New Palestinian Government In Trouble

Can you summarize? thx, c.i.

My take is that if Mahmoud Abbas can face down Arafat on the cabinet appointments, there is a real chance of progress. Joint developement of a gas field would also be significant, as commerical ventures do have influence on government policies.

Arafat fight over Cabinet dashes peace hopes
Arafat fight over Cabinet dashes peace hopes
From Robert Tait in Jerusalem - 4/22/03 - London Times

ISRAEL all but wrote off the prospect of reviving the Middle East peace process yesterday as Yassir Arafat stood on the brink of winning a power struggle with the new Palestinian Prime Minister.
Senior Palestinians said that Mahmoud Abbas had no chance of forming a government after his row with Mr Arafat, the Palestinian leader, over Cabinet appointments.

Mr Abbas, the Palestinian Prime Minister-designate, has until today to submit his Cabinet list to the Palestinian Legislative Council for approval. Without Mr Arafat's endorsement, it is unlikely that the majority of Fatah members in the parliament will support the administration.

Mr Abbas, who has been courted as a partner for future negotiations by the United States and Israel, has threatened to resign unless his Cabinet is approved. He said yesterday that he would step down unless Mohammad Dahlan, 41, was put in charge of the security services, a role that would involve confronting militants who attack Israel.

Palestinian sources said that the issue was deadlocked and that time was running out for Mr Abbas, also known as Abu Mazen. Standing firm over Mr Dahlan was a key test of Mr Abbas's credibility, they said.

Nabil Shaath, a Palestinian Cabinet minister and an Arafat loyalist, said: "Mahmoud Abbas has no chance of presenting a government due to the large gaps and deep crisis between him and Yassir Arafat."

Mr Arafat is understood to have approached other candidates for Prime Minister, including Mr Shaath and Salem Fayed, the Finance Minister.

Sources close to Ariel Sharon, the Israeli Prime Minister, said that replacing Mr Abbas with one of Mr Arafat's allies would wreck the chances of negotiations along the lines of the peace "road map", an international plan that envisages a Palestinian state by 2005.

Raanan Gissin, Mr Sharon's spokesman, said: "Contrary to Arafat, Abu Mazen is against terrorist activity and against what is euphemistically called the armed intifada. If Arafat is going to put in another leader, it's going to be a non-starter. And what's going to be the main victim? The road map. If it's someone who is going to continue the present Palestinian policy, that gives us no option but to continue with our present policy.

"This whole process could have been much shorter and the Palestinian people would have been stronger in pressuring Arafat if it wasn't for the Europeans, who keep giving Arafat legitimacy by coming to see him and giving him light at the end of the tunnel."

Washington is committed to publishing the road map after Mr Abbas and his Cabinet are confirmed. President Bush has floated the idea of a meeting between Mr Abbas and Mr Sharon being hosted at the White House. Israel is ready to ease security measures should Mr Abbas take office.

Mr Dahlan left the Palestinian Cabinet last year after a disagreement with Mr Arafat, who sees him as dangerously ambitious. However, his effectiveness in dealing with militants as head of preventive security in the Gaza Strip has won Israel's support. Mr Arafat has insisted that Hani al-Hasan, the present Interior Minister, remain in charge of security.

Mr al-Hasan was a vocal critic of the 1993 Oslo peace accords with Israel, which Mr Abbas helped to negotiate.

Mr Arafat also objected to the wholesale sackings proposed by Mr Abbas, and demanded that 17 of the current ministers remain in the Cabinet. Mr Abbas has bowed to Mr Arafat on several points.

Yesterday Professor Ali Jerbawi, a political scientist at Bir Zeit University in the West Bank, said that Mr Abbas had lost credibility by not standing by his original Cabinet.

Miguel Moratinos, the European Union's Middle East envoy, as well as President Mubarak of Egypt and King Abdullah of Jordan called Mr Arafat to urge him to accept Mr Abbas's administration.

