oh one more rich---Your new presidential candidate
for 2004 is using one of the best plays possible..
Its funny how that left gets right-minded.
Clinton reassures Israel of America's support and says Arafat 'has failed as a leader'
Sat Feb 23, 5:06 PM ET
By JASON KEYSER, Associated Press Writer
JERUSALEM - U.S. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (news - web sites) on Saturday said American support for Israel was rock solid and she put the blame for nearly 17 months of bloodshed firmly on Yasser Arafat (news - web sites), saying that "he has failed as a leader."
Audio/Video
Israel Removes Tanks Around Arafat (AP)
"Yasser Arafat leaves a trail of violated vows and death along a path that could have and should have led to peace and life," she told members of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, who were meeting in Jerusalem.
The junior Democratic senator from New York, on a two-day solidarity visit to Israel, urged other Americans to travel to the Holy Land as a show of support for Israel and defiance against terrorism.
"It is imperative that we do everything within our power not to give the terrorists any victory no matter how small or mundane," she said to cheers from the audience.
Clinton said that following the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington, bonds between Israel and the United States surpassed just family links and religion.
"We have moved even beyond that to be one, one with our democracy, one with our freedom, one with our value for human life and one in resolve against those who would try to undermine and destroy us."
She said Israel's capture last month of a ship loaded with Iranian weapons, which it said was headed for the Palestinians, revealed a dangerous link between the Palestinians and Iran, which she called "the most active state sponsor of terrorism in the world."
She said she would discuss the dangers to Israel from Iran's pursuit of nuclear and other weapons in meetings with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites) and Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer on Sunday.
"Israel is a canary in a mine shaft," she said. "What happens to Israel in this setting now will largely determine what happens to us and the rest of the world."
Clinton spoke after Tourism Minister Benny Elon, and she was criticized for sharing the podium with the ultranationalist politician who advocates expelling Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza Strip (news - web sites).
An article published in December in Nekuda, a monthly magazine for Jewish settlers living in the Palestinian areas, quoted Elon as warning Palestinians that his party's idea of voluntary transfer meant making their lives so miserable that they would leave.
"For example, I will close all of the universities, I will make your life difficult until you want to leave," he told the magazine.
Israeli opposition leader Yossi Sarid said in a statement that it was unseemly for Clinton to appear on the same stage as Elon.
"It was embarrassing to see an important representative of democracy sitting down to dinner with Minister Elon, who openly espouses a racist doctrine of transfer," he said.
Clinton caused a stir during a previous visit when she hugged and kissed Soha Arafat, after a speech in which the Palestinian leader's wife accused the Israelis of using poison gas against Palestinian women and children. Clinton later repudiated the remark and said that she feared she would have caused an international incident by denouncing Mrs. Arafat on the spot.
During this trip, in addition to meetings with Israeli officials, Clinton plans on Sunday to visit the grave of slain prime minister Yitzhak Rabin (news - web sites) as well as the sites of recent Palestinian attacks that claimed Israeli and American lives in Jerusalem.
There are no scheduled meetings with Palestinians |
