Kuwaiti MPs Angered by Arafat Tribute [Kuwaiti government airs Arafat tribute]

IMRA ^ | November 21, 2004 | Jerusalem Post

[yonif]

Members of the Kuwaiti parliament have expressed outrage after the country's state-run television station broadcast programs paying homage to Yasser Arafat.

MP Muhammad al-Mutairi harshly criticized the country's information minister, Muhammad Abulhassan, demanding the establishment of a parliamentary committee of inquiry on why the programs were televised.

Relations between Arafat and the Kuwaiti government soured in 1990 after the PLO expressed support for Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.

On November 9, the Kuwaiti undersecretary for news, Tarek al-Ajmi, was suspended from his post by Abulhassan after the airing of a tribute to Arafat.

At the time, the minister said he would investigate the matter, and insisted that he had issued strict instructions against televising additional programs devoted to Arafat.

Nonetheless, Mutairi told the Gulf News daily, "Reports on Kuwait Television praising Arafat as a great freedom fighter were also broadcast on November 11 and November 12."

"It appears that the memory of the government is getting weaker. This is not consistent with the feelings of the Kuwaiti people because it involves someone who stabbed Kuwait in the back and did not respect its leaders and its people," he said regarding Arafat.

Mutairi added that it was inappropriate for Kuwait to have sent a high-ranking delegation to attend the Palestinian leader's funeral, and he called on the government to apologize to the people.

Other Kuwaiti parliamentarians also joined in the criticism, with MP Feisal al-Meslim saying that he had asked the Information Ministry for copies of the instructions given to its staff concerning how to handle the Arafat issue.

[yonif]

The Kuwaiti government hates Jews and Israel more than it hates Saddam and his allies who supported the invasion of their country.

[yonif]

Ping.

[yonif]

[sukhoi-30mki]

Yep,Countries like Kuwait & Qatar(America's new muse in the Persian Gulf) haven't had the best of ties with Arafat & the PLO,but they have been very close to Hamas.Khalid Meshal,the real head of Hamas shuttles routinely between Doha,Damascus & Tunis & he has a lot of fellow scumbags in Qatar,despite American forces being present just a few miles away(So much for a global war on terror!!).Both countries have also played host to Chechen radicals-whenever Russia has taken up this issue with the them,Washington has always supported it's Slammic lackeys.

[dr_who_2]

Yes, but if Kuwait didn't have a parliament, no Kuwaitis would have been able to talk some sense into their own government. I think this illustrates Bush's point about spreading democracy in the M.E. Sure, the end result may give a microphone to twice as many "blame Israel/deify Arafat" demagogues in the Arab states, but it also gives the so-called liberals a voice that they didn't have before.

[dr_who_2]

It's a guns/butter issue. A member of the Arab ruling class can harbor terrorists ("refugees"), share weapons, intelligence, and his country's wealth, but he might find that to be more difficult if his dirt-poor subjects have advocates who are complaining about purely domestic issues, even if he can shut many of them up with money/favors. Given the appeal of secular movements like Baathism and Soviet Communism in the past (both of them are on the decline, thanks to Uncle Sam), I don't think Arabs are pliant enough (much less unified enough) to continue to expand the terror conflict. Arabs seem to be easily manipulated, but I think that's because most of them can't bring about political change except through violence.

Can we trust Arabs? No!!!! But we have to work around that without resorting to re-colonizing the Middle East.