Architect of Evil

If
Yassir Arafat had not existed, the Israeli government would have had
to invent him, and maybe they did. Observing his unkempt
appearance, slovenly dress and caricaturistic profile, for
years we were convinced he was a golem for the Jews, erected as a lightning
rod, to mire the Palestinians in unproductive internecine warfare and
counterproductive posturing.

His main instrument of survival seemed to
be the ruthless elimination any challenges to his power, thereby nipping
in the bud the
emergence
of
any younger,
more
honest
and dangerous
(to
the
Israelis) revolutionary leaders.

But like many brilliantly subtle plans for world or regional
dominance (including the original Golem story), it eventually came back to bite them in the ass. Fate can also be subtle, cruel and ironic.

When
the situation eventually evolved to the point that the Israelis wanted
an
honestly
negotiated
end to the
conflict, there was not an honest negotiator to be found on the other
side – Arafat had eliminated them all. Jeff Jacoby has an apt eulogy
in today’s
Boston Globe:

In a better world, George Bush would not have said,
on hearing the first reports that Arafat had died, "God bless
his soul."

God bless his soul? What a grotesque idea! Bless the soul of the man
who brought modern terrorism to the world? Who sent his agents to slaughter
athletes at the Olympics, blow airliners out of the sky, bomb schools
and pizzerias, machine-gun passengers in airline terminals? Who lied,
cheated, and stole without compunction? Who inculcated the vilest culture
of Jew-hatred since the Third Reich? Human beings might stoop to bless
a creature so evil — as indeed Arafat was blessed, with money, deference,
even a Nobel Prize — but God, I am quite sure, will damn him for eternity.

from the Boston Globe