Arafat calls for end to attacks on civilians

Reuters | 6/19/02

[kattracks]

GAZA, June 20 (Reuters) - A statement by Palestinian 
President Yasser Arafat sent to Palestinian media for 
publication said on Thursday that he condemns attacks that 
target Israeli civilians and calls on his people to stop them. 
    Officials said it was unlikely that Arafat would read the  
speech himself, but that it was distributed to Palestinian 
newspapers, radio and television stations, and the official 
Palestinian news agency WAFA. 
    "Out of my concern to our people, their land and their 
future, I declare my complete condemnation to these attacks that 
target Israeli civilians," Arafat's statement said. 
    The attacks "have nothing to do with our national rights in 
legitimate resistance to Israeli occupation and our right to 
defend our resistance and our holy sites against this settlement 
danger". 
    The statement was released after a Palestinian suicide 
bomber killed six people and wounded 35 at a Jerusalem bus stop 
on Wednesday, prompting U.S. President George W. Bush to delay a 
speech laying out the path to a Palestinian state. 
    The suicide bombing, the second attack of its kind in the 
city in two days, had raised the prospect of the Israeli army 
responding in line with a new policy of retaking and holding 
Palestinian land as long as such attacks continue. 
    A member of the Hamas organisation blew himself up on a 
Jerusalem bus on Tuesday and killed 19 people, the highest death 
toll in a Palestinian attack in the city in six years. 
    "I have to speak to you frankly about the necessity to 
completely stop these attacks which have been repeatedly 
condemned by the Palestinian leadership and against which we 
have taken firm decisions to preserve the high national 
interest..." 
    "Targeting civilians, whether Palestinians or Israelis, is a 
condemned and renounced act by the Palestinian leadership and by 
me personally, and by the international community." 
    Arafat said the Israeli government used the attacks as a 
"pretext and a justification to the current Israeli government 
to use in raiding our land and killing and wounding thousands of 
our people..." 
    ((Jerusalem newsroom, 972-2-537-0502, 
jerusalem.newsroom@reuters.com)) 

19 JUN 2002 21:53:39 Arafat calls for end to attacks on civilians

© 1999 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.

[Post Toasties]

I hope Israel has learned a lesson here. You have to give these Pally bastards the proper incentive to shut down their homicide bombings, which means grab their territory, not commiserate with them.

[white trash redneck]

Well, isn't this special.

[BlessingInDisguise]

Oh yippee, AraRat released a statement of condemnation. Everything's all better now! If the Israel's try to defend themselves now they are the aggressors. /sarcasm

[rageaholic]

Arafat should be locked into a dog kennel in a public square and beaten with a threaded metal rod by passers by.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Dennis Ross (former Clinton mideast envoy) is on with Brit Hume right now and says Arafats condemnation of suicide attacks is worthless unless he condems and takes proactive measures to halt Hamas, Hezbollah, and the other terrorist organizations he created. Asked what Arafat had done to create peace in the region, Mr. Ross said "nothing".

[ecomcon]

Someones' lips moving?

[CIB-173RDABN]

I think someone believes they may be in someones crosshairs.

[Straight Vermonter]

That ought to get him a few billion more from the EU.

[ThinkDifferent]

Obscure Buffy the Vampire Slayer reference:

Angel: Why don't I believe him?
Oz: Well, he lacks credibility.

[goodnesswins]

BBBAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

[NEWwoman]

Arafat calls for end to attacks on civilians

How many times has be said this?

[NautiNurse]

I think this is the first time today Arafat has pretended to denounce his own terrorist attacks.

[NEWwoman]

Excuse the typo. I mean how many time as he (Arafat) called for an end for an attack on civilians.

[ChadGore]

If Arafat controls the HAMASide bombings, why deal with him???

If Arafat DOESN'T control the HAMASide bombings, why deal with him ?? ?

[swarthyguy]

Of course, he does not consider Israel to have any civilians.

[john in missouri]

[Some hope remaining.]

Arafat should be locked into a dog kennel in a public square and beaten with a threaded metal rod by passers by.

What thread pitch?

[rageaholic]

I recommend a coarse pitch for maximum skin breakage. One end would be wrapped with duct tape for a handle. A simple and effective terrorist countermeasure.

[Moose4]

First question--will his statement be read repeatedly over all Pallie media outlets--in Arabic?

Anything else proves that this is nothing more than fodder for Western consumption and that he's winking while he's saying it.

Actually, heck, even if he does condemn the attack to his own people, it doesn't matter. Arafat is a dead man walking, he's irrelevant, he's lost control of his own "state". He's just consuming resources until some radical Pallie puts him out of our misery or until Satan calls him home.

Karma payback's a bitch, eh Yassir? Blow people up for 40 years, kill your fingers to the bone, all to end up totally despised, the laughingstock of millions, a pariah to your own people, living in a bombed-out building. Was it worth becoming a terrorist, Yassir?

Never mind, you're a Muslim, you probably think it was.

}:-)4