Game's Up, Yasser

Did he authorise the killing of women and children? Perhaps he did, but for every single Israeli innocent his militants slaughtered, the Israelis killed 100 innocent Palestinians. Those who insist he was a terrorist never stop to consider what misery, oppression and suffering the "victims of the victims" have endured and are enduring. This calculation is always absent from the sums of those who eagerly dub Arafat a terrorist.

You steal and occupy Palestinian land through military conquest, you consolidate your occupation of that land by building thousands of illegal settlements—then you summon Arafat to a peace conference and pressure him to cut a deal. What is the deal? A fraction of his original homeland with no mention of captured East Jerusalem or the 6 million scattered Palestinian refugees. When he refuses such a suicidal offer, he is called a terrorist, someone whose real objective is to push every Israeli into the Dead Sea.

I met Arafat briefly in August 2001 in a Delhi hotel. I was offered an interview, but since my interviewing skills are zilch, I preferred a brief conversation with him. He looked fatigued, forlorn, desperate and sick. I suspect he knew the game was up, that finally he had lost. The only person with whom I've longed to get a picture taken was Arafat. Till a few months ago, that picture occupied pride of place in my house. Alas, my dog Editor chewed it up. Now, all I have is an empty frame.