Editorial: Arafat is incapable of enacting reforms

Wednesday, June 5, 2002 | 9:24 a.m.

Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has come under pressure from Israel and the United States to reform his government, especially his security force that has done nothing to prevent suicide bombings against Israel. But a few days ago Arafat announced that he was inviting Hamas to join his Cabinet. Yes, that's right, Arafat wanted to include the same terrorist group that is believed to be responsible for carrying out more suicidal attacks against Israel than any other terrorist group. This hardly sounds like the kind of response that would improve Israel's security.

Despite Arafat's overture, Hamas turned him down on Monday as did the Islamic Jihad earlier. Arafat's followers have suggested that to include Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Palestinian Authority's Cabinet would give Arafat a better chance to rein in these groups. But who did they think they're fooling? Arafat hasn't shown any desire to clamp down on those terrorist groups and another outfit, Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades, which has ties to Arafat and has been responsible for suicide bombings in the past year.

President Bush has sent CIA Director George Tenet to the Middle East this week to assess what kind of Arab backing there is for changes in the Palestinian Authority. At this point, however, we haven't seen any constructive moves by Arafat that would cause us to believe Arafat has changed -- he's still a terrorist at heart.