The previous weekend three Hamas suicide bombers had carried out attacks in Jerusalem and Haifa, killing 27 Israelis in the span of 12 hours. Under intense U.S. and Israeli pressure, Palestinian security forces had fanned out across the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, hauling 120 Islamic militants into custody. But Israelis derided Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasir Arafat’s efforts as a mere roundup of the usual suspects, and White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer all but mocked the Palestinian leader, saying his jails are “built with bars in front with revolving doors at the back.” Certainly the sheik himself appeared serene as he dismissed reports that Arafat had placed him under house arrest. “If it were true, you wouldn’t be meeting me,” he told Newsweek, his high-pitched voice barely louder than a whisper.
In an hourlong conversation at his residence in the squalid Sabra neighborhood of Gaza City, Yassin claimed that neither the detentions nor Israeli assassinations of Hamas militants had harmed the group’s ability to continue its devastating wave of suicide bombings. “They can target whom they want,” he said. “We have hundreds willing to die.” And he claimed that in the intensifying showdown between Arafat and Islamic radicals, he had no doubt who would prevail. “The people know who will get them their rights,” he said with a faint smile. “That is why they are turning to Hamas.”
Indeed they are. And, ironically enough, the most dire threat Yasir Arafat has ever faced may be from his own people. Arafat, the supersurvivor who as a guerrilla (or terrorist, depending on your point of view) escaped countless attempts on his life in the ’60s,’70s and ’80s, now must crush a guerrilla uprising in his own territory. It is an uprising–the 15-month intifada–that Arafat almost certainly fomented himself but that he may no longer be able to control. What’s worse, much of the rest of the world sees the Palestinian suicide bombers not as freedom-fighting guerrillas–the view of Arafat’s increasingly disaffected people–but as terrorists who are as bad as Al Qaeda. In the wake of President George W. Bush’s post-September 11 declaration that those who harbor or support terrorists are terrorists themselves, the ever-vacillating Arafat is losing the support not only of Washington but of his longtime ally, the “international community.” “This is the first time that he is really feeling pressure from all sides,” says Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, Israel’s minister of Defense.
For Arafat, Hamas’s bloody weekend may have amounted to one bombing too many. So appalled were U.S. officials by the slaughter, which occurred while new U.S. envoy Anthony Zinni was in Jerusalem pressing for a ceasefire, that the Bush administration finally seemed to hand Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon the victory he’s sought for two months: a U.S. willingness to equate Israel’s struggle against terror with America’s. Senior administration officials called the weekend bombings “a watershed” and said Bush and his wife, Laura, talked about how much they felt for Sharon. The administration shut down the Texas-based Holy Land Foundation as an alleged source of Hamas funding, and for the first time did not restrain Israeli military retaliation.
Israelis and many U.S. officials–and increasingly even some Palestinians–say that Arafat is only reaping what he sowed. The Palestinian leader, after all, turned down successive peace deals and permitted, or incited, the intifada as a means of winning through terror what he failed to get at the bargaining table. But Arafat’s options for action now are few. Consider: hours after Yassin granted NEWSWEEK an interview, the Palestinian Authority moved against the Hamas leader. Agents cut the sheik’s telephone lines, seized his Land Cruiser, stationed dozens of police and security men in front of his house and forbade him to meet with anyone other than his family. But within half an hour, 1,000 Palestinians had marched to Yassin’s residence, chanting pro-Hamas slogans and denouncing the Palestinian Authority as “collaborators.” A gun battle broke out between Hamas guerrillas and security forces; one of Yassin’s personal guards was killed. Amid the chaos, Yassin was whisked away by Hamas men to an undisclosed location. He spent the night in hiding and returned home the next morn-ing. The Palestinian Authority’s security force was nowhere to be found.
