Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Michael Weinstein, the editor of HonestReporting.com, which has just come out with a new 1 minute on-line film that reveals the dark legacy of Yasser Arafat.

FP: Mr. Weinstein, welcome to Frontpage Interview. It is a privilege to have you here.

Weinstein: Thanks for having me. You do great work at FrontPage.
 
FP: What inspired you to produce this film?

Weinstein: We're concerned that the media will sanitize Yasser Arafat in death, as they so often did during his life. Right now, it's essential to clarify that this man was the innovator of modern terrorism, including the Islamic version that plagues the entire free world. Many aren't aware that Yasser Arafat innovated plane hijackings and suicide bombings. After 9/11, there were comparisons between bin Laden and Arafat. The comparisons were unfair... to bin Laden. Arafat was committing mass terror attacks while bin Laden was in diapers.

Moreover, we wanted to document that Arafat inculcated an entire generation of Palestinians to choose jihad over peaceful co-existence with Israel, America, and the west. Any hope of resolution of this conflict requires the rejection of Arafat's path, so we need to clearly document what that bloody path was.

FP: In many respects, therefore, Arafat was the architect of 9/11, right?
 
Weinstein: Certainly insofar as he showed the Arab world that high-profile terrorist acts can increase one's presence on the world stage, and can generate sympathy and legitimacy for one's movement if accompanied by good media relations and PR.

FP: Why do you think the mainstream media so rarely discusses the themes that are in your film?

Weinstein:  Two main reasons. First, the media's effort to achieve 'balance' oftentimes skews events -- since Arafat was considered a 'freedom fighter' and 'hero' by many Arabs, the media is willing to promote that view, downplaying or omitting his terrorist methods. Second, Arafat actually managed to win over a good portion of the western media to his warped perspective.  They're willing to look past the four-plus decades of terror, incitement, and rejection of co-existence, because of the supposed 'nobility' of the Palestinian cause.
 
FP: What thoughts came to your mind when you found out that Arafat died?

Weinstein: I thought of the thousands of innocents whose death he caused, none of whom received such a glamorous send-off.

FP: What is your take on the reports that suggest that Arafat died of AIDS?

Weinstein: Entirely plausible.

FP: Yep. Mihai Pacepa, the former Romanian intelligence chief, has written in his memoirs, Red Horizons, how his secret police taped Arafat's homosexual orgies with his body guards. The heroic status Arafat enjoys in the eyes of Arabs might be a bit tainted if this secret got out. But then Arabs and Palestinians would create a conspiracy theory to deny it anyway, right?

Weinstein: That's safe to assume.

FP: When did HR get started, and why?

Weinstein: HonestReporting began in the end of 2000, at the outbreak of the 'second intifada', when western media coverage was overwhelmingly biased against Israeli self-defense.

FP: It is simply bizarre that the western media coverage would have been so anti-Israeli after 2000. The Israelis put forward an incredible offer of peace and a state to Palestinians. Arafat rejects it and calls for suicide bombings. The whole world condemns Israel. I don’t get it. It’s almost as if the more terror that evil inflicts on innocent people in free societies (and especially Israelis), the more that the Left goes into ecstasy and blames the victims. What is your view on this?

Weinstein: It never ceases to amaze me how western media outlets refuse to acknowledge the jihadi death cult that exists in Arab culture, and that lies at the heart of Islamic terror. Arafat played a big part in fanning the flames of incitement in Palestinian TV, schools and mosques, but almost never did reporters acknowledge this incitement. The omission left many blaming Israel for Palestinian terror, which was exactly what Arafat wanted, of course.

FP: How has media coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict changed over the last few years?

Weinstein: There's been some improvement, due to media monitoring, 9/11, and broader recognition of the Palestinians' rejection of peaceful co-existence. We've had some real breakthroughs in getting the media to understand that by giving credibility to Palestinian terrorists, they've emboldened the terrorists to continue their murderous ways.

We're in regular contact with all the top news outlets, and by presenting our case factually and objectively, we've had many significant successes in changing media policies vis-à-vis Israel. For example, Hamas is no longer described in Reuters reports as 'engaged in an uprising for independence' -- rather, Reuters now accurately describes them as 'committed to Israel's destruction.'

