Arafat, Yasser

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Yasser Arafat

Born on August 24, 1929 (Cairo, Egypt)
Died on November 11, 2004 (Paris, France)

President of the Palestinian Authority
Political activist

Yasser Arafat, the leader of the Palestinian people, dedicated his life to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state in the territories occupied by Israel after 1967, but he was unable to achieve his dream. He was considered a terrorist by the Israelis, and a menace by most of the international community, but a freedom fighter by the majority of the Palestinian people. According to the Financial Times' obituary of Arafat, "Edward Said, the late Palestinian scholar, regarded Arafat's main achievement as giving coherence, unity and national leadership to the cause of Palestine. This may prove to be his political epitaph but his legacy is far from secure."

"Those who call us terrorists wish to prevent world public opinion from discovering the truth about us and from seeing the justice on our faces."

The radicalization of an unhappy boy

Mohammed Yasser Arafat was born into a privileged family in Cairo, the capital of Egypt, on August 24, 1929. (His first name is sometimes spelled Yasir.) His mother, Zahwa Arafat, came from a distinguished family in Jerusalem that claimed to descend from the Prophet Mohammed, the founder of Islam, which is the religion of Muslims. His father, Adber Rauf Arafat, was a food and spice merchant who made a good living from selling his wares around the Middle East. Two years before Yasser's birth his parents moved from the British-controlled territory of Palestine to Cairo. As a young child Yasser was very close to his mother, but she died tragically when he was just four, sparking the beginning of a troubled childhood. After her death, he was sent off to Jerusalem, Palestine, with his six brothers and sisters, to live with his uncle in a house situated near the al-Aqsa mosque and the Wailing Wall (also known as the Western Wall; remnant of an ancient Jewish temple), two of the holiest sites in Palestine. His early experiences in Jerusalem were to shape the rest of his life.

After World War I (1914–18; war in which Great Britain, France, the United States, and their allies defeated Germany, Austria-Hungary, and their allies), Britain was in charge of governing Palestine (the area known today as Israel), the Occupied Territories (Israeli-occupied territories in the West Bank and Gaza Strip), and part of Jordan. Palestine was undergoing a period of intense political instability, and the Zionist movement (which held that Jews should form an independent state in Palestine) was calling for total control over the region. Jewish immigration from America and Europe into the area was also increasing. The Arafat family, like most Arab families in Palestine (who called themselves Palestinians), were alarmed by the rapid expansion of Jewish settlements. Across the dinner table they had many politically charged debates, so as a very young boy, Arafat received his first taste of Palestinian discontent and anger over the uncertain future of Palestine. His quick and active mind soon focused on the Arab unrest, instead of on school work or worries at home.

On his return to Cairo in 1937 Arafat's father remarried. Arafat grew to dislike his stepmother, a woman who, according to Arafat biographer Alan Hart in Arafat: A Political Biography, was a "cruel" lady, and who turned the family home into a war zone with constant arguing. Arafat's father married a third time, but by then Arafat's eldest sister, Inam, was taking care of the children. Although his attendance at school was poor, from the age of about ten the boy appeared to possess talents as a natural leader, and he was often found giving orders to groups of his fellow schoolchildren in the district. Hart wrote that he "carried a stick and used to beat those who did not obey his commands."

By 1946, as Zionist claims to Palestine were intensifying and becoming more violent, Arafat had become a bossy, idealistic, and political teenager. He believed the only way to save Palestine from Zionist occupation was to take up arms and fight the Jews. To this end, he joined a group of men smuggling arms from Egypt into Palestine. But he was dealt a major blow when he witnessed Egyptian soldiers disarming these men. Hart quoted Arafat as saying, "The Arab regimes put on a show to pretend they supported our cause but their real intention was to neutralize us. They were corrupt and under the hand of British rule." This episode planted the seeds of his contempt for the rest of the Arab world and strengthened his belief that only the Palestinians could save themselves from Jewish occupation.

