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The Palestinian Authority has used
tens of millions of dollars it received from donors such as the European
Union to finance terrorism, while Saudi Arabia has given a total of
$550,000 in the last year to more than 100 families of Palestinian
terrorists, according to a government report released yesterday.
The 103-page report entitled, "The Involvement of
Arafat, PA Senior Officials and Apparatuses in Terrorism against Israel,
Corruption, and Crime," which Prime Minister Ariel Sharon plans to give US
President George W. Bush in their meeting tomorrow, also labels the
Palestinian Authority "a supporting, encouraging, and actively operating
body of terrorism" whose chairman, Yasser Arafat, was "directly involved
in the planning and execution of terrorist attacks."
"It is crystal clear from a reading of this report
that Arafat cannot be a partner for peace, and as long as he is in the
picture there is no chance for peace," said Minister-without-Portfolio Dan
Naveh, who presented the report, dubbed "The Arafat File," at a press
conference at the Prime Minister's Office yesterday afternoon.
Naveh headed the committee that compiled the report,
which is based on thousands of Palestinian documents seized during
Operation Defensive Shield last month, IDF intelligence information, and
Shin Bet interrogations of terrorists. He said the documents unequivocally
prove Arafat's direct involvement Ð as the "supreme leader" of his Fatah-based
Aksa Martyrs Brigades Ð in scores of terror attacks against Israeli
civilians over the past 18 months.
Moreover, the report states that hundreds of Fatah
activists operating in the Fatah's military wing, the Tanzim, and the Aksa
Martyrs Brigades, were in fact being paid by the EU's $9 million monthly
transfers to the PA.
The EU's funding, which the report states amounts to
roughly 10% of the total PA current budget (and the Arab states' $45
million monthly transfers) were funneled to terrorists by the PA "by
integrating them in the list of national security employees, despite the
fact that in practice they operated in the framework of local branches of
the Tanzim and the Al Aksa military Brigades," the report states.
"The EU's money was being used by Arafat to
indirectly finance terror activities," Naveh said.
The report notes that Arafat himself was "personally
involved" in the allocation of money to terrorist activists even though on
most occasions he "significantly cuts" the requested sum.
Documents directly approved by the Palestinian
leader and bearing his signature include the July 9, 2001 allocation of
$350 for 24 Fatah members in Bethlehem, including the wanted terrorist
Atef Abayat; a $600 allocation on September 19, 2001 to three senior
Tanzim commanders, including those involved in the terror attack at a bat
mitzva party in Hadera; a November 7, 2001 $800 allocation for each of the
nine families of the Palestinian commanders killed in the Bethlehem area,
including Atef Abayat; and a January 20, 2001 allocation of $350 to each
of 12 Fatah/Tanzim terror activists in Tulkarm who were involved in fatal
attacks against Israel.
In addition, an undated document that was dealt with by Palestinian chief
financier Fuad Shubaki Ð whom the report defines as logistical operator of
financial aid and support of terrorist actions Ð that was likely approved
by Arafat allocated $80,000 for the construction of a large arms
production workshop, including a lathe, a milling machine, and equipment
required for metal processing in the production of weapons such as rockets
and mortars. All such weaponry was forbidden the PA under the Oslo
Accords.
The documents, some of which have been released over
the last month or so, have been dismissed as "forgeries" by the PA even
though they have been handed over to Jordanian and Egyptian security
officials who privately don't doubt their veracity, security officials
say.
The report, which also singles out imprisoned West
Bank Tanzim leader Marwan Barghouti and Palestinian Intelligence chief
Tawfik Tirawi as being directly involved in terror attacks against Israel,
also mentions the involvement of several Arab states in PA terrorism,
including Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, and Syria.
According to the report, Saudi Arabia has
systematically transferred money to families of suicide bombers, including
$545,000 transferred to 102 families of terrorists including relatives of
nearly a dozen suicide bombers killed in 2001. The funds, which were
transferred through the Arab Bank, provided each family with over $5,340.
Additional documents mentioned in the report point
to direct Saudi aid to the Islamic Jihad and Hamas terror organizations,
funding which Naveh said was at odds with Saudi desires to be involved in
the peace process.
The report also contains letters of gratitude
written by PA officials to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein for his
country's financial aid to the PA.
A small section of the report also details incidents
of physical abuse against the Christian population in Bethlehem, including
extortion, land confiscation, and other criminal activity which the report
states were perpetrated by Palestinians with the full support of PA
officials.
The end of the report is devoted to the corruption
and fiscal management within the PA.
