News With a Slant

From WAFA, the Palestinian News Agency:

President Arafat: “The situation in Palestine is at the edge of explosion”

Galicia Spain, June 8th 2002 Wafa; President Yasser Arafat warned yesterday, from an explosion in the entire region if the Israeli occupation forces do not withdraw from the Palestinian Occupied Lands.

H.E. addressed the celebration held in Galicia in the honoring Mr. Miguel Angel Muratinos the European envoy to the peace process, for granting him the Argowanai De Oro 9th Prize.

H.E. President Arafat also said that if the International community stays indifferent, not fulfilling its duties of obliging Israel to withdraw according to UN Security Council’s resolution 1402, 1403 and the Madrid Declaration of the Quartet Committee, and enabling our people to practice their legitimate rights of establishing the independent Palestinian State with Jerusalem as its Capital, the whole region will witness a disastrous explosion that will impact not only the region but the stability of the whole world.

Jerusalem has become the key. The cries for a return to pre-1967 borders are smoke and mirrors, because that would leave the western half of Jerusalem under Israeli control. Israel has declared Jerusalem its capital; the Palestinians declare that Jerusalem shall be the capital of any future Palestinian state.

And the beat goes on.