Background/ Seeing the last of Arafat: Not if, but when

The Leftist Meretz party suggested that all the cabinet talk about expelling Arafat amounted to a smokescreen. It charged that Sharon had produced another in a series of tricks in order to duck the demands of peacemaking.

"He doesn't take the concrete step demanded of him, to evacuate [illegal settlement] outposts. He has taken no concrete steps to enable Abu Mazen and [Palestinian Minister Mohammed] Dahlan to fight against terror, for example, humanitarian gestures.

"I don't see how Abu Mazen can do this. Abu Mazen needs to make every effort to combat terror, but if the Israeli government doesn't take steps to allow him to do this, we are being sentenced to more terror, more expulsions, more talks, more dramatically-announced cabinet meetings."

In any event, the prophesies of doom regarding Arafat the leader have proven premature, just as new waves of terror have shattered the budding illusion that the Al Aqsa Intifada had ended in an Israeli victory, notes Haaretz diplomatic correspondent Aluf Benn.

"Those same intelligence and security officials that already last year had dubbed Arafat a Dead Man Walking, and who had forseen his removal along with Saddam Hussein, showed up at the Sunday cabinet meeting in order to explain that Arafat was still strong, that he is spurring the wave of terrorism, and that he is sparing no effort to trip up Abu Mazen."
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A Conversation with Beshara Doumani
An Arab-American historian charges that the media's representation of the conflict in the Middle East turns reality upside down.

Numerous critics charge that, in the United States, ignorant or biased reporting of the conflict in the Middle East leads to a common perception of Israel as a beseiged democracy surrounded by Islamic fundamentalists and Arab populations bent on its destruction, even as Israel repeatedly holds out the olive branch of peace. According to associate professor of history Beshara Doumani, this is a deeply flawed picture, and one that is not common elsewhere in the world. “It’s very frustrating,” Doumani says, “to live in a country where popular perceptions are so fundamentally removed from the realities that exist on the ground.”
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