The P Factor In Palestine

The Palestinian Authority may be getting set to exhume PLO leader Yasser Arafat's body from its tomb in Ramallah to see if he was poisoned by polonium, traces of which were just found on his personal effects. He died in 2004, reportedly of a massive stroke, two years before elements of the Russian intelligence services used the substance (which you need a nuclear reactor to produce) to kill ex-agent Alexander Litvinenko.

Litvinenko was the first known polonium victim, which could help explain why it would've been missed in the investigation of Arafat's death. Investigators also might have missed it because it didn't happen. Pro-peace blogger Richard Silverstein has more details and a considerable amount of speculation about Israel's possible role here. At the New York Times, Isabel Kershner describes Arafat's mixed legacy and the current situation for Palestinians, whose reaction to definitive news that Arafat had been murdered is anybody's guess:

Revered by many as the revolutionary founding father of Palestinian nationalism, he was also reviled, particularly by many Israelis, who considered him a terrorist. He was among three recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 for his role in accepting the Oslo accords, a blueprint for peace with Israel, but nearly 20 years later his promises of a Palestinian state remain unfulfilled. Corruption was also rampant under his leadership.

“We have moved from at least having the impression under Yasir Arafat that our national aspirations could be fulfilled to survival mode,” said Zakaria al-Qaq, a political scientist at Al Quds University in East Jerusalem. Nowadays, Mr. Qaq said, Palestinians are concerned about whether or not their salaries will come in, referring to a worsening financial crisis that has caused the Palestinian Authority to delay payment of June salaries to its employees

Gingrich's "Anti-Semitic Diatribe"

Richard Silverstein didn't like the sound of Newt Gingrich's South Carolina victory speech:

We are going to argue American exceptionalism, the American Declaration of Independence, the American Constitution, the American federalist papers; the founding fathers of America are the source from which we draw our understanding of America. [Obama] draws his from Saul Alinsky, radical left-wingers and people who don’t like the classical America.

Silverstein:

Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals is replete with multiple references to the Founding Fathers and American constitution as the embodiments of liberty and democracy. But note how he sets up Alinsky as a radical who is alien to America. The final nail in the coffin is his reference to “classical America.” Who or what is classical America? It is of course white Christian America, everything that Saul Alinsky and many of you out there reading this are not. This is a classic anti-Semitic diatribe gussied up in Tea Party rhetoric.