http://www.msnbc.com/news/801833.asp?vts=091120032055
JERUSALEM, Sept. 11 ? The Israeli government said Thursday that it would expel Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat from the occupied territories, although such a move could be several weeks away. As massive protests broke out across the occupied territories, Arafat vowed to resist any Israeli attempts to remove him and the new Palestinian prime minister abandoned plans to form a new government.
WITHIN AN HOUR, thousands of marchers rushed to Arafat?s headquarters in Ramallah in the West Bank, ringing the compound to protect him from what they feared would be an immediate Israeli move to seize him.
Arafat emerged flashing a V-for-victory sign and told the crowd, ?Abu Ammar is staying here,? referring to himself by his nom de guerre.
?We are on sacred land, and we will protect our holy Christian and Muslim places,? he said, using a bullhorn. ?We send a message to the detainees, and to the prisoners: Together, all the way to Jerusalem.?
He then led the crowd in a chant, waving his finger in rhythm: ?To Jerusalem, to Jerusalem, to Jerusalem.?
Arafat?s choice for prime minister, Ahmed Qureia, said he was dropping his efforts to form a new Palestinian government in light of the ?crazy decision,? which he said would destroy ?stability and peace in the region.?
Arafat?s Fatah faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization distributed leaflets warning that ?those who are planning expulsions, killings and assassinations will not be safe from the destructive
consequences.?
?Our people and our factions and our national Islamic forces will not let this criminal decision pass without consequences,? it said.
ISRAEL ?WILL REMOVE THIS OBSTACLE?
The security Cabinet?s decision, which was taken in defiance of U.S. opposition, dramatically recast the Israeli-Palestinian dispute as a personal confrontation with Arafat, 74, the president of the Palestinian Authority.
?Recent days? events have proven again that Yasser Arafat is a complete obstacle to any process of reconciliation,? the government said in a statement. ?Israel will act to remove this obstacle in the manner, at the time, and in the ways that will be decided on separately.?
Israeli sources told Reuters that security ministers ordered the army to come up with a plan to carry out its decision.
The decision to give the army substantial time to draw up plans was cast as both a concession to U.S. opposition and an opportunity for Qureia to take steps to cool the violence that has swept the region in recent weeks.
But Qureia spurned the apparent opening.
?This is an adventurous and grave decision that ... finishes off any attempt by me to form a new Cabinet,? said Qureia, the speaker of the Palestinian parliament, whom Arafat nominated for prime minister over the weekend after Mahmoud Abbas. ?This grave and adventurous decision would not only blow up the Palestinian territories but also the entire region.?
OTHER OPTIONS ON TABLE
Eight of the 11 members of the security Cabinet were in favor of expulsion, and two were opposed, Israel TV reported. Sharon, who has not made his view public, was scheduled to meet later with his full Cabinet.
In addition to Arafat?s expulsion, strategic decisions on the agenda include a possible reoccupation of the Gaza Strip, where Hamas leaders are based, Israeli security officials said.
Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said Arafat must be expelled as an obstacle to peace despite U.S. objections.
?I think there are some situations in which we have to make decisions ... that are completely cut off from outside influence,? Shalom told Israeli Army Radio before the Cabinet meeting.
The Israeli military had already begun making preparations for Arafat?s expulsion in the near future and was waiting for the security Cabinet?s decision, a security official told the AP on condition of anonymity.
Signaling its readiness to try to seize Arafat, the army took over the Palestinian Culture Ministry and an uninhabited structure overnight near Arafat?s headquarters as apparent lookouts, witnesses said.
U.S. REJECTS ISRAELI MOVE
A spokesman for the State Department repeated Thursday that the United States opposed any move to exile Arafat because it could expand his appeal to violent militants. ?It would just give him another stage to play on,? the spokesman said.
But some in Israel have endorsed even stronger measures.
In one of the most strident comments yet from the mainstream Israeli press, the English-language Jerusalem Post called in an editorial Thursday for the assassination of Arafat ?because the world leaves us no alternative.?
