Arafat must not be assassinated, US tells Sharon

[L@mplighterM]

Arafat must not be assassinated, US tells Sharon
By David Rennie in Washington
(Filed: 03/04/2004)


The United States yesterday publicly reminded Israel that it opposes any bid to kill or exile the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat.

Richard Armitage, the deputy secretary of state, spoke out after the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, appeared to threaten Mr Arafat and Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, leader of the Lebanese Hizbollah group, calling them "marked men".

Mr Armitage said: "Our position on such questions - the exile or assassination of Yasser Arafat - is very well known. We are opposed, and we have made that very clear to the government of Israel."

Earlier, 10 days after an Israeli missile strike killed Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the spiritual leader of the Hamas terrorist group, Mr Sharon hinted that Mr Arafat and the Hizbollah leader might be next in line.

"I wouldn't suggest either one of them should feel secure. I wouldn't propose that any insurance company give them coverage," Mr Sharon told the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz.

"Anyone who kills a Jew or harms an Israeli citizen, or sends someone to kill Jews is a marked man, period," Mr Sharon added.

His remarks effectively demanded some form of response from Washington, as the Bush administration strives to convince allies in the Arab world that it has not given carte blanche to Mr Sharon.

Washington was widely accused of fumbling its response to the killing of the Hamas leader last week. In the initial US reaction, the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, stressed that Hamas was a terrorist group and Sheikh Yassin a terrorist planner.

A few hours later, US State Department and White House spokesmen changed tack and described the fatal attack by a helicopter gunship as "deeply troubling".

The remarks by Mr Armitage were a fairly mild shot across the bows for Mr Sharon, by Washington standards. Not only is he below cabinet rank, but Mr Sharon has made no secret of his belief that he can sidestep the foreign policy bureaucrats at the State Department, instead dealing directly with the White House, as well as his supporters in Congress and the Pentagon.

Mr Sharon faces intense pressure from hardline members of his ruling coalition over his proposal to remove all Jewish settlements from the Gaza Strip.

Though the Bush administration has formally sidelined Mr Arafat, declaring him an obstacle to peace, Washington's stated position is that Palestinians should choose their own alternative leader.

It urges them to elect a leader committed to eradicating terrorism as the only path to the creation of an independent Palestinian state.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main...ixnewstop.html

The 11th Commandment:


You mustn’t kill Arafat!

[KSO]

Even the bush administration understands that's killing Arafat will be the most idiotic thing Israel can do, will bring chaos and desire for revenge to new hights, and will cause hundreds of casualties in both sides.
Sharon wont bite the hand that feeds him, Better have annoying Arafat around than empty pockets!

[L@mplighterM]

Terrorism can’t be tackled through selective killings of terrorists! I think that many of the problems facing the world today have their roots in the fact that there’s way too much diplomacy. There’s nothing wrong with trying to solve disputes but eventually the time for talking should come to an end.

There should be costs for directing individuals to engage in terrorism and Arafat should have paid for his crimes against humanity a long time ago.

[KSO]

Originally posted by L@mplighterM
Terrorism can’t be tackled through selective killings of terrorists! I think that many of the problems facing the world today have their roots in the fact that there’s way too much diplomacy. There’s nothing wrong with trying to solve disputes but eventually the time for talking should come to an end.

There should be costs for directing individuals to engage in terrorism and Arafat should have paid for his crimes against humanity a long time ago.

Do you really want The Israeli nation to pay a huge price for the single moment of joy that you'll have knowing that Arafat is no more... That doesn't worth it, Arafat has no power, he controls nothing, his removal will only make things worse for Israel, as long as he is officialy considered the leader of the PA his removal will cause critisicism of Israel by everybody including the USA.

[L@mplighterM]

Originally posted by KSO
Do you really want The Israeli nation to pay a huge price for the single moment of joy that you'll have knowing that Arafat is no more... That doesn't worth it, Arafat has no power, he controls nothing, his removal will only make things worse for Israel, as long as he is officialy considered the leader of the PA his removal will cause critisicism of Israel by everybody including the USA.

I wasn’t specifically advocating that Israel kill Arafat! I think all western leaders should give Israel the nod to kill Arafat.

[KSO]

Originally posted by L@mplighterM
I wasn’t specifically advocating that Israel kill Arafat! I think all western leaders should give Israel the nod to kill Arafat.

