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Who
Will Replace Yasser Arafat? |
Posted:
11.08.04
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As Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat lies ill in a French hospital,
Palestinian officials are negotiating the future of a Palestinian
state without its founding father.
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Palestinian leader Yasser
Arafat has been a controversial figure in the Middle East conflict
for more than three decades. While most Israelis consider him a
terrorist, Palestinians and their Arab neighbors consider him the
father of the Palestinian liberation movement, which has sought
to end Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories since 1967.
 In
recent years, Arafat has been ostracized as an ineffective leader
and his organization, the Palestinian Liberation Organization
(PLO), has fallen into disorganization and corruption.
What happens next will dictate whether the region descends even
further into chaos and violence, or whether other Palestinians
can restart the peace process, which Arab and most European governments
say is the most important issue facing the world community.
"The need to revitalise the Middle East peace process is
the single most pressing political challenge in our world today,"
British Prime Minister Tony Blair said in a statement congratulating
President Bush on winning a second term.
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Chaos or
renewed hope for Palestine |
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Now that Arafat is ill and, according to some reports, close
to death, his failure to appoint a successor has left the Palestinian
people without leadership and on the brink of what could become
a bloody power struggle. Already, Israeli officials have stepped
up security fearing violence in the region if he dies.
But, some experts say Arafat's absence may present an opportunity
for the Palestinian people to reorganize their institutions and
resume peace negotiations with Israel.
"Arafat's absence would probably create an opportunity for
the Palestinian people to activate effectively their institutions,"
Khalil Jahshan, a former president of the National Association
of Arab-Americans, said. "Now the Palestinians have a chance
to have an effective prime minister, an effective president of
the [Palestinian Authority], an effective chairman of the executive
committee of the PLO and to see if they can implement the reforms
that 90 percent of the Palestinian people have been asking for."
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Arafat's
role in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict |
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Yasser Arafat's leadership of the Palestinian people began in
1969 when Arab states tapped him to head the PLO, a body created
to negotiate Israel's withdrawal from Palestinian territory.
 Throughout
his leadership, Arafat has been criticized for claiming to want
peace, but failing to condemn factions of the PLO that have carried
out terrorist attacks in the group's name.
Arafat came to the United States several times during the 1990s
to meet with Israeli leaders and President Clinton, who made an
Israeli-Palestinian solution a priority. However, talks broke
down in September 2000, when Arafat rejected a sweeping peace
plan.
In 2003, President Bush refused to recognize the leader as a
legitimate partner in negotiations.
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Arafat's
successor |
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The Palestinian Basic Law, the equivalent of a constitution,
calls for the speaker of the parliament to take on Arafat's role
in his absence and then hold elections within 60 days, according
to Amgad Attallah, a former legal advisor to the PLO.
 Two
men have been named as possible successors if elections were to
be held. The first, Mahmoud Abbas, known as Abu Mazen, is the
secretary-general of the PLO. Abbas is considered a moderate and
has called for an end to violence against Israelis.
Another possibility is Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei,
the second in command at the Palestinian Authority, the administrative
arm of the PLO. Known popularly as Abu Allah, Qurei is also considered
a moderate and has locked heads with Arafat over his failure to
reign in militant Islamic groups like Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad.
 Since
Arafat's illness, Abbas and Qurei have been sharing the president's
duties. Qurei has taken charge of the administrative duties, while
Abbas has assumed responsibility for diplomatic negotiations with
Israel, according to Atallah. But, neither man has been able to
garner the same respect the Palestinian people had for Arafat,
according to Atallah.
"None of the Palestinian leaders today have a popular mandate
to pursue peace the way that President Arafat did or still does,"
he said. "The only way that they're going to be able to develop
that popular mandate is through elections."
--Compiled
for NewsHour Extra by Kristina Nwazota
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It makes me want to come to school every day, and it has given me something that I’m really good at.
