EGYPT REFUSES SHEIKH YASSIN ENTRY AT LAST
MOMENT YESTERDAY
Yassin's Triumphant Return to Gaza Maybe Delayed
MER - Washington - 11 June:
Throughout the Middle East in recent days they've been meeting about
Hamas, they've been meeting about Sheikh Ahmed Yassin who on Saturday is supposed to
return to his home, the Gaza Strip, the birthplace of Hamas.
The Middle East game these days requires a kind of political
supercomputer to keep track of all the twists and turns and to make calculations in time
with events.
When he was released from Israeli imprisonment after the botched
Mossad assassination attempt in Amman of another Hamas leader last year, Yasser Arafat
raced to his bedside in Jordan paying him homage with excessive gestures and kisses. King
Hussein personally greeted him, took credit for his release, and did much the same as
Yasser.
Indeed, the Israelis last year decided -- based on their own complex
calculations -- that it was better to release Hamas Political Head Mousa Abu Marzook from
New York imprisonment instead of extraditing him to Israel; and then they followed this by
releasing Yassin. Maybe they were hoping to co-opt the Hamas leadership; maybe they were
hoping to further push the Palestinians toward civil war; maybe events are just out of
control for everybody though no one will admit it.
Yassin went to Egypt a few months ago for medical treatment. He is
blind, and quadriplegic -- another example of mind over matter it seems, another example
of the power spirituality and principle no matter what the secularists think. He then went
on a whirlwind trip throughout the Middle East, being received more head-of-state-like
than Arafat in many key locations including including Saudi Arabia and Iran.
On Saturday Yassin is to triumphantly return to Gaza. The Israeli
cabinet has been debating what to do. Yasser Arafat has been meeting with the head
of the CIA and is rushing to Cairo. And just yesterday, at the last minute, the
Egyptian government caved in to American/Israeli/Arafat pressures and refused to let
Yassin back into Egypt from Sudan on his way back to Gaza.
The following article was published in "The Independent on
Sunday" a few days ago:
HAMAS LEADER'S TRIUMPHAL TOUR SPELLS
DANGER FOR YASSER ARAFAT
by Deborah Horn
Sheikh Ahmed Yassin's feting by Arab heads of state gives militants
new status.
AS IF Yasser Arafat didn't have enough to worry about. For two
months the Palestinian leader has watched warily as his political rival, Sheikh Ahmed
Yassin, spiritual leader of the militant Hamas movement, has been received almost like a
head of state in nearly a dozen Muslim countries.
The warm reception for Sheikh Yassin represents a fresh challenge to
Mr Arafat's rule. Tired of months without progress in peace talks with Israel, Muslim
countries are signalling their dissatisfaction with the hard-line policies of Israel's
prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, by playing to their own grumbling opposition.
The danger to Mr Arafat has not been lost on Israel. Israeli
officials say they "reserve the right" to prevent Sheikh Yassin, who is said to
be collecting millions of dollars in aid, from returning to Gaza. "Obviously anyone
who is in a leadership position, particularly among the Palestinians, who calls for the
destruction of Israel, is not considered a benevolent phenomenon," said Mr
Netanyahu's adviser, David Bar-Illan. The irony is that Israel was forced to free Sheikh
Yassin after an attempt by Mossad agents to assassinate a Hamas official in Jordan went
farcically awry. The Jordanians exchanged the captured Mossad men for the imprisoned Hamas
leader.
Palestinian Authority officials play down the threat that Sheikh
Yassin's whirlwind tour poses. "I'm not worried at all," said Ahmed Abdel
Rahman, the authority's secretary general. "The Arab states are telling Mr Netanyahu,
'If you destroy the PA and the peace agreements, we will support Hamas.' It's very clear
... [and] this is a good answer to Mr Netanyahu. If he is smart, he will listen."
Reflecting Mr Arafat's obvious concern, the Palestinian government
asked Jordan, home to about three million Palestinians, not to grant Sheikh Yassin entry.
Lebanon and South Africa have also refused to allow Sheikh Yassin entry - the latter, it
is reported, after Mr Arafat got in touch with his good friend President Nelson Mandela to
have the sheikh's visa revoked.
Sheikh Yassin's Middle East tour began with a low-key request by the
Hamas leader, who is quadriplegic, blind and suffers from ill health, to visit Egypt for
medical treatment. In April, Israel gave him permission to leave on a diplomatic passport.
From there he went to Saudi Arabia to attend the annual pilgrimage to Mecca. Then
something unusual occurred. King Fahd and Prince Abdallah asked to see him. Within days,
Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Iran and Yemen had extended invitations.
Next, he went to Kuwait, Syria and the Sudan, where President
Khalifa suggested setting up a charity to aid Palestinians in Gaza. Hamas officials say
they are trying to set up a meeting with Saddam Hussein in Iraq. From there, say the
officials, he may go to Pakistan and Malaysia.
All along, Sheikh Yassin never veered far from typical Hamas
rhetoric. He spoke about Israeli aggression, pronounced the Oslo peace agreements dead,
reiterated the need to liberate "all of Palestine" and predicted that Israel's
destruction would come in the next century. He was careful, however, to avoid open
conflict with Mr Arafat. Barbs directed against the Palestinian Authority - not lost on
Arab audiences - were made obliquely. In Damascus, for instance, he told reporters that
"those who abandon their people's rights are distancing themselves from their
people".
But, rhetoric aside, Sheikh Yassin's visit may signal the beginning
of the movement's subtle change from a militant rejectionist opposition to an open
political party. It is no secret that many of the states that welcomed Sheikh Yassin are
battling fundamentalist opposition groups of their own. The strategy of these governments
has always been to appease and contain them.
One theory is that they are doing the same with Hamas. "When a
revolutionary organization or a terrorist organization starts to be part of regional
politics, it cannot continue to be revolutionary," said Ghassan Khatib, a Palestinian
political analyst who directs the Jerusalem Media and Communication Centre. "It may
be that Hamas is trying to become a political player in the region."
The attention on Sheikh Yassin has boosted Hamas's standing, both at
home and abroad. Usually supported by no more than 10 per cent of the Palestinians in the
West Bank and Gaza, the most recent poll shows that almost one in four Palestinians
sympathize with Hamas, according to Mr Khatib's centre.
Support for Hamas usually mirrors Palestinian backing for the peace
process, slumping when negotiations are going well and rising when they fail, as they have
done for 15 months. This time, Hamas is interpreting that support, and the grand welcome
Sheikh Yassin has received abroad, as backing of its strategy rather than a measure of
disillusion with the peace process.
"Hamas is pleased," said Ismail Abu Shanab, one of the
movement's leaders in Gaza. "Sheikh Ahmed Yassin is a symbol of resistance and jihad.
He has been invited by those countries. This means they give support and legitimacy to
this path, which is the path that can stop Mr Netanyahu's aggression and bring back stolen
Arab land."
