Though Shimon Peres, Israel's foreign minister, has "officially" denied it, the chances are that Yediot Aharonot had got it right when it wrote that President Yasser Arafat was on the Zionist state's hit list. The mass circulation daily reported on Sunday that Peres was convinced that the army's second-in-command, Gen. Moshe Yahalon, wanted to liquidate Arafat.
Peres' denial is only natural. No foreign minister can confirm that his government is planning the assassination of another head of state, especially when the intended victim represents the only hope of solving a problem as intractable as the Middle East conflict. Even Israel which, in the past, got away with so much atrocities will find the consequences beyond the control of its Washington lobbyists and clients. The news gives an insight into the mindset of the ruling circles in Israel, celebrated as "the region's only democracy". That is a democracy whose terrorism is every bit as evil as that of the terrorists the world is now hunting for.
Nevertheless, the revelations came as a surprise. Not because it showed the army as ruthless. We always knew that. But we did not realize that it was stupid as well. The revelation by Peres denotes a streak of insanity hitherto unspotted.
What exactly do these army leaders imagine would happen if Arafat were taken out of the equation? Do they seriously think that the Palestinians would give up the struggle against repression and occupation? They live in a dream world if they do. If Arafat were eliminated, any hope of a peaceful settlement between Palestinians and Israelis would be finally expunged. Palestinian political leadership would pass into the hands of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. It might be more divided in the short term, but it would be far more lethal for Israel.
The idea does not make any sense from an Israeli point of view. Unless, that is, there is an even more insane agenda. Is it their aim to completely polarize Palestinian opinion so that they can then paint every last of them as terrorists, thereby hoping to justify to Washington and the Europeans an end to dialogue and, instead, a new campaign of violence and intimidation? Is that such a ridiculous notion? Just look at what is happening now. They murder Palestinian activists then issue ultimatums to Arafat to maintain the crumbling cease-fire. How can Arafat succeed if the Israelis carry on killing Palestinians? The inevitable result is more bitterness and fury.
There is no chance of peace while the blood continues to flow. Of course, we all knew that there were plenty of Israeli politicians who fear Palestinian moderates far more than they fear militants, who want all Palestinians to say that Israel must be wholly destroyed. They fear Palestinian moderation because they know it is the door through which Israel will be force-marched by the world, even by Washington, into making concessions. For them Yasser Arafat is the leader and the symbol par excellence of Palestinian moderation which is why Ariel Sharon, the leader and symbol par excellence of Israeli intransigence, misses no opportunity to attack him.
Until now, however, it was not evident that such crank-brained views had taken so deep a root in the Israeli high command.
