PLO approves Arafat's choice of Abu Ala as new PM

The executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization approved Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat's appointment of senior official Ahmed Qureia (Abu Ala) as his next prime minister, on Sunday evening.

A senior Palestinian official said Qureia was studying the proposal. His response is expected in these next few days.

Arafat's decision to appoint Palestinian Legislative Council Speaker Qurei as the next PA prime minister comes less than 48 hours after the resignation of Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, who on Sunday told reporters that he was determined not to backtrack.

Sources close to Abbas said Sunday night that he was considering leaving Ramallah for a long stay in one of the Arab states.

PA officials said Arafat's hasty decision to name Qurei as prime minister was designed to close the door before Abbas's possible return. "President Arafat wants to avoid international pressure, especially from the US, to reinstate Abbas," explained one official.

Arafat on Sunday held a series of meetings with Fatah and PLO officials in his office to discuss the repercussions of Abbas's resignation. At he end of one of the discussions, he walked up to Qurie, patted him on the shoulder and jokingly said: "May God assist you with this disaster."

Palestinian Authority officials said members of the Fatah central council recommended to Arafat that he appoint Qurei as prime minister. They also asked that a new portfolio for deputy prime minister be created in the new cabinet.

It was unclear who would be named as Qurie's deputy, although one official did not rule out the possibility that the job would be given to either Saeb Erekat or Hani al-Hassan both known as staunch Arafat loyalists.

The Fatah leaders told Arafat that they would like to see a new interior minister in the new cabinet, preferably one of their own. One of the Fatah operatives said a leading candidate for the post is Gen. Nasser Youssef, a former security chief with close ties to Arafat.

"Abu Ala is our candidate for the job," said Hussein al-Shiekh, a senior West Bank Fatah official. But, he cautioned, "I don't believe that a new cabinet with a different head can do more than what Abu Mazen (Abbas) did. The success or failure of the Palestinian government depends on Israel's actions."

Cabinet Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo said he doesn't believe Qurie would be able to change the policy of the cabinet. "The question that Abu Ala should ask himself is will he have to adopt a different policy than that of the outgoing government. I don't think so."

Abed Rabbo said Qurei would also have to ask himself if he would be prepared to compromise on his authorities a reference to Arafat's insistence on retaining control over all the Palestinian security forces.

Fatah legislator Hatem Abdel Kader expressed hope that the appointment of Qurei would help ease tensions in the Palestinian leadership. "The Palestinian Authority can't afford to appoint a new prime minister every 100 days," he said, referring to a fierce power struggle between Arafat and Abbas that resulted in the latter's decision to quit.

"Abu Mazen (Abbas) took a difficult decision and is convinced that he did the right thing," Abdel Kader added. "He feels that he was humiliated and deeply insulted because he was neither supported by Arafat nor given the chance to do anything." Qurei, 66, is a veteran PLO leader who returned with the PLO from Tunis in 1994. He is one of the major architects of the Oslo Accords. Since his return, he has been living in his home village of Abu Dis, southeast of Jerusalem.

http://www.zoa.org/pressrel/20020211a.htm

2. AHMED QUREI Qurei, 63, is Speaker of Arafat's Palestinian
Legislative Council. He has not publicly criticized the PA's 17-month long
terrorist war against Israel.

Threatening mass violence against Israel: Qurei, in an interview
with the Tunisian newspaper Al Sabach (quoted in Ha'aretz, Dec. 6, 1996)
said: "If Israel does not honor the agreements, the Palestinians will also
ask for Haifa, Jaffa, and Safed [cities within Israel's pre-1967
borders]...The response to the continuation of the occupation will be more
dangerous than the intifada...the arms available...and the organizing is
better than in the past...The alternative to peace will be bad for the
Israelis, something which they do not want. The Palestinian people will
oppose the occupation, from children to adults, including the Palestinian
police. The Israelis must know that the Palestinians have many options and
choices."

Israeli flag-burning demonstration: "Qurei walked over a freshly
burned Israeli flag during a protest in Ramallah [on July 12, 1997]...A TV
camera caught Palestinian protesters burning an Israeli flag as leading
Palestinian Authority and PLO officials watched. Witnesses said Qurei
smiled as he watched two Palestinian men burn the flag and then stepped
over its charred remains. [Cabinet Secretary Danny] Naveh called the act
'disgraceful' and said it angered all Israelis and Jews." (Jerusalem Post,
July 13, 1997)

Lied about Arafat's anti-Israel speeches: When asked in 1995 about
Arafat's many anti-Israel speeches, Qurei replied that Arafat "never made
any such speeches." (Moment, August 1995)

Balfour Declaration "a mistake": In November 2002, during a visit
to the region by British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Qurei said he hoped
Blair would take steps to "correct the historic mistake that Britain
committed against Palestinians through the Balfour Declaration in 1917."
(Jerusalem Post, Dec. 14, 2001) [The Balfour Declaration was Britain's
pledge to help create a Jewish National Home in the Land of Israel.
Calling it a "mistake" is tantamount to saying that the creation of the
State of Israel was a mistake.]

here is some more i put together months ago when it looked like abu mazen was going down

http://www.gamla.org.il/english/article/1997/dec/ler4.htmIMRA: Dr. Aharon Lerner

Abu Ala - Ramat Eshkol Also to be Part of Palestinian State
Date: 22 December, 1997
IMRA interviewed Ahmed Qreia (known as Abu Ala), speaker of the Palestinian legislative Council, in English, on December 22. The entire interview follows.

IMRA: Yasser Arafat's most recent statements about Jerusalem indicate that there would be not compromise on any of the area of Jerusalem to the east of the 1967 line.

Abu Ala: There will be no compromise for one centimeter of the West Bank including Jerusalem.

