Associated Press reporter admits covering up for Arafat

Arafat was clearly delusional in the interview with AP reporter, which they admit today, but he was portrayed as a man of peace.

by Stephen M. Flatow

Did American journalists cover up for Yasir Arafat, as critics often claimed at the time? A longtime reporter for the Associated Press has finally let the cat out of the bag, and it’s not a pretty sight.

Arafat (Wikimedia Commons)

In a recent blog post, the veteran journalist Dan Perry recounted an interview he did with Arafat for the AP in December 2001. The date is important, because for the previous fifteen months, Arafat had been leading a massive terrorism war against Israel, which the Palestinian Arabs called the “Second Intifada.” Wave after wave of suicide bombings and shootings, for which Arafat’s Fatah movement openly claimed responsibility. Those of us in Israel at the time will never forget the empty streets, stores and buses.

“Was Arafat the one sending crazies to blow themselves up in Israeli buses and cafes?,” Perry wrote in his recent blog. “The Palestinian narrative said violence began organically…and Israel overreacted. Something didn’t quite add up and my colleagues and I at the Associated Press resolved to figure the whole thing out.”

So, they set out for Ramallah, to “figure the whole thing out” by asking Arafat. Not by believing Fatah’s constant claims of responsibility for the attacks against Israel. Instead, they were going to ask Arafat.

The interview began with Arafat complaining that he was not getting enough praise for having “already arrested 17 key militants.” (Perry never uses the word “terrorists” a trend that continues to this day.)

Perry, in his recent blog: “I suggested that if violence so devastating was happening against his will for over a year, the forces carrying it out must be very strong indeed. ‘You are speaking with Yasser Arafat,’ he admonished me. ‘I know how to do it. I know how to do it.’ ”

Read that question again. Perry was challenging Arafat.  He was saying, in effect: “You claim the terrorism is being carried out against your will, which means that the terrorists must be ‘very strong indeed,’ which means arresting 17 of them is woefully inadequate.”

Having failed to get a straight answer about the arrests, Perry next asked Arafat if he “regretting not doing more to prevent the outbreak,” since “1,000 Palestinians had been killed” as a result of the violence. 

Perry was referring to terrorists who were killed in Israeli actions, and Arab civilians who were inadvertently killed when terrorists stationed their men and weapons in civilian neighborhoods, in order to use them as human shields.

The PLO leader’s response? “Arafat said the death toll actually stood at 2,000. I tried to argue, but Arafat insisted...”

Then Perry asked Arafat if he regretted not accepting Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s reported offer of a Palestinian state in 90% of the territories. “ ‘We have our independent state,’ Arafat protested. This would have been a major scoop! Did they sign a secret deal that they were keeping from the world? Arafat smiled in conspiratorial fashion: ‘Ask Barak’.” 

Thus, there were three significant news items contained in the interview: Arafat was evasive about why he had arrested only 17 terrorists; Arafat was lying about the death toll, falsely claiming that it was twice what it really was; and a delusional Arafat was weirdly claiming that a Palestinian state already existed.

Which of these revelations appeared in the article that Perry and his colleague Karin Laub wrote in their December 8, 2001, article for the AP?  

None of them. Not one.

—Arafat falsely inflating the number of fatalities. Not mentioned. 

-- Perry and Laub did mention Barak’s offer of a Palestinian state. But instead of truthfully reporting that the delusional Arafat claimed the state already existed, they wrote: “But the Palestinians held out for more land and a ‘right of return’ for millions of refugees and their descendants.” 

— And as for Perry challenging Arafat for arresting only 17 terrorists, here’s what Perry and Laub wrote: “Asked whether he would be prepared to face down resistance by the militants and their growing legions of supporters, Arafat smiled and said: ‘You are speaking with Yasser Arafat. I know how to do it. I know how to do it.’”

They simply covered up the fact that Arafat had evaded Perry’s question.

In fact, one could say the entire article was a cover-up. Instead of reporting what Arafat actually said—the delusions, the lies, the ducking of questions about the arrests—Perry and Laub portrayed Arafat as a man of peace who was bravely fighting the terrorists: “He said he will not shy away from a confrontation with the militant Hamas and Islamic Jihad groups to revive what hope remains for peace…He said he will continue pursuing the rest despite the continuing Israeli airstrikes…He said he was ready to return to peace talks immediately…”

All this, despite the fact that Perry knew—as he wrote in his recent blog post—that Arafat’s claim of fighting the terrorists was wildly implausible, since there were so many of them, and he had arrested only 17 of those “key militants.”

Perry concluded his blog post with this interesting reflection on Arafat’s military uniform: “Perhaps it [was] borrowed from a play about a fairytale army whose ranks contain one single, solitary man. A very senior officer, who believed that everything was real.”

So today, Perry reflects wistfully on the delusional Arafat. But Perry knew the truth at the time. He knew from the interview that Arafat was a deluded, conspiratorial lunatic. But Perry covered it up. It would have been very helpful to Israelis, American Jews, and everybody else to know the truth about Arafat. They could have made more informed decisions if they had that information. But for some reason, Dan Perry and the Associated Press didn’t want them to have it. I wonder why.

