Yasser Arafat appears to have faced down one domestic challenge to his methods of rule. There will be others, writes Graham Usher from Ramallah Amid smiles and handshakes, on Tuesday Palestinian prime minister, Ahmed Qurei, withdrew his resignation, resolving at least one strand of the crisis that has rocked the Palestinian Authority in Gaza. "The president refused the resignation and I will comply, and we are waiting to see how things will move," he said, standing alongside his president in Ramallah. "I am satisfied President Arafat is serious this time, that it will not just be words but that this time there will be action." The "action" is the result of a compromise worked out between Yasser Arafat and Qurei and a commission of Palestinian parliament members and ministers. Under it Arafat has pledged to transfer three "internal" security forces to the prime minister and his interior minister. The remaining nine forces (now "consolidated" into three) will be answerable to Arafat, in his capacity as head of the PLO's National Security Council. In other words -- commented one legislator in Ramallah -- Arafat has agreed to observe the Basic Law passed during Mahmoud Abbas's government last year but "suspended" following the government's fall. Will Arafat be more "serious this time"? Palestinians shrug their shoulders. There is no real resolution of the status of interior minister: some legislators say it will come under Qurei's purview, others that it will stay with the incumbent Hakam Balawi. Nor does the deal address the issue that ignited the crisis in the first place: Arafat's appointment of his nephew, Musa Arafat, as head the PA's main police force in Gaza. Few believe Arafat will rescind that decision, though he has apparently empowered the attorney general to investigate all cases of alleged corruption. In any case the "reforms" have not convinced Israel and the US: both essentially dismissed them as another case of "propositions, not action" from the Palestinian leader. But the compromise will almost certainly satisfy the Palestinian parliament, cabinet and the majority in Arafat's Fatah movement, all of which understand this is the maximum Arafat will yield in the present circumstances. The bigger question is will it satisfy those Fatah dissidents who led the revolt in Gaza. "The worth of the reforms will be measured by what happens on the ground," said PA deputy cabinet minister, Sufian Abu Zaida. "When the [corruption] cases are taken to the Justice Ministry, we will know something real has happened. Until then we will continue our [anti-corruption] campaign by peaceful means." On Tuesday Palestinian schoolchildren in Gaza marched against "corruption in the PA" and Israel's month- long siege of Beit Hanoun. But most Palestinians expect the demonstrations will dwindle. The fragile consensus is that in this "internal battle", as in so many others, "Arafat has emerged the stronger," said one cabinet minister. What did the Gaza revolt signify? For Arafat and many in the Palestinian leadership the answer is plain. It was the first move in an attempted coup, orchestrated by former Security Minister Mohamed Dahlan, aided by "outside powers", and with the aim of setting up a separate Palestinian administration in Gaza ahead of an Israeli withdrawal. More independent observers discount the conspiracy theory, while admitting the fact of a revolt. "What happened within Fatah and the PA apparatus in Gaza was a naked power struggle that took the form of a rebellion," wrote Palestinian analyst, Mandour Nofal, in the Palestinian Al- Ayyam newspaper on Monday. "The objective of those behind it was not the overthrow of Yasser Arafat and the PA but rather to create a precedent and consolidate their positions in Fatah and the PA. What the rebels were after was to force the leadership to instigate major changes in the PA security forces". If so, the rebellion clearly failed. But the rebels' failure does not necessarily translate as Arafat's success, says another Palestinian analyst. "For most of the Intifada Arafat has played one side off against the other, maintaining a certain balance [between the different streams in Fatah] while remaining immune from criticism. What we saw in Gaza was the end of the balancing act. Instead, in order to maintain his control in Gaza, Arafat was forced to rely on people who are the most hated in Gaza." In this sense "Arafat has been weakened by the crisis". For this analyst and the vast majority of Palestinians the only peaceful exit from the crisis is new Palestinian elections -- local, parliamentary and presidential. But faced with an Israeli occupation and a US veto all are aware elections are not going to happen anytime soon. The most that can be expected for now is that "this time" Arafat stays true to his word and grants Qurei and his cabinet some degree of autonomy over some of the security forces. "Then the issue will be clear," says one cabinet minister. "We will be able to see whether Dahlan and his group have their own project or are simply demanding change." The alternative is what happened in Gaza, only worse and more of it. It will be Fatah and the PA's final descent into a power struggle over whatever spoils Israel chooses to leave.
