Taking Cromwell’s Advice

29 October 2004


Arafat Leaves Ramallah for Medical Treatment in France

This morning, the situation in the West Bank is confused, but a few facts have emerged. Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat is much sicker than previously believed. He’s leaving his Ramallah compound for the first time in years for treatment in France. Whether he lives or dies now isn’t very important. His day has passed and one way or another, it’s time for new faces at the top in the Palestinian movement.

Mr. Arafat’s eventual death with be a scene of great agony for some, but the truth is that he hasn’t been much of a success. Since the emergence of the PLO as a murdering, hijacking gang decades ago to now, Mr. Arafat has misled the Palestinian people. There’s no Palestinian state, Israel does as it wants in areas where Mr. Arafat’s people live, and he hasn’t left his residence in years because there’s no guarantee he could come back. These are not signs of a great liberator, a great leader of his people. They are proof that he has been an incompetent. And since the French authorities haven’t finished their inquiries into the money his wife has been spending in exile in France, there could well be charges that he is a thief on top of being a bungler.

The worst crime he has committed, though, is his refusal to groom a successor. The only explanation for this that makes any sense is raw selfishness. If someone could take over for him, he became expendable. Expendable incompetents have a short shelf-life. Now that he is hors de combat, this failure will induce a crisis. With the figurehead gone, a power struggle will follow. His flight to France creates the vacuum that needs filling.

Whoever succeeds him will have to be a rejectionist for a time in order to placate the hardliners and dead-enders. At the same time, a change at the top does create possibilities previously unavailable. A leadership that can create a Palestinian economy worthy of the name would be strong enough to make peace. And if Israel could find away to get rid of its present leadership, accepting olive branches becomes feasible on both sides.

Mr. Arafat has been a poor leader of his people when measured by his successes. There’s more Arab blood on his hands than his supporters will acknowledge, and while many his people live in ramshackle camps, his wife and child are rather well-off residents of Paris. Oliver Cromwell said it best in dismissing Parliament in 1653, “You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing …. Depart, I say; and let us have done with you. In the name of God,—go!” Mr. Arafat should make sure the door does not hit him on the way out.

© Copyright 2004 by The Kensington Review, J. Myhre, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent.

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