Anyway Israel shouldn't kill him, there is no death penalty in Israel, he can be brought and trialed and jailed if found guilty,
If Israel will assasinate arafat, it will bring us closer to north korea who's leaders (Father Kim and son Kim) are constanly plotting against the south leaders, not exactly a country you wanna be paired with...

[rhodescholar]

Originally posted by KSO
Even the bush administration understands that's killing Arafat will be the most idiotic thing Israel can do, will bring chaos and desire for revenge to new hights, and will cause hundreds of casualties in both sides.
Sharon wont bite the hand that feeds him, Better have annoying Arafat around than empty pockets!

Killing arafat would be the smartest thing the israelis could ever do.

With that animal out of the picture, the frustrated younger leadership could finally begin to take control, and the billions in arafat's swiss bank accounts might actually get into the hands of the arab people he so wholeheartedly supports.

2 points: i love when someone says "dont do that, it might upset the arab street." If that had a shred of truth, every lane, circle, avenue and cul-de-sac in arab lands would have been afire long ago.

Second, for a russian, whose country has used carpet bombing techniques on chechnyan women and chidlren, while condemning even the slightest nods by israel to defend itself, is utterly laughable. As a russian, i find it pathetic how far russia, and its govt, has fallen in terms of its credibility, which has bottomed out to the same level as the saudis: ZERO.

[KSO]

[i]
Second, for a russian, whose country has used carpet bombing techniques on chechnyan women and chidlren, while condemning even the slightest nods by israel to defend itself, is utterly laughable. As a russian, i find it pathetic how far russia, and its govt, has fallen in terms of its credibility, which has bottomed out to the same level as the saudis: ZERO. [/B]

Im not a russian and I certainly don't approve Russias war crimes at chechya...

[rhodescholar]

Originally posted by KSO
Im not a russian and I certainly don't approve Russias war crimes at chechya...

How kind of you. My point was that the biggest whiners against eliminating arafat, besides the iranians and syrians who control his pupper strings, are the absolutly pathetic russians.

They are utter hypocrites, and like the spanish, without a shred of credibility with regards to israel.

[I am David]

Killing Arafat is too severe, and the backlash would be too great. But Israel can get rid of him just as well as putting him in jail.

[Mediocrates]

Kas-o should Arafat be made King of the Jews?

[MGB8]

Its not worth killing Arafat because the response would be European countries tripping over themselves to show OPEC how much they dislike Israel and how much they love the Palestinians.

Imprisoning him would lead to about the same result.

Better to help him die naturally...

Unfortunately, the world is much to ready to watch the Arabs kill the Jews, even to help them do so in the guise of "peace", in return for the oil spiggots flowing.

Its a sucky situation.

The best thing that Israel can do is to force the Europeans to face the facts that they have learned nothing since the Holocaust, and to point out the double standards that they use with Israel, themselves, and the standardless arab world.

Israel's best defense is a strong nuclear deterent against the Arab/Muslim world.

Also, I think the rest of the world is slowly waking up to the fact that the intolerance of Arab-Islamic imperialism is a threat to them, also, and must be eradicated - and changing the muslim world to be more tolerant of others, to abandon its imperialist aims and instead adopt beliefs of success through cooperation and co-existence...that would be nice.

Another option is to help them advance an "end of world" scenarion where true Muslims go to heaven and all others die - like some "fundamentalist" Christians believe.... this at least puts off the emotional need to show their superiority over other peoples until the end of the world.

[Mediocrates]

Actually if anything the so called threat against Arafat merely reinforces that he should remain in power since the only reasonable interpretation is that Arafat could only be assassinated if he were no longer in power and it could be demonstrated that he still engineered terrorist attacks. Yassin and co. were hit because they held no formal power, no matter how many EUocrats want to throw themselves into his grave, tearing our their hair with grief. This 'threat' to Arafat is really an endorsement by Israel that Arafat should start killing off his own Hamas rivals or, if he were toppled non-fatally he would automatically become an IDF target.

[rhodescholar]

Everything comes down to one thing: OIL.

"Israel's best defense is a strong nuclear deterent against the Arab/Muslim world."

WRONG.

If israel comes up with an energy source that will get the world off the arab tit, then israel will be FAR safer.

The euros know that the arabs are the most intolerant people probably on earth, but MUST appease them to continue teceiving oil. This was spelled out by the british in the late 1930s as a justification for the 1939 White Paper. They needed the arab oil for the upcoming war against germany. It is imperative for the survival of western civillization that it get off of arab oil and right soon.

[Oh Jerusalem]

Put me in the tank turret at the Mukata. I'll show you what needs to be done for starters.