Though Naveh stressed that the report's findings
were apolitical and professional findings gathered by IDF intelligence,
the Shin Bet, and other security services, he said the report is an
important tool which Sharon could and should use for both "political and
legal" purposes. |
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BETHLEHEM, West Bank - Residents of
this biblical city are expressing relief at the exile to Cyprus last week
of 13
hard-core
Palestinian militants, who they said had imposed a two-year reign of
terror that included rape, extortion and executions.
The 13 sent to Cyprus, as well as 26 others sent to
the Gaza Strip, had taken shelter in the Church of the Nativity,
triggering a 39-day siege that ended Friday. Palestinians who live near
the church described the group as a criminal gang that preyed especially
on Palestinian Christians, demanding "protection money" from the main
businesses, which make and sell religious artifacts.
According to Bethlehem residents, one of the group's
top leaders, Jihad Ja'ara, 29, traveled around town with an M-16 rifle,
terrorizing the community. "Finally the Christians can breathe freely," said
Helen, 50, a Christian mother of four. "We are so delighted that these
criminals who have intimidated us for such a long time are now going
away."
Others feared new gunmen will capitalize on the
group's disappearance and the pullout of Israeli troops. "Will new gangs come in?" asked Samer, 33, from the
Christian suburb of Beit Jala in Bethlehem. "The gunmen will start taking
revenge on the weak, desperate people."
Residents also said that Mr. Ja'ara and another top
leader, Ibrahim Abayat, took nine Muslims whom they suspected of
collaborating with Israel into an apartment near Manger Square and fatally
shot them. The executions took place shortly before the April 2
gunbattle between Israeli troops and Palestinian fighters that sent more
than 200 Palestinians fleeing into the church, where they remained for 39
days.
Abayat, in a phone interview from inside the church
while the siege was under way, said he was personally responsible for the
killings. He said there was no need for a trial because "it was a
well-known fact that these people were linked to Israel." Abayat and Mr. Ja'ara are now at a seaside hotel in
Cyprus, waiting to be moved to an as-yet-unnamed European country, where
many expect them to be set free.
The gang has said it is part of the Al Aqsa Martyrs
Brigade, a militia linked to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat that has
claimed responsibility for several recent suicide bombings in Israel.
Zuhair Hamdan, founder of the Movement for
Coexistence in Jerusalem, was sitting on a chair outside his corner shop
near Bethlehem in November when an official Palestinian Authority car drew
up with a squeal of brakes. From the back window a gunman, who Mr. Hamdan says
was a member of the gang, emptied 12 bullets from a M-16 rifle, hitting
him five times in the abdomen, legs and neck. Mr. Hamdan was so close to
death in the hospital that he now jokes, "They took my body to the
cemetery but the cemetery rejected me."
Mr. Hamdan said seven members of the gang were
involved. Five of the seven assailants have since died, at least one of
them fatally shot by Israel during the recent church siege, he said. "The remaining two gunmen are being kicked out of
Bethlehem, but wherever they end up, someone will get to them and make
them pay for all the awful things they've done," he said. The gang apparently used its ready access to guns
and close ties with Mr. Arafat's Palestinian security forces to extort
money, run guns, smuggle drugs and even demand that young women separate
from their husbands.
After one woman was reportedly raped by a gang
member, the perpetrator was put in jail, but only briefly. His comrades
reportedly forced the jailers to let him go. The gang's hostility toward Christians extended to a
17-year-old altar boy fatally shot during an Israeli incursion in October.
A small stone monument the family erected in Johnny
Talgieh's memory on the spot in Manger Square where he died was kicked and
spat on by gang members, then toppled with ropes and cables and left
smashed on the ground. "They did not want to recognize that a Christian
could be considered a [martyr]," said a family member, "even though having
that statue there would have given the Palestinian cause a huge propaganda
boost. "They hate us Christians more than they love
Palestine."
Even during the recent siege, gang members who had
not fled into the church continued to demand their regular 10 shekels
(about $2) from each taxi driver going in and out of a parking lot close
to the compound. One who refused, saying he had no cash, was
reportedly beaten up last month. The gang apparently operated under the full
protection of Mr. Arafat's Fatah organization and Tanzim, its military
wing.
During the 19-month uprising, they have often fired
into the nearby Israeli suburb of Gilo from church grounds and the homes
of Palestinian Christians in Beit Jala. When Palestinian gunmen would show up at the door,
Christian families often had no choice but to let their homes be used as
sniper posts and face the consequences of Israeli retaliation.
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Incitement against Israel, rewards
for attacks - the politicians in Brussels have been ignoring what the
PLO-chief has been doing with his EU aid money. The EU also financed
Arafat's security apparatus which, having been trained by the German
Federal Intelligence Service, is now under suspicion for involvement with
terrorism.
