I know that I cannot run PAL directly to any TV I've owned. It's possible that the specific model you're looking at will support it, but you'd have to check with some authoritative documentation to be sure.

SCART, IIRC, is a big plastic block connector with multiple conductors, right? This is absolutely nothing like anything that's ever been used in the US. Component inputs are uncommon, but do exist on higher-end TVs, of which I'm sure the plasma display you reference is. They are, essentially (and this isn't entirely correct, but it's close enough) Red, Green, and Blue each on separate cables. The cables are the exact same size and shape as an RCA cable, like the kind that the audio output on the empeg would use. I believe that the impedance, et al., is the same, but I don't know for sure. The more common connectors are composite, which is a single RCA-type cable (definitely the same impedance, et al., as an audio cable) that carries the entire video signal, and S-Video, which is a multi-conductor cable that carries chromaticity and luminance separately, and looks rather like a PS/2 keyboard or mouse connector on both ends except it has 4 conductors and a plastic key inside the surrounding shield. There are a couple of other connectors that you still see, but they're reasonably obsolete and will mostlikely not be on a plasma TV.