Where I Stand — Mike O’Callaghan: New failure on horizon

Friday, May 17, 2002 | 4:11 a.m.

YASSER ARAFAT has made a bold announcement that he would stand for election within six months. Pardon me while I yawn along with thousands of Israelis and Palestinians who have heard this song before.

We already knew that he has been losing popularity with his people. Ten days ago in Tel Aviv, Israeli Maj. Gen. Amos Gilead told me that the bloodshed wasn't the result of a popular uprising. The small crowds greeting Arafat after he had been let out of his Ramallah cage confirmed Gilead's point of view. Then his avoidance of crowds in Jenin a few days ago forecasts an even darker future for the Palestinian Authority leader.

There is no doubt that the Palestinians are fed up with the kind of life Arafat and his gangsters have provided for them. Money for services has too often funded a plush lifestyle and big bank accounts for the leaders. Most of the people have feared expressing their concerns because of the brutal treatment and eventual death dealt out to many dissidents. I have found it necessary to speak to Palestinians individually and never in a group when searching for their true feelings.

Today we are being told that Arafat has been pressured by several Arab countries to call for elections and change his government. Which of the Arab countries can he use as an example of popular government? Syria? Egypt? Jordan? Kuwait? Iraq? Yemen? Lebanon? Saudi Arabia? There isn't an Arab country that has a popular democratic form of government. Only the country of Israel has a democratic form of government with necessary checks and balances to protect its citizens.

Six years ago I was in Israel watching the election of Yasser Arafat to head up the Palestinian Authority. Former President Jimmy Carter also had a group of observers there and declared it, despite a few shortcomings, a legitimate election. What happened or didn't happen after that election has sown the seeds of discontent. Arafat, like several Arab leaders, knew his people were restless so he directed their anger outward toward the Israelis. This is the same game the Saudis and others have played by directing the anger of their people toward the United States.

What Arafat didn't do was create a government that had a separation of powers with checks and balances. All of the powers to spend, judge and execute remained in his hands and he doled them out to his closest associates. The Palestinian people got the crumbs left over on the streets.

So now the Palestinians and the world are supposed to be happy with another election and no creditable opposition to Arafat and his Fatah gangsters? If this is true, then get ready for more suicide bombings and attacks by terrorists. Arafat knows how to wreak havoc but he has no intention or ability to run a decent popular government.

Allow me to recall a Jerusalem Post editorial written in 1996 prior to the first Arafat election. It read in part: "If there is anything admirable about the way the PA has prepared the elections, it is Arafat's skill in eliminating all serious opposition well before balloting day. The dirty work of intimidation, bribery and suppression has been completed, and the voting will undoubtedly be orderly -- as orderly as it is in Iraq and Syria with results just as predictable."

Following that election I wrote that the new Palestinian government must show the world it's not just one more Arab police state hiding behind a democratic disguise. Near the top of the list of things it would have to do was implement an economic development and jobs program. In addition, there would be the test of Arafat's ability to convince his young terrorists that going to work every day and sweating, although not as exciting as shooting, bombing and rioting, is the way to succeed in a democratic society.

Well, Arafat has failed to meet any of these challenges, and now he wants the Palestinians and the world to believe he will do better if given several more years in office.