Word: ariels
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...Ariel Sharon's fourth meeting with the President Bush in the past year was a reminder of how dramatically the diplomatic tides have shifted. The most frequent visitor to the Clinton White House had been Sharon's archenemy, Yasser Arafat - and the Palestinian leader has been nowhere near George Bush's Washington. But despite his absence, it was Arafat who dominated much of Thursday's discussion at the White House...
...Ariel Sharon is hedging his bets. The Israeli prime minister, who leaves for Washington Tuesday, continues to denounce Yasser Arafat as irrelevant and insist there will be no negotiations until Arafat does more to stop Palestinian militants attacking Israelis. Last week he even went so far as to publicly regret not killing Arafat when Israeli forces captured Beirut in 1982. But even amidst the bellicose rhetoric, Sharon is still reaching out, meeting last week with aides of the Palestinian leader he has under virtual house arrest in Ramallah...
...Osama bin Laden's favorite propaganda themes precisely because they are founts of hostility towards the U.S. throughout the Arab world. The last time Washington sought Arab support for taking on Saddam, it also leaned on the Israelis to make peace with the Palestinians. But having lately given Ariel Sharon carte blanche to deal with the Palestinians as he sees fit - despite the dire warnings from such allies as Saudi Arabia - the Bush administration is not going to find Arab regimes rushing to take political risks on its behalf. Indeed, consensus among the Arab governments right now leans towards rehabilitating...
...Last December, Ariel Sharon proclaimed Arafat "irrelevant." And nowhere is that more true than in the lives of the 3 million Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. They wake each day to the harsh reality of an Israeli occupation modified, but never ended, by the Oslo Accords. They endure the roadblocks that turn a 20-minute drive into a six-hour one, the checkpoints that stop women in labor from reaching hospitals, the curfews, the siege, the grinding, ever-deepening poverty, the air raids, the incursions, the demolitions of homes and fields and the incremental loss of their lands...
...Israelis still support Ariel Sharon in the polls, but one year after his election on promises to restore Israel's security, that security is even further beyond reach. A steady raising of the ante on air strikes, assassinations and incursions has not stopped the tide of suicide bombers. Systematically degrading Arafat's power has left the Israelis no safer. And, having been there before, Israelis know that reoccupying the West Bank and Gaza towns ceded to Arafat will simply expand their own vulnerability. Those Israelis who continue believe that peace is still possible with the Palestinians on the basis...