Arafat leaves no clear successor

By Arthur Max
The Associated Press

Raouhi Fattouh will become acting president.

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JERUSALEM — Yasser Arafat jealously guarded his power for four decades, blocking many potential challengers from rising into prominence while others died in combat or were thrown into Israeli prisons. Arafat's refusal to groom a successor could haunt his people.

As long as he was alive, Palestinians refused to discuss Arafat's succession openly, concerned about being disrespectful to the man who put their plight on the world agenda. Even after he fell gravely ill, Palestinians refused to speculate on who would be their next leader.

The result is that no Palestinian in public life has the stature or power base to wield authority as Arafat did, much less the strength to unify competing political factions and the fractious array of security forces Arafat set up.

	Mahmoud Abbas is the former prime minister.

Parliament speaker Raouhi Fattouh will become acting president of the Palestinian Authority for 60 days, in accordance with Palestinian basic law. But Fattouh is a bland politician and is likely to fade quickly from public view.

The list of weaker politicians who could follow Arafat permanently includes former Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, current Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia and two Palestinian security chiefs, Mohammed Dahlan and Jibril Rajoub. In an unconfirmed report early today, a Palestinian official said Abbas had been named Arafat's successor as PLO chief.

The most popular leader, and the one who would have the best chance of consolidating power, is Marwan Barghouti, but he is serving a life sentence in an Israeli prison.

	Ahmed Qureia is current prime minister.

Rather than a single person, a collective leadership could coalesce to govern for the near term, along the lines Arafat dictated before leaving for Paris.

Under that arrangement, Abbas and Qureia have a carefully balanced division of authority. Abbas, widely known as Abu Mazen, is chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization's executive committee, the paramount political body. Qureia, known as Abu Ala, took charge of security forces.

Some analysts think a smooth transition to elections, shepherded by a caretaker government under Abbas and Qureia, could open new prospects for peace after four years of the second intefadeh, the violent uprising against Israeli rule.

	Mohammed Dahlan was a former Gaza security chief.

"It could be one of the most hopeful signs of the last four years, because these Palestinians, at different stages, have been critics of the militarization of the intefadeh," said David Makovsky at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

But hard-line militant groups opposed to Israel's existence likely will seek to exert greater influence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Hamas and Islamic Jihad also could launch a new wave of suicide bombings to provoke a fierce Israeli response, making it difficult for the new leadership to initiate serious peace talks with Israel.

Power-sharing is unlikely to last for long, with jousting sure to break out in the ranks of Arafat's Fatah political movement.

"There will be a strong competition over power, but not fighting," said Ghassan Khatib, the Palestinian labor minister. "We would see strong competition between individuals and streams within Fatah over power, but they will not use weapons against each other, because both parties would lose in that case."

The last general election was in January 1996.

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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