Another newspaper, Yediot Ahronot, quoted Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz as telling two people in his inner circle that expelling Arafat was the least Israel should do and that killing him should be considered.
Proposals to assassinate Arafat were not on the security Cabinet?s agenda, a security official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
RESPONSE TO NEW BOMBINGS
Sharon cut short his visit to India this week to consider Israel?s response to two suicide bombings Tuesday by the militant Islamist group Hamas that killed 17 people, including the bombers, at a bus stop near Tel Aviv and at a popular coffee house in Jerusalem. Dozens of bystanders were maimed and wounded.
In a first response, Israel stepped up its campaign against Hamas, dropping a half-ton bomb on the home of a senior official, Mahmoud Zahar, on Wednesday.
Zahar survived the bombing ? the first time that Israeli forces have targeted a Hamas official in his home ? but his eldest son and a bodyguard were killed. Twenty-five other people were wounded, including three women and five children, hospital officials said.
Hamas? military wing threatened to widen its bombing campaign and target Israeli homes and high-rise buildings. The group?s military wing issued a statement Wednesday claiming responsibility for the bombings Tuesday, saying they ?came as the beginning of our retaliation for the enemy?s crimes against our people.?
The organization already had threatened unprecedented revenge for Israel?s failed attempt to kill Hamas leaders, including its founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, in an airstrike over the weekend.
Israeli security forces were on high alert Thursday, particularly in Jerusalem, and police checkpoints caused massive traffic jams. Earlier in the day, Israeli forces in the West Bank blew up two houses, one south of Arafat?s compound, the other in the suburb of Beitunia.
Israeli tanks also shelled a Palestinian police post east of Khan Younis overnight, but no one was injured, Palestinian police and rescue workers said.
BUSH CALLS FOR TERROR CRACKDOWN
As tension escalated in the region, President Bush on Wednesday called on Qureia to crack down on terrorism and said the United States had not abandoned its blueprint for peace in the Middle East despite the violence and political turmoil.
Bush told reporters in the Oval Office that Qureia?s job was to ?consolidate power within his administration, to get the security forces under control, all the security forces, and then unleash those security forces against killers.?
JERUSALEM, Sept. 11 ? The Israeli government said Thursday that it would expel Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat from the occupied territories, although such a move could be several weeks away. As massive protests broke out across the occupied territories, Arafat vowed to resist any Israeli attempts to remove him and the new Palestinian prime minister abandoned plans to form a new government.
WITHIN AN HOUR, thousands of marchers rushed to Arafat?s headquarters in Ramallah in the West Bank, ringing the compound to protect him from what they feared would be an immediate Israeli move to seize him.
Arafat emerged flashing a V-for-victory sign and told the crowd, ?Abu Ammar is staying here,? referring to himself by his nom de guerre.
?We are on sacred land, and we will protect our holy Christian and Muslim places,? he said, using a bullhorn. ?We send a message to the detainees, and to the prisoners: Together, all the way to Jerusalem.?
He then led the crowd in a chant, waving his finger in rhythm: ?To Jerusalem, to Jerusalem, to Jerusalem.?
Arafat?s choice for prime minister, Ahmed Qureia, said he was dropping his efforts to form a new Palestinian government in light of the ?crazy decision,? which he said would destroy ?stability and peace in the region.?
Arafat?s Fatah faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization distributed leaflets warning that ?those who are planning expulsions, killings and assassinations will not be safe from the destructive
consequences.?
?Our people and our factions and our national Islamic forces will not let this criminal decision pass without consequences,? it said.
ISRAEL ?WILL REMOVE THIS OBSTACLE?
The security Cabinet?s decision, which was taken in defiance of U.S. opposition, dramatically recast the Israeli-Palestinian dispute as a personal confrontation with Arafat, 74, the president of the Palestinian Authority.
?Recent days? events have proven again that Yasser Arafat is a complete obstacle to any process of reconciliation,? the government said in a statement. ?Israel will act to remove this obstacle in the manner, at the time, and in the ways that will be decided on separately.?
Israeli sources told Reuters that security ministers ordered the army to come up with a plan to carry out its decision.
