President Arafat has brought the Palestinian cause to London before, but no visit to the British capital by him or by any Palestinian has been as important as that which he is currently undertaking. The shape of the US-British axis in the war is now clear. President Bush is playing the role of general while Prime Minister Tony Blair assumes the mantle of diplomat. While Bush consults with his generals in the war room, Blair maintains the diplomatic offensive, doing whatever he can to draw and hold together international support for the American campaign — and that includes parlaying with the Palestinians.
It is widely understood that the animus against the United States felt by the man in the Palestinian street is propelled by immense bitterness and frustration that nothing is being done by Washington to counter continuing Israeli oppression and double-dealing. Bush’s refusal to use his immense leverage to force the reactionary government of Ariel Sharon back to the negotiating table has deepened Palestinian despair. But Arafat has resisted substantial grassroots pressure to reflect Palestinian fury. Instead, he has shouldered the political risk of a patient and statesman-like approach, because he can see that mere bombast and fury would at best have only short-term benefits. Most probably, they would serve to sideline the whole question of Palestine.
Bush and Blair are now talking openly about a Palestinian state. Blair says that the Oslo Accord needs to be reactivated. Arafat has confined Palestinian demands to just such a move. He is thus able to present a moderate and statesmanlike front at the very time the Sharon government appears ever more extreme. With every day that it continues with its obdurate oppression, the Sharon government places itself in a more and more extreme position. Even Zionist supporters in the US now find it hard to justify Israeli policy. The only obvious way that the Sharon administration can get itself off the hook — short of returning to the Oslo Accord blueprint — would be for extremist elements within the Palestinian community to break loose. We can expect, therefore, that the Israelis will continue to do all that they can to provoke Palestinian anger, all the more so given Sharon’s failure to portray Arafat as yet another terrorist following the Sept. 11 attacks. They may even, as was done before by Zionist terrorists, perpetrate an outrage upon their own people in an effort to re-secure US sympathy.
Now, therefore, is the moment for all Palestinians to stand behind their leader. There has probably never been a better chance for a just settlement to the terrible wrongs of over half a century. The international community is listening to the Palestinians as never before. Of course, it is hard to ask a people which was so patient for so long in exile to go that extra mile. But it is worth remembering that it was the first intifada that drove the Israelis to Oslo; the second demonstrated the full extent of Israeli brutality and oppression, while showing the world the desperate depth of despair among ordinary Palestinians.
Now it is American needs that have finally opened Washington’s eyes to the necessity of an answer to Palestinian demands. Arafat is pursuing the only course which can offer his people justice at last.