But the tendency to present Palestinians as victims and Israel as the aggressor in the conflict persists. And the media almost never acknowledge the root cause of this conflict -- Arab rejection of the legitimacy of the State of Israel.

FP: What does it say about the morality and conscience of an international community that gives an individual like Arafat a Nobel Peace Prize? Would I be exaggerating by saying that, in principle, it is like giving Stalin, Hitler, Mao or Pol Pot a peace prize? The only difference really is that Arafat was denied the total power in which he would have gladly killed the millions of humans that the other mass murderers did. Your take?

Weinstein: The credibility of the Nobel Peace Prize was simply destroyed by Arafat's becoming a Nobel laureate. The documented record of Arafat's support of murderous terrorism even after the 1994 prize should cause that committee to annul Arafat's prize.

FP: Arafat’s odyssey in Paris in the last days of his life was quite creepy, bizarre and surreal. It reminds of me of the morbid shenanigans surrounding the deaths of Soviet dictators. I think the circumstances and behaviour of associates surrounding the death of a leader very much illuminates whether we are dealing with a populist democratic hero or a death-cult despotic figure. What do you think?

Weinstein: Arafat's last days were telling indeed. Especially the battle over his fortune, which he embezzled from aid funds intended to reach the impoverished Palestinian people. While he was blaming Israel for that poverty all those years, he was stashing away hundreds of millions in Swiss bank accounts.

FP: As expected, some Palestinians have come forward with some fantastic conspiracy theories. An evil Jew, it turns out, has poisoned Arafat. What does it say about a culture that is so deluded that it can’t even accept the mortality of its leader? Why do you think this culture is so addicted to conspiracy theories?
 
Weinstein: From Gaza City to Damascus to Tehran, the answer to nearly every Arab failure of leadership has been, for many years: 'Blame Israel and the Jews'. Dictators and autocrats deflect criticism of themselves by creating an illusory enemy of the people. Israel, the Jewish people and the United States have served that purpose in recent history. It's become so absurd that even the death of a diseased old man needs to be spun as a 'Zionist conspiracy.'

FP: Jew-Hatred, naturally, is the one word that can summarize Arafat’s life -- and the lives of most Palestinians. I think there is enough empirical evidence to prove, beyond reasonable doubt, that the last thing a large percentage of Palestinians want is their own state. They want to kill Jews, and they yearn for their own deaths, somewhere either briefly before or briefly after they soak their hands in the blood of Jews. What’s the psychology here?
 
Weinstein: I don't think that's the psychology of all Palestinians, but that ideology has become a powerful, perhaps dominant one. Arafat promoted this, including the 'love of death,' and that's the most dangerous ongoing aspect of his legacy. An entire generation of young Palestinians have been taught that jihad against the Jewish people is preferable to co-existence and working out a peaceful settlement.

FP: Your 1 minute film is a masterpiece, briefly touching on all the main – and dark -- aspects of Arafat's life. You refer to his personal corruption and embezzlement. Indeed, his secret bank accounts are reputed to total billions of dollars. Why didn’t Arafat share this money with the Palestinian people?

Weinstein: For one thing, Arafat dispensed large wads of cash to cronies who bolstered his power for decades. So he needed deep pockets. Why didn't he build schools and hospitals with the fortune? Well, despite all the rhetoric, he never actually behaved as if the welfare of the Palestinian people was a top priority. His own power and prestige were clearly paramount. The moment that illustrated this best was Arafat's rejection of Ehud Barak's offer of a Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank at Camp David in 2000. That would unquestionably have been best for his constituency, but as Dennis Ross said, 'Arafat could not accept Camp David because when the conflict ends, the cause that defines Arafat also ends.'
 
FP: Yes, and I think Arafat’s greatest objective was to make his own people bleed rather than to be content and have joy. That way, the yearning to die while killing Jews remains a top priority.

Well, let’s finish off Mr. Weinstein. How should Yasser Arafat be remembered?

Weinstein: The godfather of modern terrorism, who sacrificed the welfare of his own people and regional peace for personal power and prestige. And a deft manipulator of western media and public opinion.

FP: Mr. Weinstein, it was a pleasure talking to you. Congratulations on your powerful one minute film on Arafat and all your noble and vital work in general at Honest Reporting.

Weinstein: Thank you, Jamie.

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