In 1947 the United Nations (an international organization founded in 1945 and made up of most of the countries of the world) voted to split Palestine into two halves: one controlled by the Jews and one controlled by the Arabs. But the Palestinians rejected the plan. Fearing Palestine would be lost to the Jews, the neighboring Arab countries of Transjordan (later Jordan), Syria, Egypt, and Iraq sent armies into Israel, the name given to the new Jewish state, to retake the land. It was to no avail, and in 1948 David Ben-Gurion (1886–1973; see entry), the first prime minister of Israel, declared Israel's independence. War erupted between the Arab and Jewish armies and lasted for months, but the Arabs were finally defeated. Nearly one million Palestinians fled or were forcibly removed from their homes and became refugees.

In 1948 the newly created state of Israel occupied 78 percent of the former territory of Palestine. For Arafat this was the true beginning of the Palestinian tragedy and of his lifelong struggle against the occupation. He devoted all his energy to preparing his people to fight the Israelis. In 1951, while studying engineering at Cairo University, he set up the Union of Palestinian Students, a place where students could meet to discuss the plight of the Palestinian people and pool their ideas. Arafat also started to wear the keffiyeh (pronounced ka-FEE-yah), the black-and-white-checked head scarf that became the symbol of the Palestinian cause as more and more Palestinian fighters wore them into battle.

The Palestinian movement forms

Armed with an engineering degree and a highly politicized mind, Arafat traveled to Kuwait, where he began to publish a magazine called Our Palestine. The publication called for armed struggle against the occupying Jews, the right of return for the Palestinians (that is, the right of Palestinians to return to their homes in Israel), and all-out war against Israel. Most of these demands remained at the center of his politics throughout his life. Together with five friends, and still in Kuwait, he formed Fatah, a political and military organization dedicated to the creation of a Palestinian state. With little money and experience the group posed little threat to the Israelis. In January 1965 the amateurish lot raided Israel's borders, but they achieved nothing except a short time in prison. Soon, however, Fatah's growing popularity among Palestinians would turn it into an internationally recognized organization.

In 1967 Arab armies once again gathered on Israel's borders, determined to carry out a full-scale war in the hope of regaining their land. Despite the small numbers of Israeli troops, the Jewish soldiers were triumphant, capturing the Sinai Peninsula, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights within just six days—the remaining 22 percent of Palestine. The outcome of this war, known as the Six-Day War, was a devastating and humiliating blow to the Arab armies. At this point Yasser Arafat, furious and intent on revenge, decided that his war must be fought in an unconventional way. He would no longer rely on the Arab world's armies.

Arafat's unsuccessful attempts at fighting the Israelis drew widespread attention to Fatah and very quickly other Palestinian factions joined Fatah in the recently formed Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), which was set up by Gamal Abdel Nasser (1918–1970; see entry), the socialist president of Egypt, in 1964. The PLO consisted of an assembly of high-profile men dedicated to the Palestinian struggle. President Nasser organized the PLO, hoping to keep a check on young men, such as Arafat, who were politically active. He was afraid that their actions could lead to another full-scale war with Israel, which he did not believe the Arab armies could win. In 1969 Arafat became the chairman of the PLO.

Fatah's Palestinian fighters were based in Amman, Jordan, the neighboring country just east of Israel. The Fatah movement grew rapidly and violently. Its politically charged speech and radical activities began to worry King Hussein of Jordan (1935–1999; see entry), because he did not want trouble in his country or trouble with Israel. When PLO militants were blamed for a series of bombings and the hijacking of three passenger airplanes, King Hussein reached his breaking point. In September of 1970 Hussein ordered his soldiers to drive Arafat and the PLO out of Jordan. Arafat had become an unpopular man in the international community. Israel labeled him a terrorist, and many Arab leaders were afraid of his radical movement. He was forced to flee to Lebanon, where he regrouped.

As an exile in Lebanon, Arafat was driven even further away from his Palestinian homeland. He had become increasingly desperate, but his power base was strong and he enjoyed feverish support amongst his people. In Lebanon he continued to consolidate his power, and the PLO grew dramatically in size and strength. Throughout its history, the PLO was aided by financial support from wealthy Arabs and governments throughout the Middle East.

