This is a clearly told sad tale, by an eminent Palestinian journalist, of the chameleon shenanigans of a survivor. The brave Fatah guerrilla - then PLO - leader was in fact born in Cairo, though he would be the last to tell you he wasn't a Jerusalem Palestinian, and his claim to relatively high-born Hussein lineage is tenuous. But Jerusalem was "the place of his mental birth", so his misrepresentation "deserves our sympathy", writes Aburish. His sympathy runs out, though he does acknowledge the flawed hero's contribution to the recreation of a Palestinian identity. "A naughty charmer", the boy became corrupt, chaotic, dictatorial, and most comfortable with ruling elites. His political acrobatics - "for Palestine I'd lie all the time" - avoided ideology and always put "Palestine First", no matter what was going on with Arab disunity. Aburish concludes that Arafat is "a throwback to another age . . . of a brave, uneducated, wily Arab chief". "Not a modern leader", his dependence on the US only helps him to stay in power against the wishes of his people, "like the rest of the Arab leaders". His reliance on Israeli goodwill is as unrealistic This gentle biographer says: "Arafat has reached the end of his rope."
