Arafat's decline leads to fears of violence
Bi LunChina Daily  Updated: 2004-11-06 09:08

A flurry of contradictory information on President Yasser Arafat's illness was leaked on Thursday as the Palestinian leader at various times was said to be brain dead or in a coma, in a stable but serious condition, and then dead - until reports of his death were retracted.

Arafat has certainly been moved to the intensive care unit after his still undiagnosed condition deteriorated critically at the Percy Hospital in Clamart, the southwest suburbs of Paris.

The 75-year-old Palestinian leader, who embodies the Palestinian struggle for statehood, was fighting for his life at the military hospital where he has been treated since last Friday.

A prolonged absence or death of the Palestinian leader is worrying for the prospects of the region and Israeli-Palestinian relations. There are fears of unrest among Palestinian factions, which Arafat, for decades a symbol of the Palestinian struggle with Israel, even by some who opposed him, was largely able to prevent.

Chaos in the West Bank and Gaza could make any dealings with Israel even more difficult.

The death of a leader Israel and Washington see as an obstacle to peace could also shuffle the cards in the Middle East conflict.

Israel accuses Arafat of fomenting violence in the Palestinian uprising against an Israeli occupation that is now four years old.

The United States and Israel have shunned Arafat, who has been a virtual prisoner in his Ramallah office since 2001.

Arafat, who enjoys the strong support of the majority of the Palestinian people, has a tight rein on Palestinian political and military power, and thus has a key voice in any Palestinian-Israeli peace talks.

Israel's refusal to deal with Arafat, the legitimate and chosen leader of the Palestinian people, as a negotiating partner for almost three years, has complicated the Middle East peace process already in place.

Four years of Israeli-Palestinian fighting has extinguished virtually all political contact between the two sides.

The decades-long conflict, which is now locked in a twisted logic of violence, only shows that neither party, Palestinian or Israeli, can attain what it dearly longs for.

The death of an icon to the Palestinians, in this sense, might drive the already desperate situation increasingly out of control.

With Arafat being sidelined indefinitely, Israelis and Palestinians have raised a wide range of possibilities about how the situation could play out.

As a matter of fact, his decline has touched off a spate of political activities in Jerusalem and Ramallah.

Palestinian officials focused on establishing lines of authority to keep up the day-to-day operations of the Palestinian Authority while Arafat is incapacitated, and wanted to ensure that no internal conflict would erupt in the volatile strip at a time of uncertainty.

The Israeli military drew up plans to deal with possible unrest in the aftermath of his death, while political officials began searching for ways to ensure that, in the event of his death, Arafat would not be buried in Jerusalem.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has taken far too great a toll already.

Previous peace efforts to end the long-standing thorny crisis have been met by the old familiar waves of violence.

No matter if Arafat passes from the scene, the hope is that the two sides can find a way out of the current bloodletting and reopen some form of dialogue.

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