Posted: Thursday, August 30, 2001

Special Dispatch No. 264: A Palestinian Weekly Raises Threats to Target American Embassies and Military Vessels

A Palestinian Weekly Raises Threats to Target American Embassies and Military Vessels

The Palestinian weekly, Al-Manar,(1) in its issue preceding the assassination of PFLP leader Abu Ali Mustafa, published two articles that included threats against American embassies and military vessels in the Middle East.

Al Manar's editorial, titled "Bush and His Stupid Dreams," read: "In his hostility towards our Palestinian people and its leadership, George Bush has gone further than any other leader of the country which claims to be neutral or host to the peace process..."

"This is, by no means, a praise to the American presidents who preceded him. Each and every one of them had his role in serving the Zionist goals in the region and in the world in its entirety. However, some of them... kept in mind that the huge number of Arabs and Muslims may lose control, and the [Arab] rage may cross the red lines - leading to the flattening out of some of Washington's embassies to ground level, or to the shelling and burning of some of its military vessels in the ocean, along the Arab shores."

"However, George Bush does not only avoid looking like his father, he also wants to beat him in the race of hostility towards the [Arab] nation and its primary cause... his political and mental blindness reaches a level where he confuses the henchmen with their victims and demands that [the victims] keep their heads still beneath the criminal's knife so the [knife] would remain intact and the fingers on its handle would not get weary."

"The leader of the greatest terrorist state is not satisfied with the bridge he [put] up with the occupation, through which he supplies it with his shells, missiles, and most developed and lethal weapons, in order to rip the bodies of these people and the livers of their children to pieces, in order to demolish their houses and trees. He also demands that the leadership of this people serve as the guard of the criminal murderer's knife; to defend it from the wrath and avenge of the masses; to give up the leadership's role in regaining the rights of this people, in the fulfillment of its goals and in bringing it to safe heaven; [he demands that the Palestinian leadership becomes] a faithful guard in the service of Zionism and the occupying settlers. Furthermore, Bush exaggerates in his impossible dream and demands that the leadership of the [Palestinian] people would siege its warriors, stop them, and even kill them so that the Zionists could fulfill their dream and take over a land without a people, which did not happen so far... and will not happen tomorrow either..."

"The stupidity of [the Palestinian] people's enemies, the likes of Bush and Sharon, who cruelly attack headquarters, commanders, and members of the Palestinian security apparatuses, double the momentum of the linkage between all the parts of the united body which forms the Palestinian people, and first and foremost, the symbol and leader of its struggle, President Yasser Arafat."

Another article, signed by "Karim," read: "...Bush would have stopped his hostile position towards our people and its leadership, had only his interests in the region been threatened. He would not have supported Sharon and his aggression, had the American interest confronted a serious danger."

"We do not blame the [Arab] regimes, for these have already become White House doormats; but we do have complaints to the Arab masses who remain silent. Why don't these masses shake the dust of inaction off their shoulders? Do the nations' masses await a decision by the regimes in order to go to the streets and destroy the interests of the American tyranny?"

"We await the roar of the Arab public that will break the absolute silence that is being used by Bush and Sharon to continue their aggression. The borders and the fronts are not open due to an [official] decision by the rulers; they are open with a popular awakening for which we have long been waiting [for]. Bush is an accomplice to the aggression and he supports it. So what is the nation waiting for?"(2)

Endnote:

(1) Al-Manar (PA), August 27, 2001.

(2) Al-Manar (PA), August 27, 2001.

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-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), September 01, 2001