A week after his death Palestinians are slowly coming to grips with the loss of Yasser Arafat, writes Graham Usher from Ramallah After the emotional fury of Yasser Arafat's funeral quiet has descended on the occupied territories as Palestinians step cautiously into an uncharted future. The calm has been sustained by the three-day Eid Al-Fitr holiday and what so far has been a relatively smooth political transition. Within hours of Arafat's death Mahmoud Abbas was elected Chairman of the PLO Executive Committee, its first new leader in 35 years. Former parliamentary speaker, Rouhi Fattouh, was anointed interim president of the Palestinian Authority, with the sole remit of organising presidential elections, now scheduled for 9 January 2005. And veteran Palestinian leader Farouk Qaddumi was made chairman of the Fatah Central Committee, the highest decision making body of Palestine's most powerful nationalist faction. Some eyebrows were raised with the last choice, given Qaddumi's antipathy to Abbas and the Oslo-like formulas for peace he advocates. But most Palestinians expressed relief, especially in the refugee camps. "Abul- Lutof [Qaddumi] will reassure the diaspora. They and we know he would never renounce the right of return," said a refugee from Ramallah's Amari camp. But the surface is easily ruptured. On 14 November masked gunmen entered Arafat's official mourning tent in Gaza where Abbas and his former security minister, Mohamed Dahlan, were receiving condolences. A gunfight flared, leaving two police officers and a score of others wounded. Abbas and Dahlan were at pains to insist that this was not an "assassination attempt" -- manifestly so since the gunmen could have easily killed them had they wanted to. But it was a warning. The gunmen were apparently affiliated to Ahmed Hilles, Fatah's official leader in Gaza and staunch ally of Arafat in his last, bruising battle with Dahlan for the loyalty of the movement and the PA's various security forces. Under the mantle of the "Abu Ammar Brigades" (Arafat's nom de guerre), the dissidents laid down a simple challenge to the new order: "We warn the pretenders to the legacy of Yasser Arafat, no matter how senior they are, not to think of ending the Intifada." There have been other challenges. In what to many feel was undue haste the FCC nominated Abbas as Fatah's candidate for the PA presidency. Most of Fatah opposed the decision. Some believed the candidate should be selected through a series of primaries and many would have preferred the currently imprisoned West Bank general secretary, Marwan Barghouti, to Abbas. "When Marwan takes the decision [to run], we will be near him and support him. I think he has the best chance of anybody in the movement to win the elections," said Ahmed Ghneim, a member of Fatah's Revolutionary Council. Barghouti has yet to make a decision despite the near certainty that he would win hands down in any straight contest with Abbas. Rather, say sources, he wants to revive the tactical alliance he struck last year with Abbas's short-lived government. It is based on a simple trade. Support for Abbas's presidency and his policies in return for absolute priority to be given by the new leadership to the release of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails and preparation for new general PA elections. Abbas heard similar sentiments in Gaza this week in a round of meetings with the Palestinian factions, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The Islamists want parliamentary as well as presidential elections to be held on 9 January. Nor -- Hamas leader, Mahmoud Zahhar, told reporters in Gaza on 16 November -- were they interested in any new Palestinian ceasefire unless accompanied by Israeli guarantees to end military incursions into Palestinian areas and the assassination of Palestinian military and political leaders. Like Barghouti, Zahhar also demanded the release of Palestinian prisoners. Beyond these politics of transition the mood throughout much of the occupied territories is one of profound loss. It is laced with fears of defeat and betrayal, fanned by a growing suspicion that Arafat was poisoned and by the failure of the French medical authorities to offer any counter diagnosis. Ali Hindi is a refugee and school maintenance man in Amari camp. "It's certainly the end of an era," he said on the day of Arafat's death. "Whether it is the beginning of a new one depends on whether Arafat died naturally or was poisoned. If he was poisoned, it means they are preparing to impose a settlement on us that required his removal. Our fear is that the next leadership will fail to guarantee our rights". Did Arafat guarantee your rights? "Yes. For us his greatest legacy was his refusal to concede on Jerusalem and the right of return at Camp David. At that moment of historical reckoning he had the courage and the patriotism to say 'no' to Israel and the US. Whatever his failings, they pale into insignificance beside that." What were his failings? Hindi looked for a moment and shrugged his shoulders. "He wasn't a democrat," he said. (see pp. 2-4)
