Word: arafats
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Obviously stung by the accusations, Arafat denied he had caved in to the Israelis, reverting to precisely the kind of rhetoric that infuriates Israelis. "The Palestinian state is within our grasp," he declared. "Soon the Palestinian flag will fly on the walls, the minarets and the cathedrals of Jerusalem." Arafat was more intent on shoring up his own constituencies. Embarking on a week of consultations even more breathless than usual, the peripatetic chairman flew off to reassure Arab leaders in Yemen, Egypt, Sudan and Morocco...
...Arafat will be able to bring his Fatah group and most Arab leaders on board, but the secular rejectionists will continue to undermine him as they can. The more serious threat to his agreement looms inside the occupied territories. He is about to take charge of the 30-mile-long Gaza Strip, which contains 44% of the Palestinians under Israeli occupation, most of them packed into poverty- stricken refugee camps dominated by violent street gangs and, increasingly, by the Islamic fundamentalists of Hamas...
Hard-liners living in the territories, aware now that Arafat and his police force are coming, are more cautious. They realize that Arafat has transformed himself into a moderate in order to make peace and will have to curb his radical enemies. Still, they make it clear that they intend to do what they can to derail the interim plan. "We resisted the Israeli occupation," says Riad Malki, a West Bank spokesman for the rejectionist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, "and we will resist Palestinian autonomy...
...Jordan, the sleepy oasis-green town of Jericho is a contrast to Gaza, where the intifadeh uprising has virtually destroyed the economy. The intifadeh has had far less impact in Jericho, where the residents, by comparison with the utter poverty in Gaza, are almost prosperous. Townspeople have heard that Arafat will visit soon, and like most of them, 73-year-old Ahmed Ali Missad says he will be in the street to cheer him. If he comes, says Missad, "it will mean peace. We all want peace." But even here, Palestinians can't suppress the fear that self-rule...
...administer their territory; they are doing it now, running public works, hospitals and schools. "They are a population quite capable of running their own affairs," says Quandt, "with more talent and resources to draw on than many bigger countries that have joined the U.N. in recent years." So if Arafat gets rid of the Israeli occupiers and the P.L.O. can deliver a healthy dose of prosperity, the ideologues will find fewer supporters for their campaign of rejection...