Arafat reported dead, Palestinian PM denies it. What happens in the Middle East now? I wonder does this cha nge the equation over there? Israeli TV and Haaretz say he's brain dead and not responding to treatment.
posted by tomcosgrave on Nov 4, 2004 - 65 comments

In case you still thought there was still anything even slightly rational, even-handed and non-ideological about the Nobel Peace Prize: Members of the NPP committee that gave Shimon Peres the Prize in 1994 are now attacking him for not singlehandedly putting a stop to Israeli reoccupation of Palestinian territory, even though here's only a member of the cabinet, not the leader of the country. (Alternatively, they say, he should have quit.) Which would be okay, since what's going on now isn't very peaceful ... except that they've said not a peep about about the actions of one of the other two men that shared the prize that year, one Yassir Arafat. (The third, Yitzhak Rabin, apparently gets off the hook since he's already dead.)
posted by aaron on Apr 5, 2002 - 12 comments

Israel proposes gradual withdrawal from Area A. here's the next step in Israeli policy, and just to show we're not all talk, IDF troops begin withdrawal from positions in Ramallah area. This has been tried several times before, yet Arafat has never been proven successful in stopping terror. Will things turn out any different this time?
posted by martz on Dec 20, 2001 - 40 comments