When Arafat is told that he should do what the Israeli government does --- arrest and prosecute any murderer immediately, he announces that he's ready to negotiate in good faith, if the Israelis will make an honest effort to control the violence and make peace. How much longer will the Israelis continue to victimize themselves with this phony charade?

Why are we negotiating for peace with a man who admits that peace is none of his business?

For the purpose of peace conferences and negotiations, Arafat is the man in charge. But killing Israelis is "out of his control" and nobody asks the simple question: "Why are we still blinding ourselves and losing lives every day just to serve the purposes of Arafat's hypocrisy?"

How hard is it to understand that after 20 years of this fake flip flops, we shouldn't go to another negotiating table, we should announce a timetable. The timetable should be very simple: his time is up!

The Israeli government has no moral right to allow more Israeli lives to be lost due to the fraud of another peace conference. How many more years will we blind ourselves because of the holiness of the words "peace process"? If a man admits he can't control the violence, are we supposed to accept the idea that "peace" counts, except when human life is involved?

The fact is that Arafat has long ago abdicated his right to be a peace negotiator. It is only the fact that Israel is so desperate for peace that we have adopted this fantasy.

Instead of negotiating with Arafat, we should search for our own sanity. If we could find it, we would not accept for one more day any "acceptable level of violence." We have no moral right to sacrifice one Israeli life with the shameful word "acceptable," and we have no moral right to care what the rest of the world will "accept" as an "acceptable" level of Israeli retaliation.

World "opinion" will gladly continue to accept the sacrifice of Israeli lives for the "peace process." Would the American government accept the idea of a terrorist organization killing its citizens every day in the streets of this country for 20 years and still wait for world opinion to accept what they have a right to do about it?

When President Clinton decided that bin Laden was planning a terrorist attack, nobody knew if it was true or just a diversion from Monica Lewinsky. Nevertheless, he didn't ask for permission from world opinion. He didn't care or ask if it was an "acceptable level of violence" and hundreds of innocent Sudanese lives were sacrificed for reasons nobody knows or questions or even cares about.

When an American president decides to even fantasize a threat to human life, he wantonly bombs countries with immunity, but when Israelis die every day we still wait for acceptance while we negotiate from America for an "acceptable level of violence."

Israel has the responsibility of any legally constituted government to protect the lives of its citizens and it would be derelict, sinful, and even criminal to sacrifice one Israeli life for the hypocrisy of Arafat or for American "acceptance". Did America ask first for Israeli acceptance before they bombed Sudan?

Sharon is not the first prime minister to remind us that Arafat could control the violence if he legitimately wanted to, but we know he doesn't mean it and is using the Hezbollah as a fake disguise for continued terrorism. Why are we still talking to him? He claims he has the power to make peace, but not the power to stop the killing. In that case, why are we negotiating with him? Do we want to have a form of peace that allows murder? Arafat can't have it both ways. He either should stop the violence or not negotiate.

We have no right to negotiate away Israeli lives in order to protect Arafat's right to negotiate.


JWR contributors Jackie Mason and Raoul Felder need no introduction. Comment on this column by clicking here.

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© 2001, Jackie Mason & Raul Felder.