Arutz-7\'s Yosef Zalmanson asked Yesha leader Yaakov \"Ketzaleh\" Katz today why he feels that Israel should not, as Peres said, \"accede, just this once, to the American request to meet with Arafat.\" Ketzaleh answered,
\"Just as Bush will not agree to meet with Bin Laden, so too we must not meet with Arafat. Public opinion polls published recently by Israel\'s most popular newspapers show that 80-90% of the public believe that what Bin Laden is to the United States, Arafat is to Israel and the Jewish people. Not for naught has Prime Minister Sharon said repeatedly that \'Arafat is our Bin Laden.\'
\"Therefore,\" Ketzaleh continued, \"we must fight Arafat the same way the U.S. wants to fight Bin Laden. The Jewish people, together with the Christian majority in the United States, are against all forms of pressure by the Bush Administration on Israel to agree that we should continue to be killed, as one woman was yesterday, as a result of passivity towards Arafat. Sharon himself said that we will give all help to the United States, except for that which will hurt our security.\"
Q. \"Is there no room for compromise?\"
Ketzaleh: \"Every compromise invites more terrorism. The United States allowed the terrorists to take advantage of their democracy by allowing them free entry from Saudi Arabia and other countries, by not checking up sufficiently on where their monies came from or were going, etc. - and were rewarded with these cataclysmic terrorist attacks. It is not ethical for the Bush administration to press us to do anything that could lead to continued terrorism within Israel.\"
Q. \"Peres warns that Bush and Powell will meet with Arafat and include him in the worldwide coalition, \'but if I don\'t meet with him then we will not be included.\' What is your response?\"
Ketzaleh: \"If he does meet with Arafat, then it will make it that much easier for Bush to meet with Arafat and include him in the coalition. What we have to do is continue to pressure them not to meet with Arafat, who is responsible for the same type of terrorism that they are trying to fight... The fact is that Peres has always been warning us that we have to give in, etc. and it is exactly this approach of his that has led not only to Oslo and all its tragedies, but even to the terrible World Trade Center attack.\"
\"Just as Bush will not agree to meet with Bin Laden, so too we must not meet with Arafat. Public opinion polls published recently by Israel\'s most popular newspapers show that 80-90% of the public believe that what Bin Laden is to the United States, Arafat is to Israel and the Jewish people. Not for naught has Prime Minister Sharon said repeatedly that \'Arafat is our Bin Laden.\'
\"Therefore,\" Ketzaleh continued, \"we must fight Arafat the same way the U.S. wants to fight Bin Laden. The Jewish people, together with the Christian majority in the United States, are against all forms of pressure by the Bush Administration on Israel to agree that we should continue to be killed, as one woman was yesterday, as a result of passivity towards Arafat. Sharon himself said that we will give all help to the United States, except for that which will hurt our security.\"
Q. \"Is there no room for compromise?\"
Ketzaleh: \"Every compromise invites more terrorism. The United States allowed the terrorists to take advantage of their democracy by allowing them free entry from Saudi Arabia and other countries, by not checking up sufficiently on where their monies came from or were going, etc. - and were rewarded with these cataclysmic terrorist attacks. It is not ethical for the Bush administration to press us to do anything that could lead to continued terrorism within Israel.\"
Q. \"Peres warns that Bush and Powell will meet with Arafat and include him in the worldwide coalition, \'but if I don\'t meet with him then we will not be included.\' What is your response?\"
Ketzaleh: \"If he does meet with Arafat, then it will make it that much easier for Bush to meet with Arafat and include him in the coalition. What we have to do is continue to pressure them not to meet with Arafat, who is responsible for the same type of terrorism that they are trying to fight... The fact is that Peres has always been warning us that we have to give in, etc. and it is exactly this approach of his that has led not only to Oslo and all its tragedies, but even to the terrible World Trade Center attack.\"