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Comments by YACCS

 

Too little is still too much

Yasser Arafat's "condemnation of violence" was a feeble, perfunctory excuse for statesmanship, a face-saving gesture for Colin Powell to allow the Secretary of State to meet Arafat without looking like he was (too) soft on terrorism. As I noted the press release barely mentioned the terrorist attack of Friday, and spent most of its language condemning Israel. Still, even that was too much for our supposed "allies", who complained about Arafat being forced to make the statement.

``Once again, President Arafat yields to pressure, especially American pressure,'' said an unsigned column in the Saudi Al Watan daily.

[...]

``Wouldn't it have been better for President Arafat to change the rules of the game by taking a courageous decision to refuse to receive Powell before Israel pulls out of the Palestinian areas?''

That's Saudi Arabia. Then there's a Jordanian reaction:

But [Jordanian newspaper columnist] al-Majali called the U.S. demand for a statement from Arafat ``American political terrorism,'' saying, ``It is illogical to ask the victim to denounce terrorism and not to ask the butcher to stop his terrorism.''

Even ignoring the twisted interpretation of which side is the victim, Powell did ask Israel to pull back its troops. Do these people just reprint the same anti-Israel cliches every week, regardless of what has happened that week?

Back to our "allies" the Saudis, who not only whined about it, but threatened the United States:

In the Saudi-owned, London-based Al Hayat daily, Saudi columnist Dawood al-Shirian also accused the United States of supporting Israel's West Bank offensive and warned it would prompt terrorist attacks against the United States.

Israel's incursion in the West Bank ``is more of a threat to American interests than the New York and Washington attacks and it will create a terror that is fiercer than al-Qaida's terror,'' al-Shirian wrote.

Why not let us worry about "American interests?" You stick to worrying about Islamo-fascist interests, okay?
posted by David Nieporent at 4/14/2002 04:33:00 PM |