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Yasser Arafat: Road Map is Dead, Blames Israeli Aggression

Aired September 03, 2003 - 06:35   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Now to the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. Yasser Arafat says the road map to peace is dead.
Let's go live now to Jerusalem, where our Michael Holmes has the very latest.

Michael -- you talked to Arafat on Tuesday?

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Indeed. Last evening, I spent an hour or more with the Palestinian president, off-camera unfortunately. But he did make some very interesting comments.

He was saying the road map is dead, but not the road map is dead full stop. He said from the Palestinian point of view it's not dead, but he said the actions, the military aggression, as he put it, by Israel in the last few weeks had killed the road map.

And he said that it's not that the Palestinian Authority is no longer committed to the road map -- quite the contrary. He laid the blame at the feet of the Israelis, now referring, of course, to the string of assassinations, or what Israel calls "targeted killings" on Hamas targets, particularly in the Gaza Strip. That's left nearly a dozen Hamas operatives dead and some 70 or so bystanders wounded.

It was an interesting conversation on other levels too. We asked him about the argument over the division of power between himself and the American-backed prime minister, Mahmoud Abbas. And his answer to that was, "Who can take power from me?" This is a quote. He said: "Only the people. Let there be elections, and we shall see."

He repeated his view that he's said before, and that is that he is elected and no one can dis-elect him, particularly the Americans or the Israelis.

So, a defiant Arafat and one that also pointed out that he believed that it would be very difficult to get the cease-fire with Hamas resurrected -- Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: Michael Holmes, thank you very much this morning.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.




Aggression>


Aired September 3, 2003 - 06:35   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Now to the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. Yasser Arafat says the road map to peace is dead.
Let's go live now to Jerusalem, where our Michael Holmes has the very latest.

Michael -- you talked to Arafat on Tuesday?

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Indeed. Last evening, I spent an hour or more with the Palestinian president, off-camera unfortunately. But he did make some very interesting comments.

He was saying the road map is dead, but not the road map is dead full stop. He said from the Palestinian point of view it's not dead, but he said the actions, the military aggression, as he put it, by Israel in the last few weeks had killed the road map.

And he said that it's not that the Palestinian Authority is no longer committed to the road map -- quite the contrary. He laid the blame at the feet of the Israelis, now referring, of course, to the string of assassinations, or what Israel calls "targeted killings" on Hamas targets, particularly in the Gaza Strip. That's left nearly a dozen Hamas operatives dead and some 70 or so bystanders wounded.

It was an interesting conversation on other levels too. We asked him about the argument over the division of power between himself and the American-backed prime minister, Mahmoud Abbas. And his answer to that was, "Who can take power from me?" This is a quote. He said: "Only the people. Let there be elections, and we shall see."

He repeated his view that he's said before, and that is that he is elected and no one can dis-elect him, particularly the Americans or the Israelis.

So, a defiant Arafat and one that also pointed out that he believed that it would be very difficult to get the cease-fire with Hamas resurrected -- Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: Michael Holmes, thank you very much this morning.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.




Aggression>