In the Sheikh-'Iljlin Mosque in Gaza City 500 men and boys gathered for
Friday prayers. They listen to the mosque's Imam, Sheikh Ibrahim Madh. It
is April 12, 2002 and the Imam is speaking about the condition of the
Palestinian nation.
"We are convinced of the [future] victory of Allah; we believe that one of
these days, we will enter Jerusalem as conquerors, enter Jaffa as
conquerors, enter Haifa as conquerors, enter Ramle and Lod as conquerors,
and all of Palestine as conquerors, as Allah has decreed... Anyone who
does not attain martyrdom in these days should wake in the middle of the
night and say: 'My God, why have you deprived me of martyrdom for your
sake?...
A reliable Hadith [tradition] says: 'The Jews will fight you, but you will
be set to rule over them.'...If the Jew hides behind the rock and the
tree, the rock and tree will say: 'Oh Muslim, oh servant of Allah, a Jew
hides behind me, come and kill him.'...Oh Allah, accept our martyrs in the
highest heavens...Oh Allah, show the Jews a black day...Oh Allah,
annihilate the Jews and their supporters...Oh Allah, raise the flag of
Jihad across the land...Oh Allah, forgive our sins..."
The Imam utters these lines under an assignment from the Palestinian
Authority(PA), which has also rewarded him for his service. His sermon had
to be pre-authorized by Arafat's officials. PA-TV, the PA's official
television station, carried the sermon on the same day.
And this station - Arafat's station - has been subsidized by the EU for
years. The support was officially intended for the "creation of an open
and pluralistic information system and thereby the formation of a
democratic Palestinian society."
PA-TV owes almost everything to the European taxpayers: cafeterias,
trucks, broadcast towers, training courses for journalists. Brussels even
picked up the tab for the reconstruction of the antenna towers after
Israeli attacks. The TV station which is dependent on Europe's money
broadcasts not only sermons and not only on Moslem holidays. Whoever is
interested in the varieties of anti-Semitism can subscribe to transcripts
from the Middle East Media Research Institute in Washington (www.memri.org
).
For some time now western media observers have charged that the religious
and political elite surrounding Arafat are using his television station to
wage an eternal war against the Jews, explaining the peace agreements as
an interim step, having declared Allah's war of liquidation on the State
of Israel. All of this takes place under the freedom of the Palestinian
government press.
But freedom of the press does not forbid the subsidizers to see exactly
what it is that they're subsidizing. It's easy enough to monitor what's
happening with Europe's money. All one needs to do is to turn on the
television in the Holy Land. Despite that, the broadcasted propaganda
didn't reach the European institutions until November 23, 2000.
At that time the Belgian member of the European Parliament, Olivier
Dupuis, inquired in writing whether the EU Commission "considers it
acceptable that EU funding is being used to foster feelings of hatred
towards the Israeli people?" The MP also wanted to know "what mechanisms
does it plan to introduce" in order to prevent such abuse in the future.
On December 12, 2000 EU-Commissioner Chris Patten of Great Britain allowed
the question to remain verbosely unanswered. He pointed to the EU's
agreement with Yassir Arafat's Authority, which states that the
cooperation is based on "the respect of democratic principles and
fundamental human rights " These assurances appeared to be sufficient for
Patten. They were also sufficient for the German envoy to the PA. Andreas
Reinicke dismissed the examination of the broadcast content and offered an
explanation by way of comparison: "If we lay water pipes, we can't verify
whether any of the water reaches Hamas terrorists".
Yassir Arafat's use of Europe's well-intentioned billions, and whether
they support peace or help destroy it, have now entered the political
arena. On May 6 of this year Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon sent the
EU a 100 page "Arafat File" (www.idf.il ). It is supposed to show that
Arafat has deceived the world and intends to establish his state, not
through negotiations, but through terror - and under his personal orders.
For evidence, Sharon presents documents that his troops confiscated from
Arafat's administration centers in Ramallah and elsewhere in the West
Bank. The volume contains serious allegations: that "Arafat and his people
used the donations of other countries, including the EU, to finance their
terrorism".
The EU countered immediately. On the next day, May 7, Commissioner Chris
Patten wrote a letter to the Union's Foreign Minister. "The EU-Commission
has to date not been shown any hard evidence that the EU funds have been
misused to finance terrorism or for any other purpose"
Palestine's new schoolbooks
glorify "the martyrs"
Who is right? Die Zeit researched in Berlin, Brussels, Washington, in
Israel and in the Palestinian territories: everywhere it looked into clues
and documents that indicated how EU funds that were intended in the name
of peace were turned toward war-making and funds intended for the
construction of democratic structures were turned to finance a terror
network. The results of the investigation are alarming.
