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Jerusalem

Law forbids monument to Arafat in Israel


By Jerusalem Newswire Editorial Staff
November 10, 2004

Israeli law forbids the establishment of a monument to a deceased terrorist, and the Terror Victim’s Association is working to ensure the law is fulfilled in the case of Yasser Arafat.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s cabinet Wednesday gave its approval for Arafat to be buried in Ramallah, where the Palestinian Authority plans to turn part of his Muqata compound into a grand mausoleum.

Israeli Arab Knesset Member Ahmed Tibi vowed even if it took years, Arafat would eventually be buried on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.

Official “Palestinian” sources said a death announcement would be issued Wednesday, followed by a state ceremony in Cairo Thursday and Arafat’s interment in Ramallah Friday.

Ramallah burial

“Following the request of the Palestinian Authority, and taking into account the recommendation of the security bodies as heard in this discussion and other discussions, it is our intention to allow [Arafat’s] funeral and burial in Ramallah,” read a statement issued by Israel’s cabinet Wednesday.

The government insisted, however, that Israel would in no way take “responsibility for maintaining security and public order in Ramallah during the funeral and after it…”

Israel had preferred Arafat be buried in the Gaza Strip, where his al-Kidwa clan is based.

Senior unnamed PA sources expected an official death announcement to be issued Wednesday, after which Arafat’s body would be flown to Cairo Thursday for a state ceremony at the invitation of the Egyptians.

His interment would take place Friday in Ramallah.

The Council of Jewish Communities in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip (Yesha) refused a Foreign Ministry request to provide armored buses for the event.

The Yesha leaders said they were unwilling to take part in “honoring a detestable murderer who spilled the blood of so many Jews.”

Illegal monument

While the PA plans to make Arafat’s funeral and burial a grand event, Israel’s Terror Victim’s Association has petitioned the High Court in an effort to make sure the “father of modern terrorism” is not given more than his proper dues.

The organization’s argument is based on a law forbidding the establishment of a monument to a deceased terrorist.

That law was used in 1999 as the justification for demolishing a makeshift plaza set up around the grave of Baruch Goldstein in Kiryat Arba.

Five years earlier, Goldstein, infuriated by the unceasing Muslim terror being directed at his fellow Jews, gunned down 29 Arabs at Hebron’s Cave of the Patriarchs.

Quest for the Temple Mount

Meanwhile, Israeli Arab MK and former Arafat confidante, Ahmed Tibi vowed the blood-soaked PLO chief would eventually be buried atop Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.

Arafat had expressed a deep desire to be buried at the Al Aqsa Mosque.

"In the end," Tibi told Israel Radio, "if he is not buried today or tomorrow in East Jerusalem, a day will come when there is a sovereign Palestinian government, a Palestinian state with its capital in East Jerusalem, and Yasser Arafat will be buried in the mosque of Al Aqsa.”

"This is definite. This will be," the anti-Israel MK stated.

Israel has vehemently opposed even considering Arafat’s interment atop the Temple Mount, site of the Jewish Temples to the God of Israel.

Justice Minister Yosef Lapid noted at the weekend that Jerusalem is the place “where Jewish kings are buried, not Arab terrorists.”

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