Five years later, Palestinian terrorists in Sudan killed an American ambassador after demanding that Sirhan Sirhan be released. Unusually, the Americans did not pursue the matter- the killers were set free. Arafat, who ordered the killing, flew to New York the next year to address the UN general Assembly.
How had Arafat gained such prominence? The answer is that, back in 1968, King Hussein of Jordan decided to give the PLO credit for the heavy Israeli losses in the Battle of Karameh. The reason for this generosity became apparent two years later when Hussein purged his country of the troublesome Palestinian 'fedayeen'. Henceforth there would be a distinct Jordanian identity with people of Palestinian origin taking a back seat.
What made Arafat special? Why among many competing terrorist factions, did his organization prevail? One answer had to do with his connection to the new money being made in the Gulf. He was seen as a jet-set millionaire, not a doctrinaire Socialist. His orchestration of a glamorous type of international terrorism- hijacking multiple planes- made him sexy and a symbol of the new, oil rich, Middle East. But this was only part of the story. To his own people, Arafat was a Muslim offering redemption through martyrdom. Sooner or later, Allah's plan for Israel- viz. its being washed away in a sea of blood- would unfold of its own accord.
From the perspective of old fashioned diplomats, what was significant about Arafat was that he was acceptable to pious Muslims while receiving backing from both Jordan and Egypt. However, with hindsight, we can see that Jordan was regretting its alliance with Nasser because Egyptian control of Jordanian military forces had proved disastrous during the 1967 war. Thus, Arafat's emergence as the incarnation of the Palestinian cause also meant that other countries could wash their hands off all responsibility for those troublesome people.
Another reason that the West was respectful to Arafat was his good relations with the Soviets and their proxies in the region- in particular, Salah Jadid, the Syrian strongman. By contrast, Hafez Assad was angry with him and had wanted to have him executed for the killing of a friend of his. Jadid's support for Arafat as well as his hard Left views led to his downfall and the establishment of the Assad dynasty towards the end of 1970. Paradoxically, Assad's dislike of Arafat helped Syria gain considerable political advantage in Lebanon where Arafat's Palestinians were creating havoc.
It seemed that the Arab countries which had previously taken the lead in confronting Israel were now content to take a back seat because they had blundered badly and ended up losing territory on a scale which no one had expected. Henceforth, the Palestinians would have to create their own state rather than hope for a better life under Egyptian or Jordanian suzerainty. Thanks to OPEC's use of petroleum as a weapon, Arafat gained great international legitimacy because his people had plenty of money and, anyway, it was the Seventies and terrorism seemed super-cool. The UN passed a resolution, in 1975, equating Zionism with Racism though Islamism had ethnically cleansed far more people and was still warming up. Only after the end of the Cold War was this resolution revoked as Israel's condition for attending the Madrid Peace Conference. President Bush, having won the Kuwait war, was determined to begin a 'land-for-peace' process which was continued at Oslo and Camp David. One reason Arafat's political fortunes revived was because of the largely spontaneous 'intifada' street protests by Palestinians. However, Arafat's own 'second intifada' which was much more deadly ultimately back-fired. With hindsight, it appears that the Palestinians overplayed their hand and thus, twenty years later, are being offered much less.
It must be said that the Palestinians have overplayed their hand again and again since the Nineteen Thirties. Perhaps the worst instance was in Jordan where they had become the majority. King Hussein offered Arafat the post of Deputy Prime Minister. However, Arafat could not control the extremist factions within the PLO and so the Jordanians attacked the Palestinians- Nasser was unable to broker peace and died of a heart attack- and pushed them into Syria where Assad had come to power. This meant Arafat and his men had to move to Lebanon with consequences disastrous for that country. Meanwhile Palestinian terrorism was causing a backlash among voters in the West. Trump represents a generation which equates the Palestinian cause with terrorism aimed at the West. Unlike Obama, who had sympathy for Developing Nations and understood their anger at the ravages of European Imperialism, Trump considers such places as 'shit-holes'. He thinks of Israel as a property developer creating gated communities for the affluent in place of traditional peasant villages. By contrast, the older generation of American diplomats and statesmen had been suspicious of the Socialist aspects of the Zionist state. Though Truman had supported Israel diplomatically, he had given it no weapons. Under Eisenhower, America had distanced itself from the fledgling state and had forced it to hand back its gains from the Suez War. Kennedy initiated a more sympathetic approach but America was not the main strategic partner of the Israelis till after the Camp David accord. Indeed, Nixon hesitated to help Israel in 1973 and only did so because he did not want Soviet weapons to appear superior and thus cause a fall in American influence in the region.
