|
Trending Topics
|
Source: http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1131043730124&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
The Yasser Arafat War is Over
(Jerusalem Post) Gerald M. Steinberg - The upsurge in Palestinian terror after the disengagement has led to talk about a "third intifada," but this assumption is not supported by the evidence - history has moved on. Mahmoud Abbas, Arafat's uncharismatic successor, lacks the power to unite a divided and disheartened Palestinian population in order to start another confrontation with Israel. In addition, the broad international support that the Palestinians enjoyed has been seriously eroded. The romanticism and wall-to-wall enthusiasm for Palestinian victimization adopted by many journalists has also weakened. Palestinian terror attacks are no longer granted the international acceptance they once had. Finally, the Palestinians now know that Israel was able to defeat Arafat's war. Following the Park Hotel mass bombing on Passover 2002, the IDF mobilized for Operation Defensive Shield, and the Palestinian defeat began.