In October 1973, on Yom Kippur, the holiest day on the Jewish calendar, Egyptian and Syrian troops launched a series of surprise attacks on Israel and made small military gains in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. (This was known in Israel as the Yom Kippur War, and in Arab countries as the Arab-Israeli War of 1973.) For the first time Israel was seen to be weak. The United States government stepped in to try and initiate a round of peace talks, a clear sign to Arafat that the Palestinian cause had gained international attention. Arafat felt empowered, and this led him to temporarily embrace the idea of a more peaceful solution to the Palestinian struggle. In 1974 he stood before the United Nations General Assembly during that organization's first full debate on the Palestinian situation. He offered the world peace, but warned that if nothing was done he would fight for his people's right to their land. He was the first leader of a national liberation movement to be so honored by the United Nations, which officially recognized him as the sole representative of the Palestinian people. "Today I have come bearing an olive branch and a freedom fighter's gun. Do not let the olive branch fall from my hand. I repeat: do not let the olive branch fall from my hand," he told the United Nations assembly.

Uprising and bloodshed

The peace was not to last long. In 1982 the Israelis, angered by a series of small-scale attacks by PLO forces based in neighboring Lebanon, invaded that country in an attempt to crush the PLO. During a three-month attack on the Lebanese capital of Beirut, orders were given by the Israeli government to hunt down and kill Yasser Arafat. Bombs were dropped on buildings in which Arafat was believed to be staying, and hundreds of people died. Fatah fought a long-drawn-out and bloody war with the Israelis in Lebanon, involving many suicide bombings. The Israelis were swift to arrest Fatah guerrillas (militia soldiers), and Arafat was forced to flee to Tunis, Tunisia, where the PLO kept its headquarters. The Israelis did not want to give up on capturing and killing Arafat, so they also tried to bomb his headquarters in Tunis. Arafat was renowned in the Arab world for being difficult to find and kill, however. He survived every single attempt on his life as well as a plane crash and several car accidents.

Intifada

The First Intifada, or uprising, began in December 1987, when Palestinian people in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip rose up against the Israeli occupation of their land. The demonstrators did not just consist of politically minded men, but women and young children too. During the early years of the uprising the Palestinians staged regular strikes, boycotted Israeli goods, staged huge demonstrations, and refused to pay their taxes. Young boys regularly threw stones at Israeli soldiers. The First Intifada was orchestrated by an umbrella organization that brought together all the different factions of the PLO. The scale of their resistance drew international attention to the problem.

Israel responded to the uprising with brute force. Army officers were allegedly instructed to break the legs of Palestinian demonstrators. Between 1987 and 1992 more than one thousand Palestinians were killed, and many of the First Intifada's leaders were arrested and thrown into Israeli jails. A lack of leadership led to the decline of the Intifada and to infighting between the various factions. But the importance of the First Intifada was that it brought attention to the Palestinian initiative in the Occupied Territories and made it clear to the world that the status quo could not last much longer. In 2000 a Second Intifada again drew the attention of the world. By 2005 the Second Intifada had ended, but it was still not clear whether this effort would help Palestinians attain their ultimate goal of an independent state.

With the official leader of the Palestinian people staying in distant Tunis, the Palestinians under Israeli occupation became increasingly frustrated. Although many of them were loyal to Arafat, they thought that his distant leadership had not done much to help them. There were no democratic institutions in the Occupied Territories, and hardly any infrastructure (roads, schools, and other social systems). In December 1987 a large majority of the Palestinian population in the West Bank and Gaza started a mass uprising against the Israeli occupation, which became known as the Intifada. In 1988 Arafat, who had clearly lost his hold on Palestinian sentiment, decided to officially condemn any acts of terrorism. In an amazing turn of policy, he also recognized Israel's right to exist.

Extending the olive branch

The years between 1991 and 2000 were marked by a series of peace conferences between the Arabs and the Israelis. In 1991 Arafat attended a peace conference with Israeli representatives in Madrid, Spain, to discuss the rights of the Palestinian people. It was the first time that the two sides had sat down together across a table. The Israelis still considered Arafat a terrorist who had orchestrated attacks on their people. They refused to negotiate with him and the talks collapsed. The stalemate came to an end when the Israeli people elected a new government in 1992 with Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin (1922–1995; see entry) at the helm, a man who was interested in peace. Arafat stunned the world when he attended a series of secret peace talks in Oslo, Norway, with Rabin. His colleagues were shocked and many accused him of being a traitor to his cause. But Arafat was consumed with the idea of achieving an independent Palestinian homeland for his people, and he never gave up on bringing their cause and their plight to the world's attention.

