The Hunger Games of Abdullah Barghouti

...His mission, his passion, was "to kill as many Israelis as possible". That ought to be on people's minds when the debate over how to think about the hunger-striking terrorist prisoners reaches the mainstream media's headlines as it soon will. The imperative to understand this needs to extend in all directions - even into the lofty heights of the executive leadership suite at the League of Arab States.

Frimet/Arnold Roth..
This Ongoing War..
10 July '13..

Trust us on this: being the parents of a child who was murdered changes the way you look at things.

Others might glance at a report quoting this political figure or that official, but that lens of bereavement and the immense frustration and anger that accompanies it tends to make you look a little more deeply than others do.

The secretary general of the Arab League probably makes headlines whenever he issues a public pronouncement. Without wanting to be unkind, we don't really care that much what he says or thinks under normal circumstances, and the feeling is probably mutual. Naturally, we respect and defend his right to speak in the name of the people who appointed him, but Nabeel Elaraby's views are background noise so far as we're concerned. For the record, he's a professional diplomat who served as Egypt's Foreign Minister of Egypt for four months in 2011 and before that was his country's ambassador in New Delhi between 1981 and 1983. A lawyer, he has an Egyptian law school degree as well as a Masters in Law from NYU.

This morning, we noticed that he has some things to say that actually do intrude into matters about which we take a personal interest. Speaking about a group of convicted practitioners of terror who are serving long prison sentences in Israel, the jurist/politician is quoted yesterday (Tuesday) saying that he is

following with concern the suffering of the Palestinian prisoners who entered indefinite food strike under very serious health conditions, especially the captive, Abdullah Barghouti, who entered into a dangerous condition due to his continued food strike since last May... Elaraby called on the international community to put an end to arrogance of the Israelis who use violence against the Palestinian prisoners [Emirates News Agency/WAM]

In the name of the Arab League, this senior figure launches into an appeal to "the international community, particularly the United Nations, the International Committee of Red Cross and human rights organization [sic]" to get involved and to "save the lives" of the terrorists who are refusing to eat and "to stop the inhumane practices against them".

It's significant that the hungry terrorists are not named by Mr Elaraby except for one of them: Barghouti. (We have the other names here.)

Let's give him the benefit of the doubt: Mr Elaraby may have said the things he said because his Arab League secretariat aides failed to give him a proper briefing ahead of his speech. So we will try to help. And we plan to send this posting to his office by mail right after it goes up on our site.

We have written about this dedicated killer several times in this blog. Most people who speak about him seem to know next to nothing factual, so allow us to share some basics.

Start with this: the judges who sentenced him expressed regret that condemning Abdullah Barghouti to the death penalty was not an option available to them.

(Continue)

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