The retreat was a humiliation for Arafat. That is likely to encourage only more challenges from Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants. Recent polls in the West Bank show that 70 percent of Palestinians back the intifada, and an equal number believe suicide bombings are justified as long as Israel continues its occupation of Palestinian territories. Arafat even faces growing resistance from his own police. One high-ranking officer in the Palestinian security force told NEWSWEEK that he would defy further orders to arrest Hamas and Islamic Jihad members. “Two of my friends were killed by Israeli missiles in Ramallah. How can I then arrest freedom fighters?” said the officer, who asked not to be identified. Most members of military cells had gone underground, he said, making it difficult to apprehend them; the majority of those arrested were political figures who were not directly involved in committing acts of bloodshed. The security man blamed Arafat for giving the green light to violence at the start of the intifada–and then asking the police to clean up his mistakes. “We should never have allowed the paramilitary groups to grow. We should have stopped it a year ago,” he said.
If Arafat cracks down too hard on the radicals, he could provoke a civil war–one that could end in his ouster and death. But if he continues to gives them free rein, he faces international ostracism and the dismantling of the Palestinian Authority infrastructure by Israeli missiles. “Arafat is in a corner,” says Frei Abu-Middain, the Palestinian minister of Justice. The Palestinian leader’s biographer, Said Aburish, is more blunt: “I think Arafat’s finished. Because if he accepts what the Israelis are demanding, he becomes a policeman for them. If he turns it down, the peace process is finished.”
Arafat, of course, has found his way out of tight spots before. Typically he’ll do the bare minimum needed to avoid harsher Israeli action: he is still widely perceived as the only Palestinian leader who can make peace. And Sharon, for the moment, is resisting calls from hard-liners in his cabinet to crush the Palestinian Authority (interview, page 43). Ben-Eliezer insists that the current alternatives to Arafat are too terrible to consider. “Destroying the Palestinian Authority and Arafat would be the worst mistake we could make,” he says. Analysts say Sharon is pursuing a three-pronged strategy: erode the militants’ infrastructure, debilitate the Palestinian Authority and force Arafat to make peace with Israel on Sharon’s own tough terms.
As Arafat flounders, Sharon’s position is growing stronger. According to a poll taken two days after the weekend suicide attacks, 74 percent of Israelis now approve of his performance as prime minister. Sharon’s tactics–tit-for-tat strikes against Palestinian Authority targets, incursions into Palestinian cities and assassinations of suspected terrorists–are gaining increasing support both at home and abroad.
And criticized though they are overseas, Sharon’s “targeted killings” of militants are also making life difficult for Arafat. Last month’s assassination of Mahmoud Abu Hanud, a top leader of Hamas’s military wing, came after a month of quiet–and days before Zinni’s arrival in the region to revive the stalled peace process. The killing triggered the wave of suicide bombings by Hamas, derailed negotiations, heightened popular support for the militants and intensified calls for Arafat to crack down. Palestinians say such assassinations place Arafat in an impossible bind. “They blindfold him, throw him into the sea and ask him to be a good swimmer,” says Saeb Erakat, chief negotiator for the Palestinian Authority.
Arafat will have to move fast to prove he can reassert control. Sharon, with apparent U.S. backing, is said to be weighing new military action. The message appears to be sinking in. Brandishing a list of 33 militants on Israel’s most-wanted list, Ben-Eliezer says, “Arafat has arrested six or seven people on the list this week.” Top U.S. officials say that Arafat will have to do more. But Washington is also putting the pressure on Sharon to stop knocking out Palestinian prisons. “The Israelis can’t bomb the jails whenever he arrests someone. It’s hard to keep people in when the walls are being blown in,” says Edward Walker, former assistant secretary of State.
Still, the U.S. tilt toward Sharon is unmistakable. Zinni met with Palestinian and Israeli officials last Friday morning and laid down the rules: the Palestinian Authority must outlaw Hamas and Islamic Jihad and round up an additional 38 militants on a list drawn up by U.S. officials. Washington has also dispatched William Burns, the assistant secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, to encourage Arab leaders to keep the heat on Arafat. The problem for Arafat is that to rally his people behind such a crackdown, he’ll need to show that Sharon is offering substantial concessions in return. But in contrast to his predecessor, Ehud Barak–who offered Palestinians a state on 97 percent of the West Bank and a capital in East Jerusalem–Sharon has hinted he might dismantle only a few isolated settlements and approve a Palestinian state on the roughly 40 percent of the territory that the authority now controls. And with a new, stronger hand to play, Sharon is less likely than ever to offer anything more.
