Should US Supply PA With More Arms?

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's top adviser Dov Weisglass left Saturday night for a meeting in Washington with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice where he will argue against supplying the Palestinian Authority with weapons it says it needs to fight terrorism.

Rice, who was here just over a week ago and is expected to return to Israel on August 15 to "chaperone" the disengagement process, has been pressing Israel to allow the resupply of arms and ammunition to the PA.

In recent weeks the Palestinians have argued that they lack necessary arms, ammunition, vehicles and communications equipment to fight terrorism or effectively take control of Gaza once Israel leaves.

Israel disputes this, saying that what Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has shown is not a lack of weaponry, but rather a lack of will to confront Hamas. Israel has argued that an infusion of arms and ammunition won't make a difference for Abbas until he takes the strategic decision to frontally take on his extremists.

To buttress its argument about the danger of transferring arms and ammunition to the PA, Israel has recently provided the US with intelligence information indicating that a PA policeman was involved in last Saturday night's murder of Dov and Rachel Kol in Gush Katif. Read the rest Jerusalem Post

I am not buying Abbas' assertion that he needs more weapons(money) in order to curtail Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and other terrorist groups. These groups must be condemned not glorified. Instead of using words such as "gunmen", Abbas needs to use words such as murderers, criminals, terrorists, and extremists. As noted in the article, Abbas needs to frontally take on the extremists.