NOBEL JUDGES: ARAFAT STILL DA MAN!

Exclusive: Nobel judges stand by Arafat
Exactly 10 years after Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, members of the Norwegian awards committee are adamant that they made the right choice, and that the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, rather than Palestinian terrorism, was the prime factor in the collapse of the Oslo process.

On the eve of today's 2004 award ceremony, four of the five Norwegian Nobel Committee members, including the chairman and his deputy, as well as the committee's permanent secretary, contacted by the Post, said they still consider Arafat to have been a worthy winner. The other committee member, whom The Jerusalem Post was unable to reach, has previously expressed disappointment in Shimon Peres's post-1994 support for the policies of Ariel Sharon and issued no reported criticisms of Arafat.