By Ramzi E. Khoury
Editor In Chief
What a gift to the prospect of future peacemaking! While Yasser Arafat is in Virginia readying to meet with a disorientated President Bill Clinton who is trying to figure out if the historic electoral deadlock is a sign the American people do not want to let go of him, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak takes the Intifada into a complete new phase.
By assassinating 37-year-old Hussein Ebayyat, a prominent leader of Arafat’s Fateh party, the largest Palestinian movement, Barak must be betting on a major escalation in the violence, knowing all too well that Fateh cannot but retaliate.
Fateh leaders, who have been warning that the Palestinian people will not be a sitting duck forever, are pushed now to ensure Israel gets a taste of what the Palestinian people have been enduring for the past seven weeks.
After the attack it became much more difficult to justify to the Palestinian people that Israel is killing Palestinian civilians as well as Fateh’s top leaders while Fateh, the movement that represents the will of the vast majority of Palestinians, sits silent.
Meanwhile, in a very confused Washington D. C., Arafat will tell Clinton that the Palestinians need international protection. Clinton will fiercely reject the idea as a nonstarter while wondering if the Electoral College makes any sense anymore. Arafat will then call on the United States of America of “no credibility whatsoever” to stop playing sole agent for the peace process in order for the process to proceed. Clinton will fiercely reject the idea as another Palestinian obstacle in the face of peace and instead suggest that he should personally continue playing a major role in the peace process after he is out of office in January, especially now that there is nothing else for him to do with Hillary busy becoming a New Yorker.
There is no question in the Palestinian head that the next US administration will be Israel’s “honest broker” for peace like it has been all throughout, and they are determined to get their own “honest broker” or, to say the least, break the Israeli monopoly by bringing in the Europeans to play ball against the Americans.
As for Bill Clinton, he might as well ask Ex-Prime Minister Shimon Peres for a position in his Peres Institute for Peace, changing its name to the “Worldwide Office of Ex-Leaders (WOE).” If that idea doesn’t suit him, he could just start the “Institute for Meddling on Behalf of Israel” (INBI), the same initials placed on the cross of Jesus Christ, since the Palestinian people are the crucifix of this day and age.
As for Arafat, he will go to the United Nations Security Council asking for international protection and getting the Americans ready for an instant Veto, produced as hot and fast as a warm cup of Nescafe, that the Palestinians will drink again, just like Christ had a taste of vinegar when he asked for water while on the cross.
Meanwhile, there are now Fateh leaders sitting down discussing the best way to pay tribute to Hussein, a father of three. Discussing how to get off the cross and walk away from this great pain has been futile so far.
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
