Facing heat, Arafat demands militants end attacks

Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat is using a newly restored level of popularity to beat back demands that he appoint a prime minister and reform his administration.

But he seems to be heeding calls – from within the Fateh political movement he founded as well as from the outside world – that Palestinians cease their attacks on Israeli civilians.

"The word has gone out," says a senior Western diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, "that now is a very bad time for attacks on Israelis."

In late September, after Israeli forces had once again laid siege to his compound here, Mr. Arafat instructed the two leading Palestinian militant groups, the Islamic Resistance Movement and Islamic Jihad, to abstain from violence. "Arafat sent a clear message to them through [National Security Adviser Mohammed] Dahlan not to do anything," says a senior Palestinian security official, also speaking on condition of anonymity.

This official attributes the starkest of motives to Arafat: "Only when he saw the knife against his throat did he act." The Israeli siege followed a pair of suicide attacks in mid-September that sparked speculation that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon would expel or kill the Palestinian leader.

But Arafat's move to curtail attacks on Israeli civilians is more than self-preservation. After two years of uprising, or intifada, against Israel, many Palestinians are tiring of the conflict – a fatigue that has manifested itself in street-level criticism of Arafat's leadership and of the Palestinians' most notorious tactic: suicide bombing.

Notwithstanding a surge of popularity during Israel's most recent siege, Arafat is in deeper political trouble today than he has been in many years. Four months ago, a Palestinian Cabinet minister named Nabil Amr resigned his office, calling on Arafat to reform his administration. Last month, Arafat dissolved the entire Cabinet, promising to name new ministers in an effort to placate Palestinian political frustration. He also announced that elections would be held in January.

On Tuesday night, the central committee of Fateh, the mainstream Palestinian political faction, backed Arafat's stance that the appointment of a prime minister should wait until the establishment of a Palestinian state. Given the slim likelihood of such a thing coming into existence anytime soon, the wait could be a long one.

In an interview Wednesday in his Ramallah home, Mr. Amr said the push for reform – including the naming of a premier – would continue. He noted that the central committee "took a decision about the timing, not about the idea."

But if the political push has been delayed, a reconsideration of the use of violence seems to be gathering momentum. Regarding what Palestinians call their "armed struggle," Amr says "there is a real change, a deep change." While Palestinians will not stop their "resistance" against occupation and settlements, he says, "all of Fateh is against suicide bombing."

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