In an effort to paint Yasser Arafat and his PLO as "victims" of the present Arab-initiated mini-war in Yesha, Arab news agencies reported this week on an "Israeli assassination attempt" on the PLO chieftain. According to ArabicNews.com, "a high ranking Jordanian official said ... that the Jordanian King Abdullah II on Monday at dawn received a telephone call from the Palestinian President Yasser Arafat on being exposed to an assassination attempt [sic] on Monday by the Israeli forces and that the Jordanian King had made necessary contacts at the regional and international levels - a matter which foiled this attempt.[sic]" Quoting the source, Jordan's weekly al-Hilal newspaper said that Abdullah could barely hear Arafat on the phone "because of the sounds of the Israeli bombardment when Arafat informed him that the bombardment which is close to him targets his personal life.[sic]"



King Abdullah then purportedly contacted Egypt and other states; information available to Egypt and Jordan indicated that Arafat was indeed targeted "according to a tactic laid and supervised by the Israeli chief of staff Shaoul Mofaz and with the consent of Ariel Sharon, on the ground that the assassination to be made during Arafat's meeting with the official spokesman for the Hamas movement Abdul Aziz al-Ranteisi after releasing him and thus the pretext will be that the targeted is al-Ranteisi, rather than Arafat." Al-Hilal claims that Abdullah also spoke to US officials; they then ordered a top CIA official to warn Israel not to proceed with the Arafat assassination.