[(Continued from p.11)]
most needy population -- the refugees. Not only does the PA insist on not using any portion of its budget towards improving their living standards, it is demanding 'that the international community increase its support for it....It is not surprising that Arafat may have felt more comfortable igniting a nationalist struggle -- and pinning the blame for future deprivations on Israel -- than focusing on the urgent need to reform the Palestinian system.
Another recurrent pattern which does color Arafat's judgement, at times -- and was certainly evident in the manner in which he "explained" the current crisis to the Emergency Session of the Arab Summit -- is his tendency to weave conspiracy theories (Mu'amarat) and use them, with a thin line separating fact from fiction. Thus -- as an example -- in a series of interviews in March and April 1995, including a fascinating meeting with a sympathetic Israeli and American audience, Arafat raised the argument that a secret Israeli organization -- an "O.A.S." within the GSS...working through the Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, was in fact responsible for a series of terrorist attacks such as the bombing in Beit Lid (in which 22 Israelis died). It should be noted tht this fantastic argument came (already then) in conjunction with a warning: any attempt by Israel to stall on the peace process -- because of the security "excuse," as he saw it -- would have a terrible effect on Israel's standing in the world:
"King Hussein will not go on with you, the Egyptians will not, Senegal will not, Mandela will not, if the process with us fails ..." This mixture of wild conspiracy theory, and the threat that Israel, the region and the world will know no stability unless his demands are met, was central, more recently, to his speech in Cairo, where he blamed Israel and the IDF for having conspired for more than a year to prepare the "butchery" of the Palestinian people: hence the urgent need for international protection to be introduced into all "Palestinian Territories."
The danger implicit in such manipulative assertions and "claims on reality" is that they can easily develop into a major misreading of the situation and a harmful miscalculation, as was the case in 1995, when Arafat absolved himself in this manner from any serious effort to curb terrorism; and might be the case now.
[Editor's note: This document has been edited slightly for reasons of space. In addition, the original text was followed by two appendices: Appendix A: The Key Commitments Undertaken by the P.L.O./ P.A. and Appendix B: Implementation of the Sharm El-Sheikh Understandings (17-29 October).]
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