Stephen M. Flatow, is an attorney and the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995. He is the author of “A Father’s Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terrorism.”

This column first appeared on Israel National News.

About the Itamar massacre

Some have wondered why this blog has not mentioned the horrific murder of the Fogel family in the Jewish community of Itamar on Friday, March 11th.

Be assured that the murdered and their family members have been in my mind since I first read the news Saturday evening after the Sabbath.

Frankly, my silence is attributable to being as the proverbial deer blinded by the headlights of an approaching car. I’ve been frozen not only by the attack but the implications of the attack and the world’s response to it.

When the Associated Press could only conclude its Sunday report of the massacre by stating that the community of Itamar is “home to some of Israel’s most radical settlers,” a line picked up by the New York Times, my fear that we are sinking to the lows of pre-war Nazi Germany in the demonization of Jews became more real.

In that vein, I came across the following poem by Uri Tzvi Greenberg written in response to the Holocaust.

To God in Europe

We are not as dogs among the gentiles: a dog is pitied by them
fondled by them, sometimes even kissed by a gentile’s mouth
as if he were a pretty baby
of his own flesh and blood, the gentile spoils him
and is forever taking pleasure in him.
And when the dog dies, how the gentile mourns him!

Not like sheep to the slaughter were we brought in
trainload but rather-
through all the lovely landscapes of Europe-
brought like leprous sheep
to Extermination itself.
Not as they dealt with their sheep did the gentiles deal with
our bodies;
they did not extract their teeth before they slaughtered them
nor strip them of their wool as they stripped us of our skins;
nor shove them into the fire to turn their life to ashes;
nor scatter the ashes over sewers and streams;
like this that we have suffered at their hands!
There are none-no other instances.
(All words are shadows of shadow)
This is the horrifying phrase: No other instances.

No matter how brutal the torture a man will
suffer in a land of the gentiles
the maker of comparisons will compare it thus:
He was tortured like a Jew.
Whatever the fear, whatever the outrage,
how deep the loneliness, how harrowing the sorrow-
no matter how loud the weeping-
the maker of comparisons will say:
This is an instance of the Jewish sort.

What retribution can there be for our disaster?
Its dimensions are a world.
All the culture of the gentile kingdoms at its peak
flows with our blood,
and all its conscience, with our tears ....
(Tr. Robert Friend)

I conclude by reminding myself that it’s necessary for me to double my efforts to understand the message of this disgusting act of violence and to teach that lesson to our friends, neighbors, media people and elected officials. So I’ll ask God to give me the strength for that because my tank is getting perilously low.

Stephen M. Flatow

Want to bring a bomb on board, ask a nice woman to carry it for you

A Thanksgiving Day story from the Associated Press about the disabled and air travel security sent shivers down my spine.

“For air passengers already fed up with being hauled off to the side of the security line for a pat-down or facing aggressive questions about bulky clothing or odd items in their luggage, advocates for the disabled have this to say: Welcome to our lives.

“For the disabled and infirmed — many forced to go through security lines in wheelchairs with ample hiding places for contraband, wearing prosthetic limbs that could harbor drugs or explosives or lugging oxygen tanks that could really contain god-knows-what — the added discomfort and inconvenience that many travelers are now experiencing is something they've put up with for years.”

But what really caught my eye is this-

"I didn't mind; it wasn't really that bad," 89-year-old Marquerite Aswad, who
uses a wheelchair, said Tuesday after arriving at Newark Liberty International
Airport from Fort Myers, Fla. "It was a lady, and she didn't pat me very hard.
She said, 'You look like a nice woman; I don't think you're hiding anything in
there.'"

Is the TSA kidding? Looking “like a nice woman” brings gentility in the scanning or search process? What kind of stupidity is this? OK, you terrorists, get yourself an old lady in a wheelchair and get a free ride to martyrdom.

Seriously, don’t they know at the TSA training sessions that one’s level of niceness has nothing to do with the security process? Instead of forcing the wheelchair-bound into pat downs, or the removal of artificial legs, why don’t the TSA folks learn how to question people like Mrs. Aswad before they board a flight.

“How long have you lived in Fort Myers? Where did you live before? Who helped you pack your luggage? Did anyone give you anything to bring with you? Why are you traveling to Newark? Who are you visiting? Where do they live? Where are the gifts you are bringing them? Where did you buy them? Who drove you to the airport?”

These are the types of questions I’ve been asked on international air travel before and since our Muslim brothers turned American airliners into missiles. The purpose of this type of questioning is to not only hear what the traveler has to say, but to watch how he answers. It’s the style of answer—maybe you’re too pat in your reply, and the body language—maybe the glance away, that leads to further questioning and examination of your luggage and private parts.

I know it’s not going to happen soon, but maybe, just maybe, one day the folks at TSA will wake up and realize that the present system is just plain silly.

Read the full story.