A week of behind-the-scenes manuevering: Arafat, CIA, Shinbet working closely together

Editorial, Mid-East Realities,
12 April 1997

[Washington, 4/12/97 - MID-EAST REALITIES Editorial] Joint US-Israeli efforts to quash the latest violence and rioting and still further divide the Palestinians and the Arabs from each other are frantically proceeding—mostly behind the scenes of course.

What is going on in public is once again primarily for public relations purposes—just like during all those years of State Department negotiations which Oslo turned on their head.

Behind the scenes the Palestinian Authority's screws are being turned ever further, even while all sides in the region continue to arm and prepare for future confrontation. With his monies dependent on U.S. and Israeli giving, and with his rule dependent on the monies and the support it can buy, Arafat is essentially cornered and is likely to be pulled apart as the future unfolds.

Such, of course, may well have been the Israeli intention all along— end the Intifada, discredit Arafat and destroy the PLO, imprison and demoralize the Palestinian population, manipulate world public opinion, push the U.N. out of matters realting to Israel as much as possible, control the policies of the USA as much as possible, penetrate the Arab world with economic, intelligence, and even military ties. In short: control and dominate the region with American help and with increasing interaction with the ever-more-fearful Arab client-regimes of the area—especially the Hashemites of Jordan, the al-Saud's in Saudi Arabia, and the quasi-military government of Egypt.

The main result of Netanyahu's recent lightning visit to the U.S., coupled with that of the long-collaborating Hashemite King of Jordan, was to come up with ways to further twist Arafat into complying with the role he accepted in the Oslo and Cairo agreements of recent years.

Arafat, and the Palestinian Authority he has established with American and Israeli assistance—including the recently discovered secret $150 million bank account in Tel Aviv for flight into exile should that prove necessary—are continually being forced to comply with the unenviable role of policing Palestinian areas (call them autonomous rather than ghettos) and repressing all Palestinian opposition (call it terrorism rather than fighting occupation). No matter what Arafat says in public, the underlying realities of the nearly impossible position he has allowed his people to be cornered into continually causes crisis in the misnomered peace process.

Among other specific things, Arafat has been forced in the past week to promise once again that he would take still further steps to actively work with Israel against terrorism. Helping the Israelis round up some of the Hamas cells in 1997 is reminiscent of the help provided a long year and a half ago to assassinate the Engineer in Gaza, even though Arafat then turned right around and felt compelled to attend the massive funeral.

Security Coordination between Israel and the Palestinians has been Renewed - following a secret meeting between the head of the Shabak and Yasser Arafat was the front-page headline in Israel's largest circulation paper, Yediot Acharonot, a few days ago.

In addition, it has also leaked out that the head of the CIA in Tel Aviv recently summoned three of the PA's top security chiefs to a meeting which included the head of Israeli intelligence earlier in the week. With these things already known, imagine what must be going on that isn't yet known!

Additionally it is believed that Netanyahu made it quite clear to Bill Clinton during their private meeting in Washington that the Israelis will not be deterred from implimenting their interpretation of Oslo— which in fairness to the Israelis is far closer to the actual text of the agreements as signed than is the PA interpretation. The surrender nature of the Oslo and Cairo texts was in fact the major reason persons such as Edward Said immediately began harshly criticizing what Arafat had done, even to the extent of publicly labeling him a collaborator. Now the veracity of the critics is becoming more undeniable, hence the attempt by Arafat to pretend that the agreements say something other than what they do.

Furthermore, among the behind-the-scenes realities are that the Israelis have enough blackmail capabilities against the Clinton Administration—the most Israeli-infiltrated and Israeli-oriented government in American history—to assure themselves that no serious U.S. pressure will ever be applied come what may.

All the talk in the press about saving the Peace Process, coupled with the spate of newspaper statesments from various Jewish and Arab groups funded by their respective sides, are aimed in the end to once again pressure and trick the Palestinians into once again buying into the American-sponsored peace process.

Yet right from the start—back in the tension period of the post-Gulf War—the so-called peace process was always in reality a domination process. It was always designed, and continues to have as its primary purpose, to end the Intifada by exhausting and demoralizing the Palestinians, while at the same time consolidating the hold of the American-sponsored Arab client-regimes in the region. And it continues to have as its primary purpose portraying the Americans as even-handed and bent on peace, when in fact it is precisely the Americans who make possible Israeli expansion, Palestinian subjugation, and regional chaos.

Expect more crisis and violence ahead as what is essentially a multi-tentacled plot to destroy the Palestinian quest for independence, entrench the Arab client-regimes, and assure U.S. and Israeli regional domination marches foreward.