ROM Editorials are posted and archived on JN Online: www.detroitjewishnews.com Dry Bones Keep The Martyr Waiting I , sraeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has gone back to threatening to kill Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. It is a singularly bad step in what has been an otherwise successful effort to stem Palestinian ter- rorism by assassinating or capturing the most violent . leaders. Murdering Arafat would be a mistake, both as a matter of policy and as an issue of public relations. And while it might be emotionally satisfying to be rid at last of this crook and terrorist, it would be wrong as a matter of justice and morality. Meeting with President George W. Bush earlier this month, Sharon said that he was "released from that pledge" he made three years ago not to harm Arafat physically. But it is not clear that he means the threat as anything more than a tactic to rally right-Wing support to his plan to with- draw from the Gaza settlements. Sharon associates were quick to explain that he wasn't planning any immediate assault on the Palestinian leader, whom he has kept holed up in his Mukata headquarters in Ramallah for most of the current intzfada (uprisin Still, making the threat was an unneeded reminder of Israel's ability to get rid of Arafat just as it had suc- cessfully targeted Hamas leader Sheik Ahmed Yassin and his successor, Abdel. Aziz Rantissi. The Palestinians are well aware of what Sharon can do; there was no need to rub their noses in it. The policy issue is quite clear. Assassination would make Arafat a martyr; keeping him effectively in his own prison makes him look pathetic. The former would let the Arab nations continue to focus on Israel's "occupation" and "villainy;" keeping him alive allows Israel to continue to point out how corrupt, ineffective and weak his regime really is. What better than to have him expel the 21 Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades members from the Mukata, as he did last week, out of fear that he could get killed if the IDF raided the place to cap- FiG01.6 r BL( F-oR OUR ONCE MAN u36 isRA6 S ARE CELE BRAM 1.)6 It\XPNDOQCE PAY ture those bad guys. The long-range policy is to get a meaningful peace. Arafat isn't the man to negotiate it, but it will help if he is around to endorse it. Killing him ends that possibility. And since he has no clear successor, his death would likely stir more internal strife, postponing any real resolution between the Palestinians and Israelis and possibly giving more power to the most fanatic of the terrorist groups. Israel doesn't need any more bad publicity with the outside world. Killing Arafat now would be as disastrous in international relations as it would be for America to kill Saddam Hussein now that he has been driven from power and captured. Too many nations are willing to accept the Muslim description of Israel as sav- age oppressors. There is no need to add to that impression. Ultimately, a cold-blooded slaying would be immoral, contravening what Israel should stand for as a model to the rest of the world. There will be time, let us hope, to put Arafat on trial for terrorism, to strip him of his power and to force him to concede what he has stolen from the Palestinians during his dic- tatorship. That will be punishment enough. It will be better by far to let him die of natural causes, disgraced by his . failures. Arafat has described himself as a "martyr-in-wait- EDIT ORIAL • ik)DEWNGENCE /AND OUR RI GOT TO Ltve OM' t\c SECURE AND 1)66NSIBLe BORDERS ntRSO D PREFER 1146 TP\ANTIoNAL BARE3CU PICNIC 0 1SMAE L ► NDEPENVE.krk DAte ing," telling an Arab member of the Israeli Knesset that "I am fated to die as a shaheed. "That's too good a fate for him. For ultimate justice, Arafat's blood should not be on Sharon's hands. ❑ Tasting My Israeli Service I t was delicious (yes, delicious — I could taste the joy and satisfaction) to sit at a workbench at an army base in Israel and repair communi- cation equipment for soldiers in the field. My wife, Vivian, and I joined a Sar-El volunteer program that enabled us to live and work at a base near Ramle for the last two weeks of February. Our work was easy but important, one of a few jobs for volunteers directly serving the troops. We repaired the headphones worn in soldiers' helmets to com- municate with each other as they patrol Gaza and Judea and Samaria (the West Bank). My wife worked at one stage of the repair, I at another, among nine or 10 volunteers and under the supervision of three young female soldiers. Two of Albert Best of Farmington Hills is a retired lawyer and former newspaperman. He and Vivian have been married for 56 years and have three children. Our base, known as Batzap 382, was the lovely young women had come to Israel located inside and at the rear of base named as children from the Soviet Union; the third Pikud HaOref, standing for Home Front came from North Africa. They had been in Command. Batzap's function is repairing the army less than a year. and distributing electronic and transmission We were part of a group that included vol- devices to the troops in Judea and Samaria. unteers, almost half of them non-Jewish; More than 30 percent of Batzap's vital work from Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Montana, is performed by volunteers, a method that Texas, Canada; two from South Africa; three ALB ERT provides substantial savings over having to from the Netherlands, Ireland and Norway. BE ST provide new equipment if the higher cost is Ages ranged from an 18-year-old woman to Com munity not essential for an efficient IDF. us in our late 70s. Persp ective Sar-El, derived from the Hebrew for Virtually every week, a new group from Service for Israel, was founded in 1983 as a several nations arrives at Israel's Ben-Gurion nonprofit, non-political organization. It Airport. Travel arrangements are made and resulted from an agricultural crisis in the Golan paid for by the volunteers. Sar-Elniks serve at sever- Heights when settlers were called into Army reserve al bases and perform many services. service and crops were in danger of rotting. Israelis A Sar-El representative was at Ben-Gurion Airport recruited 650 volunteers from the United States to to brief us and provide Israel Defense Forces (IDF) save the crops. Sar-El came about from the sugges- protection and transportation to our base, the loca- tion of which was not made known to us until then. BEST On page 28 4/30 2004 27