Arafat Poisoning Accusations: Another Vile Slander Against Jews And Israel
Earlier this week, the campaign to demonize the Jewish nation of Israel took another leap into the Twilight Zone, when a team of Swiss and Russian “experts” revealed the results of their examination of Yasser Arafat’s remains and claimed that the terrorist leader “was likely poisoned” with Polonium-210.
As was expected, two days later, Tawfik Tirawi, head of the Palestinian committee investigating the death of Arafat, called the case “the crime of the 21st century.” Tirawi then launched into a tirade and blamed Israel for assassinating the former king of terror:
“Israel is the No. 1 and only suspect in the assassination of Yasser Arafat. We have enough evidence, facts and data to prove the truth of our theory. We are close to the truth.”
Wasel Abu Yousef, a member of the executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, was chomping at the bit to blame the Jews:
“President Arafat was the victim of an organised terrorist assassination perpetrated by Israel, which was looking to get rid of him.”
For their part, Israel addressed this foolishness years ago, after Arafat’s widow, Suha, took time out from accusing Israel of using poison gas on Arab children to claim the Jews killed her husband. We must also remember that this is the same woman who had this to say about peace with Israel, after rejecting yet another olive branch from an Israeli woman’s group:
“I have always rejected normalizing relations with [Israeli] women. They always invite me to their functions and I categorically refuse because I hate Israel.”
Dov Weisglass, who was chief of staff to former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon when Arafat died in 2004, made it quite clear that the Jewish state had no reason to kill the 75-year-old terrorist:
“Israel did not have any hand in this. We did not physically hurt him when Arafat was in his prime… so all the more so we had no interest in this kind of activity when he was politically sidelined.”
One might wonder who else had a desire to kill Yasser Arafat, other than the Israelis. Arafat was known to maintain an extremely unhealthy lifestyle, and he was a heavy smoker. He spent most of his adult life under highly stressful conditions, traveled constantly, and worked himself into exhaustion. Israel certainly had no reason to kill a worn out, elderly terrorist who could barely get out of bed.
According to the American accountants hired by the Palestinian finance ministry, Arafat diverted almost one billion dollars of foreign aid and taxes for his own use. At the time of his death, Arafat’s assets were estimated at $200 million by the Forbes magazine, and It is believed that Suha Arafat received a sizable share of Arafat’s fortune.His vast wealth may have made him a tempting target for one of his many rivals.
There were plenty of people within the PLO who had ample opportunity to kill Arafat, and they certainly had the ability to get up close and personal with him. Some observers think he was killed for stealing from his own people, while others believe he was poisoned by his Russian handlers, who realized Arafat was a liability and a thief.
While the Arabs and their Dhimmi Western backers continue the charade of blaming Israel for Arafat’s death, the reaction from prominent Israelis and American supporters of Israel has been nothing short of outrage.
Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld, a member of The Jerusalem Center For Public Affairs, and the author of many important books on Jew hate and the delegitimization of Israel, had this to say about claims that Israel poisoned Arafat:
“One of the keys in the delegitimization process of Israel is a deceptive argument which is called scapegoating.
Before that there was a centuries long delegitimization process of the Jews. This also used scapegoating. Already, almost 2000 years ago, the Jews were accused of all evil. The greatest was the killing of Jesus, the alleged Son of God. This was called deicide. Jews could not kill anybody, only the Romans could. Deicide was the archetype of scapegoating.
In the Middle Ages, Jews were scapegoated by blaming them for the black plague, which they had not caused. It led to massive pogroms against the Jews.
In the previous century, Germans blamed them for losing the First World war (The so-called Dolchstoss legend) It was one of the arguments used in the run up to the Holocaust.
This scapegoating has now moved to Israel. Many, if not most, Arabs think that the Mossad was behind 9/11, instead of Saudi Arabs of Al Qaeda, the true criminals.
We will probably soon hear the accusation, without any proof, that Israel poisoned Arafat. It fits a more than thousand year old pattern of scapegoating.”
Echoing Dr. Gerstenfeld’s anger was Professor Paul Eidelberg, an American-Israeli political scientist, author and lecturer, founder and president of The Foundation for Constitutional Democracy, and president of the Yamin Israel Party:
“We need to bear in mind that Muslim Arabs are well known to be habitual—some would say congenital—liars. Their military concept of taqiyya — which means is deceit and dissembling— has misled naive Western commentators and even many Israelis for decades. This was recognized by Prof. Harkabi, Director of Israel Military Intelligence. Moshe Dayan said that when he spoke to Arabs he felt like he was talking to people who had just taken some ‘lie pills.’
But it’s obvious the Arabs are desperate, that they are trying to defame Israel, which is as old as the hills like the ‘Protocols of the Elders of Zion.’ No intelligent person takes their propaganda seriously. Their basic motive is defamation. But they also want to distract American diplomats away from the core issue, which unceasing Arab terrorism.”