Mahmoud Abbas

1935: Born in Safed, Galilee, the son of a cheesemaker

1948: Fled Israel with his family to Syria; studied law at the University of Damascus and taught at a school

1950s: Co-founded the Fatah movement with Yassir Arafat and became a member of its central institutions; established a family home in Qatar and married a Safed-born refugee, they have three sons; became personnel director in the public service and later a businessman

1970s: Worked as a fundraiser for the Palestine Liberation Organisation, assuming an important security role

1980: Appointed head of PLO Department for National and International Relations

1983: First began a dialogue with Israelis, meeting the Council for Israel-Palestine Peace in Tunisia as an official representative of the PLO

1984: Published his doctoral thesis, written at Moscow University, entitled The Other Side, the Secret Relations between the Nazis and the Zionist Movement

1988: Elected to the PLO executive committee and given the portfolio of the occupied territories

1993: Accompanied Mr Arafat to the White House to sign the Oslo accords with Israel

1994: Elected secretary of the PLO's Central Committee and deputy to Mr Arafat

2000: Negotiator at the failed Camp David peace talks between Ehud Barak, the Israeli Prime Minister, and Mr Arafat

2003: Appointed the first Palestinian Prime Minister- designate

Arafat rejects the proposed Paleatinian cabinet for two reasons:

• He does not want to share power with anyone
  
• Abu Mazen and Muhammed Dahlan really mean to disarm all the terrorist militias, including the Fatah-oriented Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades, and this will mean end to insurgence
  

Blair calls Arafat to end Abbas stalemate
Blair calls Arafat to end Abbas stalemate
By Robert Tait in Jerusalem and Richard Beeston, Diplomatic Editor
4/23/03 - London Times

TONY BLAIR made a personal plea to Yassir Arafat last night to back down in the Palestinian leadership crisis that is threatening to sink hopes of reviving the Middle East peace process.
With time running out for the formation of a new Palestinian government, the Prime Minister appealed to Mr Arafat in a telephone call to drop attempts to curb the powers of Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Prime Minister-designate, and allow him to take office.

The intervention came as Mr Abbas ?- widely known as Abu Mazen ?- let it be known that he no longer intends to negotiate with Mr Arafat, the Palestinian Authority leader, either personally or through intermediaries. That left the dispute between the two men in a position of stalemate and made international hopes that Mr Abbas could form a government capable of negotiating peace with Israel increasingly remote.

A reinterpretation of the Palestinian Authority's rules extended the deadline for forming the Cabinet from last night until this evening. The Cabinet has to be approved by the 88-member Palestinian Legislative Council, over which Mr Arafat has great influence.

A Downing Street spokesman said that Mr Blair had called Mr Arafat for "an exchange of views". Mr Blair is the latest in a line of European and Arab leaders to speak to Mr Arafat in an effort to persuade him that Mr Abbas is the only credible candidate.

Andrei Vdovin, the Russian Middle East envoy, told Mr Arafat in a meeting on Saturday that Palestinians could not afford any further delays.

"Either you (Palestinians) start improving the situation through forming a Cabinet headed by Abu Mazen to release the ?'road map' . . . or the situation will continue to deteriorate," he said.

It seemed doubtful last night that international pressure would have any effect on Mr Arafat, who is desperately trying to cling to power and avoid being marginalised.

He was reported to have slammed the phone down on Miguel Moratinos, the European Union envoy to the Middle East, on Sunday after Señor Moratinos told Mr Arafat that the EU would accept only Mr Abbas as Prime Minister.

"Pressure is coming from everywhere. Everybody is saying hurry up and form the Cabinet," said Abbas Zaki, a member of the central committee of Fatah, the largest Palestinian political group, which Mr Arafat and Mr Abbas co-founded.

Senior British officials were furious with Mr Arafat. "He has shot himself in the foot. This crisis plays straight into the hands of the Israelis and the hawks in Washington, who never wanted this peace initiative in the first place," one British source said.

He predicted that unless a credible Palestinian government could be formed by the summer, it would be too late for the Bush Administration to engage properly in a new peace initiative before it began to focus on its re-election campaign for 2004.

Mr Blair probably has more at stake than any other world leader. He has pressed President Bush to publish the international Middle East "road map", which plans for Palestinian statehood by 2005, as a means of counter-balancing Arab concerns over the British-US war in Iraq. British officials say that Arab governments have accused the West of double standards in its attitudes to Saddam Hussein's regime and the Israeli- Palestinian conflict.

Israel has said that it will negotiate with Mr Abbas, but it does not regard Mr Arafat, whom it blames for backing "terrorist" attacks by militants, as a suitable partner.

The dispute between Mr Arafat and Mr Abbas centres on the latter's insistence on confronting Palestinian militant groups. Mr Abbas wants to dismantle the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, which is linked to Fatah and which has carried out suicide bombings against Israel. He also wants to put Muhammad Dahlan, an enemy of Mr Arafat, in charge of cracking down on militants.