September 2, 2000 was a great day for the Palestinians. With all pomp -
only weeks before the outbreak of the second Intifada - they celebrated
another step toward statehood. Naim Abu Houmus, deputy education minister,
convened at his ministry in Ramallah diplomats, students and teachers to
commemorate an unveiling ceremony: The new schoolbooks, the first ever
written by Palestinians for Palestinians, were unpacked. "A dream of my
people has been realized", said Abu Houmus, as he placed the books for the
1st and 6th grades in the children's hands. "Now we will teach the truth".
A great day for the Europeans, too. They know: books could be weapons.
Therefore the educational assistance is the cornerstone of European
peacework in Palestine. Without Europe the school system would be nothing.
Buildings, salaries and the schoolbook commission are all subsidized by
Brussels - to the tune of more than 330 million Euros since the 1993 Oslo
Agreements. Six European states, coordinated by Italy, financed the
printing of the schoolbooks. The Palestinians reassure the group of six
that they would be allowed prior approval of the books. But so far, it
seems, they don't want to know. The Italians, happy that the ancient books
with blatant anti-semitism have been replaced, graciously look the other
way as the treaties are violated.
Barely after the new books appeared, there came a hailstorm of criticism
from western experts - despite some progress on the moderation of the tone
that everyone acknowledged. Whoever reads the books will confirm: the idea
of peace is nowhere to be found. The peace process and the Oslo treaties
are never mentioned. There are calls for religious tolerance, but only
between Muslims and Christians. Jews appear only in an historical context.
Their connection to the Holy Land is stuck in antiquity. The Jewish
resettlement of Palestine is called "infiltration". There is no direct
appeal to terrorism, but certainly "Palestine's Martyrs" are glorified,
including "The Engineer Ayash", who dispatched suicide bombers in the
1990s and killed dozens of Israelis.
The State of Israel does not exist. Its name appears on no map, terms such
as "green line", "the interior of the country" or the "1948 land" are used
repeatedly. Cities founded by Israel, such as Tel-Aviv, are never
mentioned. The name of the State of Palestine and the emblem of Arafat's
Palestinian Authority are everywhere, such as on the book covers. This
state would seem to stretch from Jordan to the Mediterranean.
Abu Houmus, the deputy education minister, justified the suppression of
Israel from the school books in the Los Angeles Times "Israel's borders
are not yet defined. When they decide where the borders are, we will go by
what the government agrees. We left this issue to the politicians." They
simply selected maps commonly used in the Arab world. Chapters about peace
with Israel would be written as soon as the final peace treaty is signed.
In other words: In 2000 a war-curriculum was put in place.
It took a few weeks until the textbook controversy reached the European
continent. On November 15, 2000 the French Socialist delegate Francois
Zimeray placed an inquiry to the EU Commission. He wanted to know why an
educational system was being financed, when its text books were "nothing
less than anti-semitic propaganda, which, in any EU Member State, would be
prohibited under the law on 'incitement to racial hatred'" Except that the
delegate was inquiring into the supervisory practices of the EU.
Foreign Commissioner Chris Patten answered that the EU Commission didn't
finance the printing of the books. That is technically correct but
evasive. Although the EU can't directly influence what six member nations
choose to do, as a member of the international "Donor Forums" it pays for
the Palestinian textbook commission and also many teachers. Does the EU
care what is being taught by the teachers whose salaries it pays?
Zimeray persisted in attacking the EU Commissioner. "I asked you a precise
question, and I expect a precise answer on an important matter. Are you
prepared, yes or no, to ensure that the EU's aid is dependent on the
respect of fundamental human rights?" Patten answered: "We will raise
these issues with the Palestinians".
In order to see what had improved, the German Christian Democratic member
of the European Parliament, Armin Laschet, went to Palestine in July 2001.
He maintains that nothing happened, nobody changed the instructional
materials. Even worse. The old anti-semitic books had been newly reissued,
using the European aid. The bindings indicate which country is the
sponsor. Armin Laschet even pressed Yassir Arafat. The latter claimed that
he saw no reason to changed the new books and had no money to quickly
replace the old ones. Arafat forgot to mention that the American
government had long ago offered to pay for the immediate and complete
replacement of the old books. Arafat declined this offer, preferring
instead to use the low-obligation European aid to rebind the old war
books.
