Musharraf and Arafat
It now seems to be official: Pakistan has been in the nuclear-arms sales business, issuing professional brochures and all. (NYT may require registration; here is a summary from the Chicago Sun-Times). What's interesting is the suggestion that President Bush must have known a certain amount about this (although the CIA apparently consistently understated and misunderstood the situation as Pakistan became more and more proficient in producing the fuel that they needed, and then selling the technology). He deliberately left them out of the lists of evil regimes, and all that, because of his sense that Musharraf has become an ally in the war against terror, and he may be doing his best in a country where many people are more radical than he is.
A.Q. Khan, Pakistan's nuclear genius, or whoever was in charge, may even have deliberately sold out-dated or inadequate technology to Pakistan's customers. Neither Iran nor Libya seems to be anywere near where Pakistan itself is, and it remains to be seen about North Korea.
Meanwhile there is more on the Palestinians. An article in today's Globe and Mail suggests that Arafat may be on the way to one of his many rehabilitations. Israel's attempts to freeze him out seem to have failed; there are other reputable Palestinians, but they refuse to proceed without him. Sharon has gone too far, and thereby opened some daylight between his position and that of the Bush administration. According to this article, some in the White House are saying they would not object to negotiating with Arafat; and Sharon's own son is supposedly already doing so.
Arafat can hardly be seen as a reliable negotiating partner. He originally derived his dominating position among the Palestinians from demanding the liberation of "all of Palestine," i.e. the destruction of the state of Israel. He signed the Oslo Accord in 1993, but took a lot of criticism for doing so, and famously walked away from serious negotiations in 2000.
It seems at least possible to argue that he is doing his best to arrive at a peaceful solution, while always ensuring he does not lose the support of his core. There are lots of hardliners and "Islamists" among the Palestinians, and sometimes, to maintain his own position, he has to make significant concessions to those people. This writer (Michael Bell) even suggests Arafat has sometimes "allowed" secular terrorist attacks to occur, partly to make sure "Islamist" terrorists (presumably including Hamas) don't gain too much ground.
Is this so different from Musharraf?
The Daily Star in Lebanon says Arafat must persuade Israel that Israeli occupation doesn't work; that requires keeping up attacks on Israelis. On the other hand, he must persuade both Israel and others that Palestinian self-rule can work. This requires stopping attacks. Obviously the goals, stated this way, contradict each other.
As I searched around on these items, I encountered once again a lot of people's favourite Palestinian: Salam Fayyad, now Minister of Finance for the Palestinian Authority. He has a Ph.D. from the University of Texas; he approached President Bush at their first meeting flashing the "Longhorns" symbol. He arrives at meetings alone, unarmed, carrying a briefcase, and chain smokes. Many of his Palestinian colleagues seem like the wild west by comparison. He is insisting on financial reforms in the Palestinian Authority--including proper accounting of the salaries paid to security officials. Arafat has preferred to keep the security forces loyal to him, and to pay them in cash.
Of course, Arafat is suspected of having shifted some money to private bank accounts as well.
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