Arafat's desperate attempts to maintain control are unravelling by the day, reports Khaled Amayreh from Gaza A showdown is steadily brewing between Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Yasser Arafat and his former Security Chief Mohamed Dahlan over the introduction of political reforms and fighting the rampant corruption throughout the PA hierarchy. The rift was wider than ever this week, with Dahlan reportedly making unprecedentedly harsh and audacious remarks about the president's leadership and style of governance. In a press conference held in Amman earlier this week, Dahlan accused Arafat of "sitting on a pile of Palestinian corpses". Dahlan, a former chief of the Gaza branch of the Preventive Security Force (PSF) and security minister in the government of Ahmed Qurie -- also known by his nom de guerre Abu Mazen -- reportedly gave Arafat what appeared to be an ultimatum. He warned the Palestinian leader that he would order some 30,000 supporters to take to the streets in Gaza unless he took "genuine and radical" steps to fight corruption and prosecute and dismiss corrupt officials. Furthermore, Dahlan accused Hamas of "siding with Arafat" by not joining forces with him to fight corruption and misgovernment. Careful not to be dragged into the intra-Fatah mess, Hamas defended its position, arguing that fighting corruption and effecting political reforms could not and should not be carried out through violent means. "There is no cause paramount enough to justify a Palestinian brandishing his weapon against another Palestinian," a Hamas spokesman in Gaza told Al- Ahram Weekly. Sensing the gravity of the growing crisis -- heightened by growing chaos and lawlessness in the northern parts of the West Bank -- Arafat's supporters ostensibly sought to de-escalate the showdown with Dahlan, accusing him of fostering instability and undermining national interests. However, the PA leadership meanwhile moved to reassert Arafat's leadership in the West Bank where Dahlan enjoys very little support. A large pro- Arafat demonstration was organised in Ramallah on Sunday, with thousands of people holding Arafat's portraits aloft. Speakers lashed out against Dahlan, accusing him -- without mentioning his name -- of colluding with the enemies of the Palestinian people to weaken the Palestinian leadership, and thus compromising Palestinian rights. More demonstrations were expected to be held in other parts of the West Bank, whose main goal would be to reassert the leadership of Arafat. The task of re-legitimising Arafat's leadership, however, is unlikely to be as easy as it once was. There is a host of factors contributing to the significant dwindling in the Palestinian leader's status among the general population. First, Fatah -- Arafat's ultimate power base -- is now split down the middle, as a growing sector of the movement, which counts especially on those affiliated with the movement's armed wing, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, is no longer willing to give the PA chairman unconditional allegiance. Second, corruption, the virtual absence of political reform and the lack of the rule of law in most Palestinian population centres have dealt a severe blow to the leader's popularity among the Palestinian people in general. Interestingly, Arafat may not even be fully aware of the fact that his popularity is dwindling, as his close aides are unlikely to confront him with the bad news, a fact that only further exacerbates the existing crisis. Another important factor contributing to Arafat's weakness in the eyes of the Palestinian masses is the PA's inability to stop Israel's brutal repression of Palestinian civilians, in the form of almost daily atrocities and wanton demolitions of thousands of Palestinian homes which are now attracting little international attention. The suffering and systematic persecution meted out to ordinary Palestinians, say some pundits, have dried up what once was an innate and spontaneous support for and loyalty to the long-time Palestinian leader. This week, the steady demise in Arafat's popularity manifested itself in Jenin in the northern West Bank, when disgruntled Fatah members stormed and burned down the governorate building. The angry activists were protesting Arafat's appointment of one of his loyalists, Qaddura Musa, as the new governor of Jenin. Another ominous incident took place in Nablus, the largest town in the West Bank, on Sunday when armed militiamen loyal to Arafat fired heavily into the air to prevent local leaders from holding a meeting in which the issue of corruption was to be discussed. In the end, the meeting did not convene, but popular mistrust of the PA grew rather than subsided as a result of this response. In the Gaza Strip, the overall situation was not any better. On Monday, armed men affiliated with Hamas stormed the Shifa hospital in downtown Gaza and killed two convicted informers who allegedly had collaborated with Israeli intelligence in the assassination of a prominent resistance figure. A third collaborator was killed inside a prison. Thanks to the valuable information provided by the collaborators, the Israeli army has been able to murder hundreds of Palestinian resistance fighters and politicians, including the two top Hamas political leaders, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and Abdul-Aziz Al-Rantisi. Hence, the liquidation of the collaborators enjoys widespread support among the Palestinian community. For its part, the PA is making desperate efforts to bring the situation under control. Two PA ministers -- one with close ties with Israel -- have been instructed to contact the Israeli government to seek permission to deploy Palestinian policemen in various West Bank population centres. However, Israel -- whose army has reoccupied the entire West Bank and has thus effectively rendered the PA government almost totally ineffective -- is unlikely to heed the Palestinian request. The reason is simple. The deployment of PA security forces in the West Bank would help revive the PA, the very entity Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has missed no opportunity to corrode and undermine.