Horrified, Laschet left Palestine and made a motion in the European
Parliament to suspend the educational aid "as long as the textbooks don't
change". The motion failed by 2 votes. The Socialists wouldn't go along
and neither would various fractions from the Netherlands, Ireland and
Scandinavia. This alliance doesn't want to bring any pressure to bear on
Europe's great hope for the Middle East. That hope doesn't fade, even amid
growing indications that Arafat doesn't want peace, which is a
pre-condition for the subsidies. Nobody weighs the consequences that it is
Arafat's own Al-Aksa-Martyr Brigades that keeps blowing up Israelis. The
credulity, the naivete, the indulgence of the Europeans seems endless.
Apparently nothing has changed since those Oslo days in the Fall of 1993
when the world was allowed to hope that there would be peace after 100
years of war in the Holy Land. At that time, at the first donor's
conference, Europeans and Arabs joined together in order to help the
emerging state. The Europeans took their mission seriously, as seriously
as they take only their agricultural subsidies. The enormous sums, of at
least 4.1 Billion Euros that has flowed to Palestine, don't include grants
from individual European countries.
Because the architects of the peace aid were concerned that the money
would awaken the desires of its recipients, they conceived the funds to be
"project assistance", whose use could be monitored better than unallocated
funds in the budget. Almost all of the new infrastructure - schools,
hospitals, airports - were arranged by Brussels. The EU always contributes
to Arafat's coffers for specific purposes, such as salaries for public
employees, including policemen and teachers.
As the second Intifada was unleashed in the Fall of 2000, Israel stopped
the transfer payments to the Palestinians. For years Israel had handed
over to Arafat's Authority its share of revenues from import duties. But
the new Sharon government believed that Arafat was not dampening the
Intifada but stoking it, and that he tolerated or encouraged the new
series of suicide attacks against Israel. The Europeans saw the situation
differently: Sharon had caused the Intifada himself by his provocative
visit to the Temple Mount; for the terror the extremists from Islamic
Jihad and Hamas were responsible; Arafat tried to calm the situation and
protect the peace process from the radicals.
Therefore the EU was faced with - as it now seems - a grave decision: They
filled in for the Israelis and since June 2001 have been contributing 10
Million Euros a month in direct budgetary assistance, no longer as
"project assistance". As portrayed by EU Commissioner Chris Patten, this
is "an important contribution, in order to prevent further collapse into
anarchy, chaos and misery". The money was supposed to be used for "basic
public needs" such as "education, healthcare, police, salaries of civil
servants". Has Arafat used the money as intended?
2200 kilos of explosive, enough for hundreds of suicide bombers
In the early summer of 2001, as the Europeans were deciding to pay Arafat
directly, Arafat decided something else - behind the backs of the
Europeans. The world first heard of this decision a few months later on
January 3, 2002.
On that day Israeli Chief of Staff Shaul Mofaz sat in a military craft
high about the Red Sea and looked at the sea through special binoculars.
Down below he saw a rusty blue freighter. Israeli intelligence had been
monitoring the ship for three months. But now Mofaz was nervous. He looked
through the binoculars himself until he could make out the lettering on
board the vessel: Karine-A. At that moment he gave the order. Within
minutes the marine commandos entered the ship. No shots were fired. Near
East expert Robert Satloff of the Washington Institute for Near East
Policy reconstructed in detail the entire chronology of the arms deal,
which was published in the journal The National Interest (upon which this
description is largely based).
Underneath the boxes of cheap clothing and sunglasses the soldiers found
water-tight containers of weapons and explosives, enough to provision a
small army. Rockets with a range of up to 20 kilometers, grenades,
anti-tank weapons, machine guns, mines. Enough C4 explosive for 300
suicide bombs: 2200 kilograms, which is 5 times the weight of all of the
suicide bombs that have exploded in Israel since the founding of the
state.
But it is not the quantity of weapons that had rocked the Near East, but
their origin and destination. The Karine-A came from Iran and the weapons
were destined for the Gaza Strip. So admitted its captain under custody.
The Israelis were pleased to let the man repeat his confession for
journalists from the New York Times and Fox TV. In an interview the man,
Omar Akawi, also named the originating party: The Palestinian Authority.
"They told me that these weapons are for Palestine", recounted Akawi. "As
a Palestinian officer I do as I am told". In the meantime American and
European officials examined the evidence and confirmed the Israeli
version.
The order to procure such weapons marked Yassir Arafat's strategic
turnaround from a peaceful to a bloody solution to the conflict. This
turnaround was accomplished in precisely the phase in which Europe placed
its greatest trust in the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and promised him
direct payments.
How Arafat paid the friendly price of 10 million dollars for the Karine-A
cargo is one of the mysteries of this affair. Whoever finds it reassuring
should do the math. At the time of the weapons deal, Europe paid at least
10% of Yassir Arafat's day-to-day budget and 50% of all aid payments. Next
to the Europeans, Arafat had only two other revenue sources - substantial
aid from the Arab states, and insignificant tax receipts. How great are
the odds that Arafat has not soiled Europe's reputation?
