Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz, who had been serving as defense minister at the time, discovered the details of the deal on Monday.
According to Mofaz, Arafat formulated the deal with Iranian leaders in secret meetings. Mofaz added that as part of the deal Iran supplied the Palestinian Authority with 50 tons of military equipment as specified by Arafat. This equipment was intercepted by the Israel Defense Forces on munitions ship "Karin A" in 2002.
Mofaz added that the capture of Karin A had revealed the depth of the relations that had begun to form between Arafat and the Iranian leadership. The former defense minister believes that as a result of this affair and the revelation of the budding relationship between Arafat and Iran, U.S. President George Bush changed his attitude and began working towards the removal of Arafat from the Palestinian leadership...
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It isn't for nothing that world leaders labelled Arafat a "moderate". I recall he earned this moniker in part by infiltrating and reporting on organizations more extreme than his own. Reading this report, I wouldn't put it past Arafat to have told the Israelis about the expected arms shipment himself. For Arafat would win either way, whether the Israelis intercepted the shipment or not. No wonder Israel chose to confine rather than kill him.
And Arafat was Sunni; hence Sunni and Shi'a can get along - provided they're sufficiently motivated to do so.