Friday, June 21, 2002 | 9:39 a.m.
Mike O'Callaghan is the Las Vegas Sun executive editor.
CONDOLEEZZA RICE, SECURITY ADVISER to President George W. Bush, put her finger on a major problem when appearing last week before the editorial board of The Mercury News, the newspaper published in San Jose, Calif.. "Frankly, the Palestinian Authority, which is corrupt and cavorts with terror ... is not the basis for a Palestine state moving forward," she told the newspaper. No truer words have ever been spoken.
The ring of truth got under the skin of the world's best-known terrorist, Yasser Arafat, the leader of the Palestinian Authority. Arafat took time to respond to Rice's comments with "she does not have the right to put or impose orders on us about what to do or not to do." Within hours he proved his point as the bloody suicide bombings continued to kill Israelis riding buses to work and school.
Secretary of State Colin L. Powell continues to struggle with how to build a Middle East peace framework. He knows that Arafat is both corrupt and a killer of thousands of innocent Arabs and Israelis. Even Powell's suggestion that an interim Palestinian state be created is going too far. Uzi Landau, Israel's minister of public security, wants nothing to do with Arafat. Landau also sees Powell's suggestion of any kind of Palestinian state under present conditions as being wrong. He told the New York Times that such a creation would mean "that terrorism pays off, and why should anyone stop it."
President Bush knows that Arafat is corrupt and a terrorist. Rice knows that Arafat is corrupt and a terrorist. Powell knows that Arafat is corrupt and a terrorist. There shouldn't be any problem for them to realize that their open concern about Iraq's Saddam Hussein also leads to Arafat and his PA. They have all seen the documents seized by the Israelis that confirm the close PA-Iraqi relationships. It's an open secret in the Middle East. Saddam Hussein has publicly praised the suicide bombers and grants $25,000 to the families of the killers. In addition to this, he has called for Arab nations to provide additional weapons for the militants and has transferred millions of dollars to the PA.
Our elected and appointed leaders know that the entire mess in the Middle East is all connected and the Palestinian terror strikes are only part of the problem. Nevertheless, they have become an important segment of the problem because they distract attention from what is happening in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia and other countries that have produced terrorists and even today support terrorists.
This brings us back to Landau's statement that pushing for an interim Palestinian state, while Israeli blood and body parts are still on the streets, will only reward the killers. The mindset of Arafat and other Arab leaders is, very simply, that any act of compassion or move toward peace is a sign of weakness. A good example of this kind of thinking was the withdrawal of the Israel Defense Forces from their security area in Lebanon. Instead of resulting in the promised peace, it only encouraged the Hezbollah guerrillas to come even closer to Israeli towns and farms and shell them with rockets and mortars.
Everybody making foreign policy decisions in the White House must be fully aware of the pain and insecurity felt by people targeted by terrorists. I would hope that the lessons terrorists have taught us in New York, Virginia, Pennsylvania and around the world, only months ago, haven't already faded into the background when foreign policies are made.
Any support the United States may give by rewarding the Palestinian terrorists can only result in more pain and bloodshed for both Israelis and Arabs. As Rice has told us, there can be no room for terrorism and corruption in a legitimate state, and Arafat embodies both of these shortcomings. A legitimate state can't be headed by the commander of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades and the Fatah organization. No, and the use of Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists for diplomatic gains can't be acceptable to the leaders of our great and free nation.
The world doesn't deserve to have another thugocracy added to its already too long list of problems.
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