Having made much progress on peace talks, on September 13, 1993, Yasser Arafat stood on the White House lawn in front of the world's cameras. The man once called a terrorist by the world shook hands with Yitzhak Rabin, a man who had once wanted to assassinate Arafat. The images of these two adversaries shaking hands remain among the most famous of the twentieth century. The following year both men were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Arafat thought he had put the Palestinians on the road to statehood, and nine months later he returned to live in the Occupied Territories. But despite all the media attention and all the praise, the Oslo agreements have not yet led to Palestinian statehood.

By the late 1990s frustration among the Palestinian people was again mounting. Not only had no satisfactory peace agreement been signed, but there was no civil society inside the Occupied Territories and very little infrastructure. Corruption among local officials and within the Palestinian Authority, the government structure of Palestine of which Arafat was president, was widespread, and unemployment and poverty were everywhere. This deplorable situation became one of Arafat's greatest failures. Even though he was quick to criticize his fellow Arab leaders for mistreating their people, he was also guilty of the same crimes. By this time he had begun to lose popularity among his own people. Further talks in 2000 between Arafat and Israeli officials organized by U.S. president Bill Clinton (1946–; served 1993–2001) were also fruitless.

Palestinian frustration culminated in the eruption of the Second Intifada in 2000. This time it was a massive uprising, not only against the Israeli occupation but also against Arafat and his officials. The people had realized that Israel was there for the foreseeable future, and they were powerless to do anything about it. Young confident men, similar to Arafat in his youth, marched in the streets. Other groups joined in, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which were Islamic fundamentalist groups. Violence erupted and spilled over the border into Israel. The images of angry Palestinian men, women, and children inspired fear within Israel. The result was the election of one of the country's most conservative governments under Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (1928–; see entry). Sharon's goal was to bring the Second Intifada to its knees, and to get rid of Yasser Arafat and his Fatah party. This prime minister had no intention of negotiating.

Cooperation with the West and decline of power

Arafat was terrified by Ariel Sharon's declared intention to eliminate him. He knew that in order to survive he would need international protection. The tragic events of September 11, 2001, in which Islamic fundamentalists attacked the United States, gave Arafat a perfect opportunity to come out in support of the United States, the country from which he desperately needed protection. He ordered his police to arrest any anti-U.S. demonstrators and rounded up many troublemakers. But U.S. president George W. Bush (1946–; served 2001–) thought Arafat's gestures of peace and cooperation had come too late. He publicly declared that Yasser Arafat had been unable to bring his people under control, and his actions were therefore irrelevant. President Bush believed the Palestinians needed a change in leadership in order to move forward. But Arafat only grew more defiant. He continued to order attacks inside Israel from within the small confines of his compound in Ramallah, in the West Bank. A desperate and angry Ariel Sharon sent troops to Arafat's compound and had him put under house arrest.

While under house arrest, facing limited access to visitors and basic amenities, and enduring frequent Israeli harassment, Arafat's health began to deteriorate. He appeared less frequently in the public eye. In November 2004 he was flown to a hospital in Paris, where he died a few days later. Yasser Arafat's body was flown to Egypt, where a military funeral was held. Heads of state, prime ministers, and foreign ministers from around the world attended the funeral. After the service, he was flown to Ramallah in the West Bank and laid to rest. The fate of his people remains uncertain, though many believe that new leadership may help the Palestinians attain part of Arafat's dream: the creation of a Palestinian state.

For More Information

Books

Ferber, Elizabeth. Yasir Arafat: A Life of War and Peace. Brookfield, CT: Millbrook Press, 1995.

Hart, Alan. Arafat: A Political Biography. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989.

Rubinstein, Danny. The Mystery of Arafat. South Royalton, VT: Steerforth Press, 1995.

Stefoff, Rebecca. Yasir Arafat. New York: Chelsea House, 1988.

Walker, Tony, and Andrew Gowers. Arafat, The Biography. London: Virgin, 2003.

Periodicals

Morris, Harvey "Palestinians Swift to Create Arafat Legend." Financial Times (November 12, 2004).

Ross, Dennis. "Think Again: Yasir Arafat." Foreign Policy (July/August, 2002). Available online at http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/files/story179.php (accessed on December 31, 2004).