Just Ask Arafat

Does world remember why we needed airline security in first place?

Noah Klieger
YNET News

Every time I travel overseas (and I must admit it happens often,) I undergo security checks at airports worldwide. Every time I ask myself how could it be that none of the billions of travelers who have been going the strict and annoying checks for years now dedicate a few seconds to thinking about the reason for this screening process, which has become an integral part of every flight by now. As if it’s pre-destined. Just like one needs a ticket and passport, one needs to stand in line and undergo a security check. A whole generation (and in fact, two generations) of passengers are convinced that the need for security was born along with the first ever flight. However, we the older ones remember why every traveler now needs to undergo those checks. We also remember that many years ago we could fly from one location to another without any interruptions. The planes were slower perhaps, and there was no in-flight movie, but we could just board a plane and fly.



It is therefore odd that even those who still remember this ancient era do not think, or do not want to think, about the reason for the bothersome addition of security: The fact that one, Yasser Arafat, and the terrorist gangs he commanded, introduced the need of security checks after inventing the notion of hijacking planes for the purposes of extorting the Free World.


The real victims

These gangs, such as Black September or Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, prompted the nations of the world and airlines worldwide to invest – and continue investing – billions of dollars in sophisticated electronic equipment.



And if we already mention the names of some gangs, we can also mention that Black September was not named to commemorate the killing of Palestinians by Israel, but rather, the massacre undertaken by Jordan’s King Hussein in September 1970 in a Palestinian refugee camp. Based on Arafat’s estimate, more than 3,000 Palestinians were butchered at the time, yet there is no doubt that the number of victims was much higher.



Once in a while, just to amuse myself, I turn to security officers worldwide – politely, of course – and ask them to explain to me why these checks are necessary. As they always reply in one way or another that it’s about security, ask another question: Yes, but who does the whole world fear, and who are the ones that require us to maintain security screening?” The answer is always the same: Airplanes are hijacked by Arab terrorists.



Even those unfamiliar with what happened 30 or 40 years ago still remember the al-Qaeda hijackers who brought down the Twin Towers and exploded in the Pentagon on September 11th.


So if everyone knows the reason for the daily nuisance suffered by billions of travelers worldwide and for the expenditure of billions of dollars, how could it be that most passengers and their governments still think that the people behind all this are the victims?



The victims are in fact citizens of the entire Free World (and even those of the not-so-free world,) who are being extorted time and again, every day and on every flight.