EU Commissioner Chris Patten praises Europe's especially "strict
mechanisms for ex-ante and ex-post controls". Every month, he says, funds
are transferred only if the proper use of the aid in the previous month
has been verified. The budget must be made fully transparent to the EU.
Auxiliary budgets are not allowed. It is highly astonishing, therefore,
how Arafat could so effortlessly drive an entire weapons ship past the
budget.
If one believes the EU, there is an actual control process for the aid
payments to Palestine: the International Monetary Fund (IMF). EU
Commissioner Chris Patten writes that the IMF examines the payments with
precision and sends a monthly "declaration of no objection".
Karim Nashashibi performs this job for the IMF. He lives in Jerusalem. The
man that monitors the Palestinians for Patten is himself a Palestinian. He
comes from the same clan and carries the same last name as Arafat's
long-time finance minister.
He had even been destined for a political career under Arafat. Until
Monday evening of this week the IMF man Nashashibi was going to become
Arafat's new Finance Minister. Then the wind changed and Nashashibi's
predecessor at the IMF is now first-in-line for the office. Arafat's
financial advisor Fuad Shubaki, the man who bought the Karine-A, is proud
to call IMF deputy Nashashibi "a friend".
That friend, who presumably is also supposed be a monitor is given to
consider "We don't oversee how every Euro is spent", because "we are not
auditors". The IMF only verifies that the sums in the budget go to the
right departments and in the right amounts. The IMF in Washington does not
see it any differently "We don't have audit responsibilities," they say,
"we only help set up the Palestinian Authority's budget". It's always been
up to the Palestinians to monitor themselves, that is to say not at all.
What now must seem to Europe's politicians as a great surprise, was
initiated long ago. Yassir Arafat's change of direction can be retold like
a chapter out of a historical war epic. For the Palestinian witnesses are
slowly beginning to break their silence. They report on PA strategy
sessions (requesting anonymity) The meetings started even before the
outbreak of the Intifada in the Fall of 2000 and apparently ended with the
recommendation to launch terror.
One of these meetings occurred in February 2001, shortly before the
elections in Israel. It took place in Jerusalem's Orient House. Two
scenarios were discussed. Option One: Arafat's people would initiate a
controlled uprising. The Intifada had by then been going on for five
months, with stones, shots, deaths. Yassir Arafat had at the outset
released jailed assailants and thereby showed that he now tolerates the
radical terror, and would use it. A strategy of murder that at the same
time would be instated only in the occupied territories. The Israeli Prime
Minister would supposedly become unnerved and would be forced to
compromise.
Our wish is for Sharon to perpetrate a massacre
Not if Ariel Sharon is elected, countered the aides with Option Two. They
offered a different, putatively modern analysis. Because a Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon would never offer more than his predecessor Ehud Barak
offered at the Camp David negotiations in the previous year, a war would
need to be launched. Was it not shown just a few months earlier that
Israel can be defeated? This is how the group interpreted Israel's retreat
from Lebanon. Israelis are incapable of suffering and would not tolerate
ongoing losses.
The invisible suicide bomber is the weapon that would strike at the heart
of this mollycoddled western society. The aides felt this theory would be
an even better solution for a hardline Prime Minister. If Sharon were
sufficiently provoked he would strike back with brutal force. Arafat's
personal troops, the Al-Aksa Brigades, stood ready.
One cynic, placed very high up in the Palestinian hierarchy, said at the
time "Our wish is for Sharon to perpetrate a massacre" After that the
"Kosovo model" should go into action. The world, disgusted at Israel,
would hurry to the rescue. In the end international troops would be
stationed in the Holy Land and protect the new Palestinian state. Even
heretofore moderate Palestinians climbed on board this tragic, feverish
dream.
The Israelis managed to prove with documents that Arafat placed himself at
the head of this movement in Spring of 2001 and turned this phantasm into
strategy. The documents were uncovered as Israeli tanks cut a swath
through the occupied territories after every new murder attack, leaving
behind debris and corpses, occupying police stations, government buildings
and Yassir Arafat's headquarters. Today the documents lie in warehouses,
stacked in moving boxes. Large teams are going through the several
millions of pages and many gigabytes of data. The Israeli army posted a
selection of documents on its website, others were handed over to
journalists in order to convince the world.
March 21, 2002 was one of those frightful days that one can never get used
to. The bomb exploded in the center of West Jerusalem, on King George
Street. The perpetrator was a young man, an Arab, who passer-by considered
suspicious. They alerted the police, who grabbed him by the belly: too
late. The murderer and three victims lay dead, 70 people were injured.
