Palestinian Anger Mounts as Israelis Tightens Noose

by Ferry Biedermann

The old British police fort known as the Muqata, which had become the local headquarters of the Palestinian Authority (PA), was blown up over the weekend by Israeli soldiers. The Israelis said 15 militants on their wanted list were hiding in the building. No bodies were found.

Palestinians say this was an excuse to demolish yet another symbol of the aspiration for Palestinian statehood.

"The Muqata to us was what the Pentagon is to Washington, what the World Trade Center towers were to New York," says Abbas Zaki, local leader of Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement and member of the Palestinian parliament. He says demolition of the headquarters was a part of a plan by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to dismantle the PA and depose Arafat.

Hebron, like most other West Bank towns, was reoccupied by the Israeli army more than a week ago and placed under curfew. After the Muqata was blown up, the curfew has been relaxed slightly. Groups of children dart out into the streets the moment an Israeli patrol has passed. Waving their arms they warn the few cars that take their chance on the roads about nearby tanks or jeeps.

Abbas Zaki says the Israeli presence will make people more militant. "Hebron was not very militant because the Israelis have always kept control of the city center, but now that they impose such a strict occupation on us, people will want revenge," he says.

Israeli measures and the U.S. focus on replacing Arafat will backfire, he says. Zaki is critical of the Palestinian leader himself but says people will back him now that the U.S. and Israel want him out.

"Arafat was almost finished after the last Israeli offensive," he says, "but now that Bush has put him in the spotlight people are naturally rallying around him."

Many Palestinians were critical of their leader's handling of the Israeli siege of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem in April and May. The stand-off ended with the expulsion of 13 wanted militants to Europe, an outcome that made Arafat unpopular.

When a mediator was needed last week to approach militants presumably holed up in the Muqata, the local authorities avoided involving the PA and Arafat because of the outcome in Bethlehem, Zaki says.

Last week's speech by President George Bush calling upon Palestinians to change their leadership is threatening to stifle internal calls for reform, says political analyst Ali Jarbawi. "Nobody of any consequence will now even want to stand against Arafat in elections," he says.

These views are echoed by Mohammed Dahlan, former head of the Palestinian Preventive Security in Gaza. Dahlan wrote in The Guardian published in London: "As long as the Israelis are against Arafat, I'm with him -- whatever reservations I have about some of the decisions that have been made."

Dahlan has long been regarded as a possible successor to Arafat but he has never sought to contest chairmanship of the PA. He is considered acceptable to the Americans and the Israelis, a quality that automatically taints any aspiring leader, says Jarbawi.

Any new leader will probably be more militant and certainly less able to make peace than Arafat, says the political analyst. "There will be a contest to be tougher towards the Israelis," he says.

Mayor of Hebron Mustafa Natsheh, meanwhile, warns of severe problems in his city if the occupation continues much longer. "It is very difficult even to coordinate humanitarian issues with the army," he says.

Garbage has not been collected for more than a week. In the hot summer this can cause serious health problems. "The longer the occupation goes on the more problems we will face," Natsheh says.

The municipality is distributing some milk and bread. "The dairies provide it for free, otherwise they would have to throw it away anyway," he says. "They cannot distribute it, people cannot come to the shops and if they do, they don't have money because nobody can go to work."

Natsheh also says the occupation is a part of a plan by Sharon to dismantle the PA. "That man can only destroy," he says. "The Muqata, the Oslo accords, everything."

The total reoccupation of Hebron is only marginally worse that the siege the residents had been facing for months.

"For three months they cut off the city, nobody could go to work in Israel or somewhere else in the West Bank," Natsheh says. "Now people cannot even go to work inside the city. The siege was, as far as we are concerned, also an occupation," he says. "Anybody can become a militant under these circumstances."