Palestinian sources painted a gloomy picture last night of chances of resolving the dispute. One official said that Mr Arafat was considering naming Ahmed Qureia, the Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council, as a possible replacement for Mr Abbas.

Arab Leaders Press Arafat Over Cabinet
Arab Leaders Press Arafat Over Cabinet
Wednesday April 23, 2003 3:00 PM

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) - In a last-minute mediation mission, the
Egyptian intelligence chief pressed Yasser Arafat and his prime minister-designate, Mahmoud Abbas, to end their standoff Wednesday over a new Palestinian Cabinet.

Failure to reach agreement could delay or scuttle a U.S.-backed peace plan for full Palestinian statehood within three years. President Bush has said he only will present that plan after an empowered Palestinian prime minister is installed.

The intelligence chief, Omar Suleiman, presented a compromise proposal to Arafat in an hour-long meeting at the Palestinian leader's West Bank headquarters, an official close to the talks said. He then visited Abbas' nearby home and went back to see Arafat again.

Two Palestinian Cabinet ministers, Nabil Shaath and Ghassan Khatib, said they were optimistic the crisis could be resolved by the Wednesday midnight deadline set by Palestinian regulations.

By then, Abbas must present a list of ministers to Arafat or step aside. He has the sole authority to form the Cabinet, but in practice needs Arafat's blessing. The Cabinet requires the approval of parliament, where Arafat's ruling Fatah party commands a solid majority.

Ostensibly, Arafat and Abbas are at odds over whom to name security chief, but the crux of the conflict appears to be Arafat's refusal to relinquish some of his authority. Abbas has lost valuable support in Fatah by appointing to his Cabinet several politicians tainted by corruption, and by not bringing in new faces.

An official close to the talks said Suleiman was trying to persuade both men to accept a compromise asserting Abbas' right to form a Cabinet without interference but also assuring Arafat he will be consulted on major decisions concerning security, including a future crackdown on Palestinian militias.

International mediators have been watching the standoff closely, and
appeared to be exerting intense pressure on Arafat to back down.

In the night from Tuesday to Wednesday, Arafat received phone calls From Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak, the Qatari foreign minister, the Arab League secretary-general and the Greek foreign minister, a senior Palestinian official said.

Mubarak called twice and dispatched his intelligence chief, Suleiman, to the West Bank to mediate. Suleiman's mission was seen as decisive.
Suleiman met for an hour with Arafat, then held talks with Abbas before meeting Arafat again. Russia's envoy to the Middle East, Andrei Vdovin, participated in the session at Abbas' office. After that meeting, Abbas and Vdovin left for an undisclosed destination.

Abbas has not spoken to Arafat since a contentious meeting Saturday, and his aides said he has not received calls from foreign leaders. The aides, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Abbas is determined to use the time left to him to form a Cabinet.

Shaath, the Palestinian planning minister, appeared upbeat Wednesday.

``I think we have a big chance in forming the government, and I hope it will succeed,'' Shaath said after Arafat met Suleiman.

However, Palestinian officials have offered sharply conflicting assessments of the crisis in recent days.

The key disagreement is over Mohammed Dahlan, a former Gaza security
chief whom Abbas wants to name Palestinian security chief. Dahlan has
promised to rein in the militias.

Arafat does not want the independent-minded Dahlan in the Cabinet and
prefers confidant Hani al-Hassan. Many Fatah officials also say Dahlan is corrupt and inexperienced.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Tuesday that it was up to the Palestinians to choose their leader. However, Abbas should be free to select his Cabinet, Boucher said.

``You don't have an empowered prime minister, you don't have a
leadership that's capable of establishing the institutions of a state unless the leaders get to choose the members of their cabinet,'' Boucher said.

Bush has criticized Arafat as being entwined with terror against Israel.

In the West Bank town of Jenin, meanwhile, Israeli troops raided two hospitals Wednesday and arrested two wanted Palestinians from the Islamic Jihad group being treated there, doctors said. In one raid, troops blew up the gate to the private Al Shifa Hospital in Jenin, hospital officials said.

The Israeli military said the two men were involved in separate plans to carry out suicide bombings in Israel in the coming days, but provided no details.

In the West Bank city of Nablus, another Islamic Jihad member was
seriously wounded after opening fire on Israeli commandos trying to arrest him, the army said. The man, Anas Shreiteh, was taken by helicopter to an Israeli hospital. The soldiers were not harmed.