The political ritual began immediately. Arafat's Al-Aksa Brigades took
responsibility for the attack. Israeli and Palestinian police met for
consultations. The American Secretary of State Colin Powell called Yassir
Arafat and demanded that he take decisive action against terrorism. The
Palestinian leadership declared that it would arrest the masterminds.
According to documents that were later discovered in Arafat's
headquarters, as well as in intelligence offices in Tulkarm and Nablus,
the Palestinian leader should have arrested himself.
Please allocate 2000 dollars for every fighter
The history of the attacks is recorded in a great sheaf of papers that are
likely to turn on its head the prevailing image of the suicide bomber. In
no way are we talking about an angry young man who, humiliated by
oppression, occupation and misery, eventually goes overboard. In fact,
they appear to be precisely planned operations of terror cells, with
months of preparation and acting under orders. Working in the background
are Arafat's satraps, bureaucratizing the whole process and fighting for
the assignment to show the martyr the way to heaven.
The man designated for this is named Mohammad Hashaikh. He comes from a
village near Nablus, is 21 years old and is a policeman in the PA. Two
so-called operators manage the planning, Naser Ash-Shawish and Mohammed
Ka'abina, both in their late 20s, both from Nablus, one a member of one of
Arafat's secret agencies, the other a member of the Islamic Jihad. The
instructions are given to one of Arafat's 13 secret agencies which
apparently doesn't mind that one of the members of the cell is from the
Islamic competition.
The cell would be discovered during its months of preparation -- by one of
the other secret agencies in Arafat's empire. Its agent wrote a report on
December 2, 2001. After that he arrested the three members of the cell for
questioning. He received instructions to release the three and keep them
under observation, apparently with the goal of using their services
himself at a later time. So he took the future martyr home, drank tea with
him and took a look at his explosive belt.
On February 8, 2002 the martyr's hour arrived. He received instructions to
travel to Tulkarem. With the explosive belt on his belly, he waited for
orders. But nothing happened. Presumably the intelligence agency couldn't
agree on who would get to lead the operation. Instead of dispatching the
assailant on his mission, they re-arrested him. He was brought to
Ramallah.
In the meantime, Yassir Arafat was personally engaged. In a phone call
with the Israelis, Arafat praised his campaign against terror and
mentioned that his authorities had arrested a terrorist. Pursuant to a
memo that Arafat's intelligence coordinator gave the cell, they returned
the explosive belt and gave the prisoner a new time and place for his
mission: Jerusalem, March 21, 2002. The surviving operators would be
rewarded after the attack.
The Israelis found a list of names, which uses the same formulation every
time: "Please send the sum of 2000 dollars for each of the following
fighters" The man who fulfilled the requests is called Yassir Arafat. The
Israelis managed to identify his signature on such documents. Almost every
time, they say, Arafat drastically reduced the awarded sum. The principles
of frugal fiscal management even carried over to the administration of a
murder machine.
The Israelis found payment receipts with which the salaries for terrorists
were paid, through a cascade of transfers, from accounts funded by the
European Union. This is an indication that things are going in a frightful
direction. But still not sufficient to prove that the blood money comes
from Brussels' slush pots. Therefore it is important to determine how
reliable is the Israeli research on Yassir Arafat and his system. After
all, the materials are being evaluated by Israeli intelligence. And the
political interest of Premier Sharon, even as a man of peace is obvious:
Arafat must go! Are we talking about information or war propaganda?
Practically every western government has been asking itself the same
question since the files were discovered - including the Germans. The
Germans therefore sent their own experts from the Federal Intelligence
Service (BND) to conduct an investigation. In the middle of April the BND
filed its first report. It considers the documents to be authentic and
agrees with the Israeli conclusions. It finds only indications of Arafat's
involvement, not courtroom proof.
On May 2, 2002, the BND filed another report. The author reaches similar
conclusions. The first documents from Israel contained "no direct proof"
of the abuse of EU funds for financing terrorism. It is "acknowledged,
however, that Arafat evidently doesn't distinguish between the structure
of the Palestinian Authority and his Fatah Movement". Therefore one
"shouldn't rule out" that subsidies were misappropriated. The report
writes of "known mismanagement" and "far reaching corruption" and comes to
the conclusion: "At no point could it be realistically assumed that
EU-funds were ... 100% accounted for".
The author provides examples. Arafat apparently filled his coffers using
financial legerdemain. For the salaries of Palestinian teachers, doctors
and police, the EU paid in dollars. Arafat transferred the money in
shekels, at a discount of 25%. The civil servants also had a tax of 3.7%
withheld, without this money being recorded in the budget as tax revenue.