Nixon's gamble paid off. Israel's victory in the Yom Kippur war meant the collapse of a Syria-Egypt axis. By the end of the Seventies, Arab opposition to Israel was merely rhetorical. Arafat has emerged as the sole representative of the Palestinian people and the anti-Zionist cause. He scored a stunning diplomatic victory by being chosen by Uganda's Idi Amin to be his best man. This Ugandan alliance was the bedrock upon which the mighty Palestinian State was founded. However, stupid Americans like Donald Trump- who was graduating from Wharton at around the time that Time Magazine had Arafat on its cover- did not understand the importance of Arafat's Ugandan alliance. Indeed, there is an unfortunate tendency in the West to see Arafat and his successors as crazy clowns who have an unerring ability to side with the stupidest maniac in the region. Still, the fact remains, Arafat did head up a Palestinian authority and Clinton got Netanyahu to make substantial concessions to Arafat under the Wye River Memorandum. Indeed, the 2000 Camp David negotiations represented the high-water mark of Palestinian influence. However, Arafat rejected the deal which Clinton had forced Barak to offer. The Israelis felt Arafat was playing a double game- encouraging Hamas to conduct attacks on civilians- and turned against him. George W Bush, too, had no time for Arafat who, he believed, had piled up a billion dollar fortune by extorting his own people.
Trump's 'Peace Plan' will, of course, be rejected by the Palestinians. It gives them about 70 percent of the West Bank whereas Clinton had offered more than 90 per cent. But the price is getting rid of Hamas or getting it to disarm- surely an impossibility. In effect, the Trump plan is a camouflage permitting Israel to pursue a maximalist agenda, though there may be a 4 year freeze on new settlements.
It is interesting that some Saudi commentators, presumably reflecting the preferences of the regime, are pressing the Palestinians to accept the deal or else embrace the fate of the 'Red Indians'. According to this view, the Palestinians are playing into the hands of Iran which harbors an ancient grudge against the Arab peoples and seeks to reduce them to slavery.
What has Trump achieved with his Plan which the Palestinians were bound to reject? I suppose the answer is that he has united Israel by getting Benny Gantz to sing from the same choir sheet as Netanyahu. This is bound to have an effect on how Left-Liberals view that part of the world. However, currently, Warren and Sanders have vigorously condemned Trump's action- with Warren taking a stronger stand. This may damage the Democrats going forward as Trump moves on to other 'Deals of the Century' to fire up his bedrock supporters.
To appreciate how big a difference Trump's plan makes for Netanyahu, consider the account that senior diplomat and Obama adviser, Dennis Ross, gives of Bibi's unpopularity with European leaders in 2011. Ross's book 'Doomed to succeed' opens with a teleconference between Obama and Merkel, Sarkozy and Cameron about the American led offensive against Libya's Qaddafi. Suddenly, the conversation shifts to Netanyahu whom the three European leaders see as the biggest threat to a peaceful outcome for the 'Arab Spring'. Few would have imagined that the three European leaders would be blamed for the Libyan disaster and that the 'blow-back' represented by Syrian and other refugees would cause major political changes in Europe. We now think of Cameron as a cretin, Sarkozy as a sleazy fellow and Merkel as a lame duck. Meanwhile Netanyahu, if not brought down by his own corruption, appears to have prevailed against the odds. Why? I think people have come to see that Israel genuinely is a friend of the West. Anti-Israeli forces in the region genuinely want to slaughter us to the last man. They hate Israelis not because they are Jews but because they are 'Western'.
There was no point giving Israel the cold shoulder because the crazies in the region would still want to kill us. Obama's soft spot for, first the Muslim Brotherhood and then the Iranians, represented a squandering of political capital. Still, it must be said, Dennis Ross, though a supporter of Israel, does not like Trump's plan. He wants the Palestinians to gain more and to do so immediately, not in some beautiful future which never arrives. But this is the crux of the problem. Palestinians want to rise up by their own efforts. Development means self-reliance. Ambassadors and Statesmen think of Orientals either as proud Bedouins- to whom tribute must be paid- or else as colorful beggars- who too must be paid off. By contrast, because we view the Zionists as 'Western', we believe they want to develop their land and get rich by their own efforts. It is foolish to assume that 'Orientals' don't have similar aspirations. The problem of the Palestinians is the same as that of any other formerly colonized people who have found it difficult to establish a legitimate form of government such that internecine killing is suppressed. On the one hand, Palestine has thrown up charismatic leaders like Grand Mufti Husseini and Yassar Arafat who threw a giant shadow on the world stage. On the other, you still have factionalism and nepotism and corruption. Arafat's own ancestral Gaza is now in the hands of Hamas- a bitter enemy of his successor who, however, had his own problems with Arafat and now appears to have little legitimacy. The Palestinian Authority said it was cutting security ties with Israel in 2015 and 2017 but, as with its recent threat to do so, nothing actually happened. Hamas and Islamic Jihad may ramp up attacks but that might have happened anyway with the same negative results. Perhaps Trump's peace plan is doomed to succeed in the sense peace will always remain a plan, never a reality.
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