Qaddoumi's Transcript

The transcript that Farouq Qaddoumi claimed showed Abu Mazen (Mahmud ‘Abbas) and Muhammad Dahlan conspiring with Ariel Sharon to kill Yasir ‘Arafat (my earlier posts are here and here) has finally been released by Qaddoumi and, while its genuineness is still quite suspect, even on its own face it doesn't seem to be quite as damning (except to Sharon) as Qaddoumi implied.

The transcript has been translated by Toufic Haddad as an exclusive for The Faster Times, so I refer you to that site to read the text, but as The Arabist notes in his own analysis, the transcript itself has some ambiguities. In fact, while it's clear that Sharon (in the transcript, the genuineness of which I still question) wants to kill ‘Arafat, it sounds as if Abu Mazen and Muhammad Dahlan are arguing against it, on the grounds that it would create more problems than it solves. ("In this way, we will inevitably fail..."; "If Arafat dies before we have control on the ground ... we will face great complications" "In this way we will fail entirely, and we will not be able to accomplish anything from the plan. Rather the situation will explode without control over it.") If the transcript is genuine then their presence in a meeting where Sharon raised the subject might be considered controvrsial and disloyal, but even on its own face the transcript does not show them supporting the idea.

As others have noted before me, this is part of an internal struggle within Fatah, and the transcript may be disinformation or outright fabrication. But even if it's genuine, it isn't quite the smoking gun Qaddoumi originally seemed to claim.