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Politics : War -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Hawkmoon who wrote (1149)	5/18/2001 10:16:26 AM
From: Hawkmoon	Respond to of 23908

No joking about Arafat By Arieh O'Sullivan and Lamia Lahoud jpost.com JERUSALEM (May 18) - The Mossad is reportedly trying to get the last laugh on the Palestinians by unleashing a volley of unflattering jokes about Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat to undermine Palestinian morale, the Saudi Arabian daily Al Wattan has reported. While Palestinian officials have laughed off the reports, the paper says that Palestinian intelligence sources have been told by Arafat himself to collect the jokes, particularly those that surfaced recently. "The report is a joke by itself," one senior Palestinian security officer in the West Bank said. "There are hundreds of political jokes circulating in the Palestinian street about Arafat, Sharon and Mubarak; these jokes are born out of the political situation and are invented by the people, not the Mossad," he said. But Arafat apparently believes the situation is no laughing matter, and an unnamed senior Palestinian official said that a report on the jokes has already been passed on to Arafat, who is using it to learn the sentiment in the street, the paper said. One source said that there is even a special department dealing with the issue. The official charged that the Mossad was the source of many of the jokes and was disseminating them to create a rift between the people and the politicians. Defense sources declined to even relate to the report. Among the jokes currently circulating: - A bearded man, obviously a Hamas member, and his son enter the office of the PA. They see a photo of Arafat on the wall, and the son asks: 'Isn't this the guy you are always cursing, Dad?' The father then says very loudly: 'Whose kid is this?' - Prime Minister Ariel Sharon phones Arafat and asks why he can't stop the violence, to which Arafat replies: 'Stop the violence? I can't even stop my lips from moving.' - Arafat's bodyguards hear an explosion in his office and rush in to see him lying on the floor, his face bloodied. One of them says: "But Mr. President, if it was a letter bomb, your hands would have been hurt." Says Arafat: "I was sealing it." - Israel has barred Arafat from flying out of Gaza. He is depressed. His bodyguards decide to try and brighten him up and buy him a pair of shoes. He likes them and say they have wonderful taste. "And how did you know my shoe size?" Arafat asks. "Listen Mr. Chairman," they say, "Your foot has been up our rear end for 30 years!" Jerusalem Post columnist Barry Rubin, who is writing a book on Arafat, agreed that jokes about Arafat are not new. "The significant thing is that they are talking about the jokes. If they are accusing the Mossad of disseminating the jokes then they are really worried that anti-Arafat criticism is getting out of hand and they have to identify that with treason," Rubin said. This, he said, would inhibit people from telling the jokes and contain them to small circles of friends. "The message is: If you don't like Arafat and if you are critical then you are objectively a Zionist agent," he said. The fact that the Saudi daily published the jokes claiming their origin is from the Mossad may be a sign that they are trying to discredit Arafat and the intifada, the PA source said. Many of the Arab regimes are tired of the intifada and want it to stop by all means since it is causing them trouble at home, he said. The Palestinians also have their share of Sharon jokes, like the one that asks: "Why does Sharon refuse to meet Yasser Arafat at Erez?" Answer: "Because he fears the Customs Authority make take him for the 'mad cow.'"

To: Hawkmoon who wrote (1149)	5/18/2001 8:31:18 PM
From: KLP	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 23908

Follow Up --Just a few hours later...Fears Mount Over Rising Middle East Violence go2net.com May 18 7:34pm ET David Lupo Maariv/Reuters By Matt Spetalnick JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel's use of deadly air strikes in retaliation for a Palestinian suicide bombing heightened fears on Saturday that the cycle of Middle East violence was spiraling out of control. Missile attacks launched on Friday night on Palestinian targets -- the first time the region's mightiest air force has been unleashed against the Palestinian uprising -- marked a fresh escalation of the nearly eight-month-old conflict. A wave of air raids plus the death toll from a Palestinian bombing at an Israeli shopping mall made Friday one of the bloodiest days since the insurrection began last September. Seventeen people were killed and more than 200 injured in the latest round of Israeli-Palestinian violence. The overall death toll since the Palestinians began their uprising includes at least 435 Palestinians, 87 Israelis and 13 Israeli Arabs. Each side blamed the other for tit-for-tat attacks that spread bloodshed and grief from Israel's normally tranquil seaside to the Palestinian-controlled towns and refugee camps of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Funerals for the victims over the weekend could serve as new flashpoints for violence. The Israeli strikes, in which at least nine people were killed and 90 wounded at Palestinian security headquarters in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, came as reprisals for a suicide bombing that brought carnage to the city of Netanya just hours earlier. The bomber, a 21-year-old member of the militant Islamic group Hamas, killed six people and himself and wounded 110 in Netanya, just north of Tel Aviv, when he detonated explosives attached to a belt around his waist. MANGLED BODIES FROM BOMBING In the aftermath of the blast, mangled body parts littered the area along with shattered glass and twisted metal. Bloodied survivors screamed for help and witnesses wept. At a rally in Gaza, Hamas claimed responsibility for the bombing said it was in response to the killing of five Palestinian paramilitary policemen on Monday in the West Bank. Israel has since called that attack a mistake. The bomber was identified as Mahmoud Ahmed Marmash, a resident of West Bank town of Tulkarm. His mother said he had been a devout Muslim who gave her a bag of sweets before setting off on his suicide mission. Just hours later, Israeli warplanes launched a series of raids against what the army called "terrorist targets." Secretary of State Colin Powell, after a meeting in Washington with Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, said: "We share a deep concern over the mounting violence." But U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan took a harder line against Israel, accusing it of an excessive reaction. "I am deeply disturbed by the disproportionate Israeli response to today's appalling terrorist attack in Netanya," he said at the United Nations in New York. Annan said: "The only way to escape from the present downward spiral lies through ending the violence and resuming negotiations." Eight Palestinians were killed and 54 wounded in an attack at a security outpost in the West Bank city of Nablus, Palestinian rescue workers said. All the dead were policemen. Mahmoud Abu Hanoud, a leader of Hamas's military wing whom Israel considers the most wanted Palestinian militant on the West Bank, escaped from his prison cell in Nablus after missiles destroyed the compound, a Palestinian security source said. MISSILES HIT FORCE 17 BUILDING In a simultaneous strike, missiles slammed into a building housing members of President Yasser Arafat's Force 17 security apparatus in the West Bank city of Ramallah, witnesses said. At least one person was killed and 14 people were injured. More than 20 more were hurt in attacks on Gaza and Tulkarm, the suicide bomber's home town. "We warn against this serious escalation against our people and we urge the international community and especially the United States to immediately intervene to halt Israeli aggression," said Nabil Abu Rdainah, a spokesman for Palestinian President Yasser Arafat. Raanan Gissin, a spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, said Israel's response "matched the severity" of the Netanya bombing. "The fingerprints of the Palestinian Authority are all over it," he said. The Palestinian Authority had condemned the suicide attack and urged Israel to show restraint. Israel's use of its F-16 fighter planes marks a major increase in its military campaign aimed at snuffing out the Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation. Israeli forces had already been criticized internationally for resorting to live fire against stone-throwing Palestinian demonstrators and using even more advanced weaponry against lightly armed gunmen. Earlier on Friday, Palestinian gunmen shot dead an Israeli driving near a Jewish settlement close to the West Bank city of Ramallah. A woman was seriously wounded. Israeli troops wounded five Palestinian youths throwing stones in the Gaza Strip in protests after Muslim prayers.