ARAFAT IS DYING
Reports on Israel television at midnight say that longtime Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat is at death’s door. His wife, Suha, is being rushed from her hotel home in Paris to be at his bedside. Arafat’s top aides, quoted in the Israeli and Palestinian media tonight, say the notorious PLO chairman is either in “critical” or “very critical” condition. Political analysts say this is an official admission that he is probably near death. However, some caution that the infamous Arab leader has appeared to be “checking out” a few times before, and is yet still with us. Arafat lapsed into unconsciousness earlier in the day, but was reportedly revived from that state—although some Israeli analysts say he is likely still in a coma. Doctors from nearby Jordan, which formally signed a peace accord with Israel exactly ten years ago today, have been rushed to his bedside. The main question here tonight is what Arafat’s apparently imminent passing will mean for this volatile region; already convulsing from the turbulent situation in Iraq and the pending unilateral Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. Late reports from Ramallah say Arafat has appointed a three man committee to run the Palestinian Authority “for the time being.” However, Israeli analysts say the “committee” was probably formed by the three men themselves, without Arafat’s actual knowledge or consent. Many expect the chaos that has been recently escalating in the Palestinian zones to explode when he finally dies, with the likelihood that a bloody power struggle, and possibly even a civil war, will follow. Typical of regional and world dictators, the veteran Palestinian leader has allowed no obvious successor to arise in his despotic wake. Ironically, Arafat slipped into a coma exactly nine years to the day, according to the Hebrew calendar, when Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated in Tel Aviv. I was out tonight having dinner at a restaurant just around the corner from the one I was at when Rabin was gunned down in early November, 1995. I was telling my Israeli and visiting American dinner partners about that, while wondering what might lie ahead for tiny Israel following the momentous and divisive Knesset vote on Tuesday night to empower the Sharon government to uproot all Jewish residents from the Gaza Strip and four communities in northern Samaria. I mentioned to them that late last night—just hours after the Knesset approved the acrimonious withdrawal plan—I watched from my living room window as bright streaks of lighting struck the very area that is to be evacuated north of Jerusalem. It was the first such electrical storm since last winter, I noted. The Arab city of Ramallah is also located in that direction as well, where Yasser Arafat--known locally as Abu Amar--is seemingly preparing to meet his maker tonight.