The decision to give the army substantial time to draw up plans was cast as both a concession to U.S. opposition and an opportunity for Qureia to take steps to cool the violence that has swept the region in recent weeks.
But Qureia spurned the apparent opening.
?This is an adventurous and grave decision that ... finishes off any attempt by me to form a new Cabinet,? said Qureia, the speaker of the Palestinian parliament, whom Arafat nominated for prime minister over the weekend after Mahmoud Abbas. ?This grave and adventurous decision would not only blow up the Palestinian territories but also the entire region.?
OTHER OPTIONS ON TABLE
Eight of the 11 members of the security Cabinet were in favor of expulsion, and two were opposed, Israel TV reported. Sharon, who has not made his view public, was scheduled to meet later with his full Cabinet.
In addition to Arafat?s expulsion, strategic decisions on the agenda include a possible reoccupation of the Gaza Strip, where Hamas leaders are based, Israeli security officials said.
Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said Arafat must be expelled as an obstacle to peace despite U.S. objections.
?I think there are some situations in which we have to make decisions ... that are completely cut off from outside influence,? Shalom told Israeli Army Radio before the Cabinet meeting.
The Israeli military had already begun making preparations for Arafat?s expulsion in the near future and was waiting for the security Cabinet?s decision, a security official told the AP on condition of anonymity.
Signaling its readiness to try to seize Arafat, the army took over the Palestinian Culture Ministry and an uninhabited structure overnight near Arafat?s headquarters as apparent lookouts, witnesses said.
U.S. REJECTS ISRAELI MOVE
A spokesman for the State Department repeated Thursday that the United States opposed any move to exile Arafat because it could expand his appeal to violent militants. ?It would just give him another stage to play on,? the spokesman said.
But some in Israel have endorsed even stronger measures.
In one of the most strident comments yet from the mainstream Israeli press, the English-language Jerusalem Post called in an editorial Thursday for the assassination of Arafat ?because the world leaves us no alternative.?
Another newspaper, Yediot Ahronot, quoted Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz as telling two people in his inner circle that expelling Arafat was the least Israel should do and that killing him should be considered.
Proposals to assassinate Arafat were not on the security Cabinet?s agenda, a security official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
RESPONSE TO NEW BOMBINGS
Sharon cut short his visit to India this week to consider Israel?s response to two suicide bombings Tuesday by the militant Islamist group Hamas that killed 17 people, including the bombers, at a bus stop near Tel Aviv and at a popular coffee house in Jerusalem. Dozens of bystanders were maimed and wounded.
In a first response, Israel stepped up its campaign against Hamas, dropping a half-ton bomb on the home of a senior official, Mahmoud Zahar, on Wednesday.
Zahar survived the bombing ? the first time that Israeli forces have targeted a Hamas official in his home ? but his eldest son and a bodyguard were killed. Twenty-five other people were wounded, including three women and five children, hospital officials said.
Hamas? military wing threatened to widen its bombing campaign and target Israeli homes and high-rise buildings. The group?s military wing issued a statement Wednesday claiming responsibility for the bombings Tuesday, saying they ?came as the beginning of our retaliation for the enemy?s crimes against our people.?
The organization already had threatened unprecedented revenge for Israel?s failed attempt to kill Hamas leaders, including its founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, in an airstrike over the weekend.
Israeli security forces were on high alert Thursday, particularly in Jerusalem, and police checkpoints caused massive traffic jams. Earlier in the day, Israeli forces in the West Bank blew up two houses, one south of Arafat?s compound, the other in the suburb of Beitunia.
Israeli tanks also shelled a Palestinian police post east of Khan Younis overnight, but no one was injured, Palestinian police and rescue workers said.
BUSH CALLS FOR TERROR CRACKDOWN
As tension escalated in the region, President Bush on Wednesday called on Qureia to crack down on terrorism and said the United States had not abandoned its blueprint for peace in the Middle East despite the violence and political turmoil.
Bush told reporters in the Oval Office that Qureia?s job was to ?consolidate power within his administration, to get the security forces under control, all the security forces, and then unleash those security forces against killers.?