U.S. Reds salute Arafat
Arab leader was trained in old Soviet Union
Posted: November 22, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern
2004 WorldNetDaily.com
In a tribute that puzzled some, last week the Communist Party USA sent Yasser
Arafat off to the next world with its highest tribute.
On Nov. 16, the National Board of the Communist Party issued the kind of
proclamation usually reserved for a high-ranking Communist Party official.
"The Communist Party USA expresses its deep sorrow on the death of Yasser
Arafat, the decades-long leader and larger-than-life symbol of the Palestinian
people's quest for justice, human rights, self-determination and statehood,"
the party's official obituary said. "From his earliest days as a student
activist, to his later roles as chairman of the Palestinian Liberation
Organization and president of the Palestinian Authority, Arafat devoted his
entire life to the cause of his people's freedom, to an end to the cruel
U.S.-backed Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands seized in the 1967 war, and
to the cause of national liberation and peace."
It continued: "Despite incessant efforts by the Israeli government to vilify
and discredit him, despite all the slanders and snubs (including by President
George W. Bush, who shunned the Palestinian leader in his last years), Arafat
remained until the very end a dignified symbol of resistance to colonial
occupation and aggression, and a steadfast champion of freedom and justice.
Whether he was presenting the case for the human and national rights of the
Palestinian people before the United Nations, or building the PLO, or meeting
with leaders of the Israeli and U.S. peace movements – which he frequently
did – Arafat was untiring in his search for a just resolution to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict."
But the kind words toward Arafat from the U.S. Communists should not be so
surprising. In fact, Arafat, as well as at least one of his successors, was
trained in the Soviet Union and received much of his early support from Moscow.
"He rejected terrorism as a path to liberation, and harshly condemned the
harming of innocents. He and the PLO officially recognized Israel’s right to
exist within secure borders," the party said in the statement. "At the same
time, Arafat was unyielding in his support for the internationally recognized
right of the Palestinian people to resist the Israeli occupation, and he
refused to give up East Jerusalem or to renounce the right of Palestinian
refugees to return. For that he was condemned and reviled by the U.S. and
Israeli governments."
The glowing remembrance continued: "At a time when the United States is seeking
to recolonize Iraq and to dominate the entire Middle East, and as our
government continues to pour billions of dollars each year into Israeli coffers
for new missiles, bombs, helicopter gunships, apartheid-like walls, and prisons
to subjugate the Palestinian people, we vow to redouble our efforts to build
solidarity with the embattled people of Palestine. The Communist Party USA
pledges to honor Yasser Arafat’s memory by intensifying the campaign against
the illegal, U.S.-backed Israeli occupation and against all U.S. efforts to
meddle in the affairs of the Palestinian people."
"We join with other peace forces, including Jewish peace activists in the U.S.
and Israel, in calling for an end to all U.S. military aid to Israel until it
returns to its 1967 borders," the party said. "We support a two-state solution,
with the state of Israel alongside a sovereign, viable, and contiguous state of
Palestine with its capital in East Jerusalem. And we support the right of
return to Israel of all Palestinian refugees, as spelled out in the relevant UN
resolutions. The road to peace in the Middle East is through justice and
self-determination, adherence to international law, and strict compliance with
the historic UN resolutions on Palestine and the Palestinian people. There is
no other path. We stand firmly for that path."
Mercifiully, the tribute ended: "We offer our deepest condolences to the
family, comrades, and friends of President Yasser Arafat."
What would prompt such a strong eulogy from the Communists? Wasn't Arafat,
after all, an independent nationalist?
Arafat not only received political and military training in the Soviet Union,
he also learned Marxist principles and the Hegelian dialectic, points out an
article in the latest edition of Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin, the premium,
online intelligence newsletter published by WorldNetDaily.
Arafat received training in these principles not only in the old Soviet Union,
but from his friends in Vietnam, his friends in China, his friends in the
Stalinist regime of Romania under Nicolae Ceausescu and others, according to G2
Bulletin.
"He may not have been a card-carrying Marxist, but he learned the lessons that
made the discredited ideology a force in the world," the newsletter explains.
Interestingly, one of Arafat's political heirs, Mahmoud Abbas, also received
his training in the Soviet Union.
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