This begs the question, how exactly did the BND know all of this? Are the
spies in Palestine so well-connected? The short answer is: yes. The long
answer leads back to the European sponsorship for Arafat, which the BND
has been part of for years - and of which the German public has been
unaware until today.
According to Die Zeit's sources, the BND has been training and equipping
Arafat's intelligence service in the Gaza Strip since the 1993 Oslo
Accords. The new security services needed help for exactly one mission:
fighting terrorism. Now the German government is vexed by the question of
whether the BND's protege has redefined its mission and therefore
converted itself from an anti-terror force to a terrorist organization.
The BND suspended its cooperation with the Palestinians at the end of
2000, as covertly as it initiated it. The BND must have become aware of
its disciples' inner changes. What did the BND report back to its
government, and what consequences did the German government then impose?
In recent weeks, a few members of the German parliament have been pressing
for an explanation. On April 5, 2002 Friedbert Pflueger, chairman of the
European Affairs Committee, appealed to Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer
to examine the Israeli documents. "If they are genuine," wrote the
Christian Democrat, "Germany and the EU cannot continue to support the
Palestinian Authority in the present manner". The documents have since
been validated, but despite that fact the debate is not taking place. Why
not?
Foreign Minister Fischer prefers to manage his crises quietly. Without a
lot of publicity he recently sent a team of investigators from the
government Corporation for Technical Cooperation (GTZ) to Palestine.
Fischer understands the explosive force of a public debate on the question
of whether German tax money is unintentionally being used to finance the
murder of Israelis. But not so to prevent it. This investigation - as
Pflueger demands - must be public and transparent. Because it touches on
the very self-conception of German politics.
Joschka Fischer wants to see strict monitoring of the European subsidies
and democratic reforms within the Palestinian Authority. These demands
recall the same wishful thinking that the affair first inspired. Why now,
in the middle of a war, should Arab democracy suddenly emerge when even
the years of the Oslo peace euphoria didn't give birth to it? And what use
are strict financial controls, if at the end of the day, Arafat is
supporting terrorism with his own money? No, the German and especially the
European politicians have blockaded themselves from comprehending that the
foundations for supporting Arafat simply no longer apply.
These politicians want peace and not a guerilla movement of
homicide-bombers. Since the end of the siege of Arafat's office alone, his
Al-Aksa Martyr Brigades have taken responsibility for three new murderous
attacks on Israelis. Whoever wants to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe
in Palestine must not sustain this head of government, his budget or his
bureaucracy.
The Palestinians demand that Europe pay them blood money
Until now, Europe's politicians have overlooked every indication of the
misuse of funds. Initially, in 1994, they found themselves in good
company. The Americans and the Israelis did the same thing. They ignored
Arafat's shadow budgets with the hope that in the end they would buy
peace. That's why they didn't react at first when Arafat armed his police
in violation of the treaty. Once his henchmen turned to terrorism they
sounded the alarm, but Europe wasn't listening.
The EU is proud of its policy of equidistance between the Israelis and the
Palestinians. But while they criticize Premier Ariel Sharon's occupation
policy, his settlement policy and his reluctance for peace, they ignore
Arafat's turnaround. Nobody wants to destroy the image of the freedom
fighter with the keffiyeh, as far from reality as it is. Some don't want
to shatter the symbolic figure of the left, others don't want to lose
their last negotiating partner.
The outcome of this policy is the refusal to supply spare parts for Israel
tanks, and at the same time the months-long refusal to reconsider Arafat's
budgetary support. Not until this Tuesday afternoon [June 4] did the EU
Budget Committe decide to suspend the payments. As long as the European
Parliament doesn't affirm this decision, however, the money will keep
flowing.
In the coming weeks it will probably be claimed that none of this could
have been known. But that doesn't add up. The Palestinians themselves have
finally let the Europeans know where they stand.
On April 22, 2002 Palestinian Minister Nabil Shaath presented the members
of the European Commission at the Mediterranean Conference in Valencia
with a demand for aid in the amount of $1.9 Billion dollars. According to
consistent reports from several witnesses, Shaath's wish-list contained
line items such as $20.6 Million dollars for weapons and $40.6 Million
dollars for the support of refugees and "martyr families".
The Palestinians expected in all seriousness that the Europeans would
follow Saddam Hussein's lead and pay blood money. The assembled European
diplomats did not greet this demand with alarm. They are not horrified,
only embarrassed. They let the wish-list disappear into the vault. The
don't want to know anything about it. They would rather be defrauded
discreetly.
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