Israeli investigative journalist,Adina Kutnicki provided some background on the late Mr. Arafat, who traced his roots back to his birthplace in Egypt, his affiliation with The Muslim Brotherhood, and the founding of the terrorist groups Fatah, Black September and the PLO:
“Arafat, the godfather of suicide terror, was a master manipulator. His skills were honed through years of KGB tutelage and they were dutifully passed down to his proteges. Moreover, he utilized taqiyya (Islamic mandated lying/dissimulation) to an artful degree, and primarily enraptured gullible western audiences.
Thereby, as an Egyptian-cum-‘Palestinian’, he exhorted ‘peace’ and condemned suicide terror to gain the west’s ‘sympathy’ for his ultimate goal – the destruction of Israel. ‘Peace’ by piece. On the other hand, his concrete actions belied his lying words, and even a members of his own Fatah revealed as much. Tellingly, Arafat both financed and condemned suicide terror.”
Another well-respected citizen of Israel who was disgusted by the vile charges against the Jewish state was Isi Leibler, the widely read columnist for The Jerusalem Post and Yisrael Hayom. Long active in international Jewish affairs, Mr. Leibler served as president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry and Chairman of the Governing Board of the World Jewish Congress. Leibler writes extensively about the demonization of Israel on his blog, Candidly Speaking from Jerusalem.
Leibler dismissed the whole ugly affair as more baseless conspiracy theory and propaganda from people sworn to the destruction of the Jewish homeland:
“The ‘investigation’ into the cause of Arafat’s death initiated by his widow Suha is yet another episode in the incredible saga being propagated to blame Israel for Arafat’s death, which took place 8 years ago, and to which previous investigations rejected conspiracy theories.
The new allegations that he was poisoned with polonium 210, the same radioactive substance employed to kill Russian defector Alexander Litvinenko in 2006, are highly questionable.
It is not surprising that a spokesman for the Palestine Liberation Organization immediately accused Israel of having assassinated him, despite the fact that Israeli spokesmen adamantly denied any involvement and had pointed out that Arafat was 75 and leading an unhealthy lifestyle.”
American supporters of Israel were also highly offended by the so-called investigation into Arafat’s death. Pamela Geller is the founder of the Atlas Shrugs Blog and best-selling author of The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration’s War on America (with Robert Spencer). Geller was less than amused by the latest slander against Israel:
“It’s just another blood libel. The Palestinians are consumed with their quran-inspired hatred for Jews. Anything that ever goes wrong for them, they blame on the Jews. It’s a reflex.”
Ms. Geller’s colleague Robert Spencer addressed the anti-Jewish religious history behind the accusations. Mr. Spencer is the director of Jihad Watch, a program of the David Horowitz Freedom Center and the author of thirteen books, including two New York Times bestsellers, The Truth About Muhammad and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam.
Mr. Spencer made it clear that the insinuations of Jewish involvement in Arafat’s death are a modern manifestation of centuries of Islamic Jew hate:
“The claim that Israel poisoned Arafat is of a piece with the endless stream of blood libels and paranoid anti-Semitic conspiracy theories from the Palestinian Authority. The Qur’an says that Jews are the worst enemies of Muslims (5:82) and accuses them of constantly scheming against the believers. This leads to a societal tendency to blame them for everything, and to see their hand in every reversal. It is as contrary to reality and good sense as the rest of the Islamic supremacist ideology.”
In the past, Jews were accused of killing Christ, making matzoh with the blood of Christian children, poisoning wells, and spreading the plague. Now, they are blamed for the death of a man who was the father of suicide terror, the inspiration for the Munich massacre and the planner of two deadly intifadas that left thousands of Jewish civilians dead.
Arafat embraced a doctrine of genocide and annihilation for the Jewish people based on eight insidious principals:
Jews
1. Jews are the enemy of Allah.
2. Islam is fighting a continuous religious war against the Jews.
3. The killing of Jews is a religious obligation.
4. Palestinians are the vanguard in this war against the Jews, and all Islamic nations are obligated to assist in this war.Israel
1. All of the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea [which includes all of Israel] is a religious Waqf – an Islamic religious trust. Any Muslim who relinquishes any part to Israel is damned to Hell.
2. All agreements with Israel are inherently temporary in nature and are signed only because of Israel’s temporary balance of power advantage.
3. Allah will replace Muslims who shirk their obligation to battle Israel.
4. The ultimate destruction of Israel is a certainty.
The purpose of this farce is clear. Suha Arafat and her Jew hating friends hope they can use the bones of her murderous husband to inspire more violence. Their goal is nothing less than the total destruction of the Jewish nation of Israel. It is time to tell them that this will never happen. “Am Yisrael Chai – The People Of Israel Live.”