IMRA: I have spoken with people from the Israeli peace camp and they all seem to be convinced that in a settlement such an area as French Hill or Ramat Eshkol - let's call them the older settlement areas...

Abu Ala: Nothing. Not settlements or settlers either.

IMRA: Not even French Hill or Ramat Eshkol? (suburbs of jerusalem)

Abu Ala: No. No. Of course no. That is occupied territory from 1967 and that is the compromise.

IMRA: We are talking about property worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

Abu Ala: If there are individuals owning property then like in any country of the world it will be preserved for that person. But not for groups.

IMRA: What do you see happening to the people who live in those large neighborhoods.

Abu Ala: They are welcome to apply for citizenship under Palestinian law.

IMRA: Is there a provision in Palestinian law for dual citizenship or would they have to renounce their Israeli citizenship?

Abu Ala: That can be discussed, but not as settlers, not as Israelis in Palestine.

________________________________________________________

Special Dispatch Series - No. 18
December 21, 1998 No.18

Abu 'Ala: “The Borders of the Palestinian State are Those Set By the 1947 UN Partition Plan”

An article published by the Chairman of the Palestinian Legislative Council and chief Palestinian negotiator, Ahmad Qurei’ (Abu 'Ala), in the PA daily Al-Hayyat Al-Jadida[1], stated that the borders of the future independent Palestinian State, that will be declared in May 1999, are the boundaries set by the 1947 Partition Resolution.

In discussing the political and legal source of legitimacy for the Palestinian State, Abu 'Ala stated that the legal basis for the establishment of a Palestinian State is embodied in UN Resolutions 181 from 1947 (the partition decision) and Resolution 194 (the return of Palestinian refugees). These two resolutions, according to Abu 'Ala, determined that two states--Arab and Jewish--should be established "on the land of historic Palestine."

Abu 'Ala asserted that "...International legitimacy (i.e. UN resolutions) recognized [the existence of] a Palestinian State alongside Israel through the partition resolution [of 1947]. This means that Israel’s legitimacy remained dependent and conditional upon the existence of the Palestinian State based on that same resolution, Resolution 181 of 1947."

This position recently acquired many advocates among the Palestinian leadership. Abu 'Ala however went far beyond this position and demanded not only the creation of a Palestinian State but the exact borders of the 1947 partition resolution. He asserted that, "...the legal legitimacy of this [upcoming] state can be strengthened by addressing the international court [in The Hague] to reassert the legitimacy of a Palestinian State with all the rights and duties that other states possess. Furthermore, it should be emphasized that the [Palestinian] state has internationally recognized borders, which are the borders set in the [1947] partition resolution..."

"...There is no doubt that all the UN resolutions that recognized the creation of the Jewish State, on the basis of [UN] Resolution 181, included an inherent recognition of the boundaries of that Palestinian State, whose legitimacy still exists although it was not established at the time [1947]."

[1]Al-Hayyat Al-Jadida, December 21, 1998

__________________________________________
Where Are Arafat's Secret Accounts?
Ronen Bergman
Senior Investigative Reporter, Yediot Aharonot

In the early morning hours of Friday,April 20, a group of armed masked men knocked on the door of the home of Jawad el-Russein in Abu Dhabi. El-Russein, the PLO treasurer, opened the door and was met with drawn weapons and an offer he couldn't refuse -- to accompany them. According to reports that reached London, he was flown, while bound, in Arafat's plane to the Palestinian Authority. Only a few PA officials were privy to the secret operation. Even today, only a few people know where the man who was the senior money man in the PLO is being held.

Members of el-Russein's family, who live in London, were given very sketchy information about his whereabouts. They say that he was acquainted intimately with the PLO's financial set up overseas. They say that there are some PA officials who are trying to prevent the treasurer from sharing this information with others. "El-Russein is a walking time bomb for senior PA officials, including Arafat himself," confirm Israeli sources.

El-Russein and Arafat are old acquaintances and their relationship is complex and charged. For years el-Russein was the PLO's chief bookkeeper. He is familiar with the smallest details of the organization's assets, how they are held, where, and who exactly has the right to sign. He is the man who knows the private bank accounts of the chairman and how PLO money has been spent from the early 1980s to this very day.

Arafat, according to reports, began to fear recently that el-Russein was about to open his mouth. And the distance from that to his abduction in Abu Dhabi was short.

The el-Russein family is not without means. The daughter, Mona Boanas, acquired infamy in British tabloids for her close relations with Culture and Sport Minister David Mellor. The family pulled strings and moved heaven and earth in an attempt to release el-Russein. Scotland Yard became involved (el-Russein is a British subject) as did the secret service, MI5, to a certain extent. The Palestinian Authority adamantly denied it was holding him. Until recently.

"PA intelligence agents are holding el-Russein in a secret hideaway," confirmed here, for the first time, the speaker of the Palestinian parliament and the chairman of "Samad," the PLO's economic arm, Ahmed Qurei, a.k.a. Abu Ala. According to Abu Ala, el-Russein was not abducted. "What do you mean abducted?! He was legally arrested in Abu Dhabi at an extradition request made by the PA and brought here. He took a loan of a few million dollars from us, and did not return it. We are demanding of him that he return the money."

Abu Ala's version is puzzling in light of the fact that there is no extradition treaty between Abu Dhabi and the Palestinian Authority. The Justice Ministry there did not publish any announcement on the matter, nor did the PA. Moreover, why should the PA, or the PLO, lend millions of dollars to its treasurer? (remainder)

http://israelbehindthenews.com/Archives/Jun-05-01.htm

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The Palestinian Liberation Organization Logo (note the absence of Israel. This is the committee which chose the "PM." They all want the destruction of Israel.)