A government without a country

What is the Palestinian Authority?

It is essentially a government without a nation. The authority consists of its leader, Yasser Arafat, an elected legislature, and more than two dozen ministries. Together, they are responsible for providing essential government services to 3 million Palestinians, including garbage collection, police protection, education, and health care. Much of these services is funded by other nations and international organizations, including the European Union, the U.S., and the United Nations. The Palestinian Authority has observer status at the United Nations, but it cannot conduct its own foreign policy. Israel still maintains control over roads, airspace, travel, and trade between Palestinian areas and the outside world.

How was the Authority created?

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Under the 1993 Oslo peace accords, Israel agreed to gradually hand over to the Palestinians much of Gaza and the West Bank, which it took over after the 1967 war. The Oslo agreement called for the establishment of a governing body for these territories. The Palestinian Authority was to serve as the foundation for the government that would rule a new nation carved out of the territories—Palestine. After a decade of political impasse and escalating violence, the authority still rules only over the communities where Arabs live, the Gaza Strip and about 40 percent of the West Bank.

How did Arafat become leader?

Arafat has been in charge since day one. As the head of the Palestine Liberation Organization, he was already the symbolic leader of the Palestinian people. When the authority was created, the rest of the PLO leadership chose Arafat as the new body’s leader. Then, in a 1996 election, Palestinians voted to keep Arafat in the position, and chose a legislature to serve with him. The election was monitored by hundreds of foreign observers, including former U.S. president Jimmy Carter, who said the balloting was fair.

Was it?

Many foreign critics don’t think so. Even though three-quarters of Palestinians went to the polls, they didn’t have much to choose from on the ballot. Arafat ran opposed by only one candidate, an unknown social worker named Samiha Yusuf Khalil, and Arafat got nearly all the media coverage during the campaign. When the ballots were tallied, Arafat had won, with 88 percent of the vote. “Arafat was essentially elected the same way Stalin was,” said former CIA director Jim Woolsey, “but not nearly as democratically as Hitler, who at least had actual opponents.”

Is Arafat effective?

There don’t appear to be many people who think so, either in the Palestinian territories or the rest of the world. Arafat is all-powerful within his organization. Many Palestinians remain loyal to him because they see him as a symbol of defiance to Israel. But he’s not viewed as an effective administrator. A 1997 report by a Palestinian parliamentary committee said Arafat presides over an organization riddled with corruption. Nearly 40 percent of the Authority’s $800 million annual budget, the report said, is lost to corruption and mismanagement. Twenty prominent Palestinian academics and politicians published an open letter in 1999 putting the blame squarely on Arafat’s shoulders, accusing him of “opening the door for widespread corruption and exploitation of the Palestinian public.”

What about terrorism?

There is that, too. Israel says Arafat winks at terrorists in the rival Hamas organization, and that he has diverted Palestinian Authority funds to the families of suicide bombers. Israel claims it found documents in Palestinian Authority offices it raided that provide a paper trail linking Arafat with the suicide bombers. Arafat contends the documents are fakes. But there’s no denying that Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, which is associated with Arafat’s own Fatah movement, plan and launch their attacks from Palestinian territory.

Is the terrorism charge fair?

Arafat says he is doing everything he can to catch terrorists operating on his turf, as required under the Oslo accords. Israel’s military incursions, Palestinian leaders say, have made it impossible for Arafat’s security forces to crack down harder. Palestinian police have jailed hundreds of Hamas militants, although the arrests have been sporadic and often temporary. In recent months, Arafat has condemned suicide bombings targeting civilians. His efforts are not seen as sincere by Israel or the White House. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has declared Arafat “irrelevant” to the quest for peace in the Middle East. Last month, President Bush called on the Palestinian people to seek new leadership that is “uncompromised by terrorism.”

Could anyone else lead the Palestinians?

The world might soon find out. Arafat has announced that elections will take place in January 2003. He has never anointed a successor. Some observers believe his top lieutenant in the PLO, Mahmoud Abbas, or the legislature’s speaker, Ahmed Qurei, would be top candidates if Arafat steps aside. But neither has much support among voters. Polls this summer showed that Marwan Barghouti, 42, Fatah’s jailed West Bank militia chief, is the second most popular Palestinian leader. Barghouti garnered the support of 19 percent of Palestinians (versus Arafat’s 35 percent). A host of other potential leaders wait in the wings, with no clear front-runner. But the speculation may be pointless. Arafat has made it clear he will seek re-election if he sees fit.

The man called ‘easy’

Yasser Arafat was born in 1929, and even his birth is a subject of controversy. Arafat says he is a native of Jerusalem, but others claim he was born in Egypt. Baby Arafat was given the name Mohammed. In high school friends nicknamed him Yasser, which means “easy,” for his easygoing ways. But Arafat took up the Palestinian cause early in life, smuggling weapons to men fighting the creation of Israel in 1948. He left to pursue a career in engineering abroad, but returned to his militant roots in 1956, when he founded al Fatah, an underground terrorist organization. Arafat’s group joined the Palestine Liberation Organization after the Arab-Israeli war, and in 1968 he became the PLO’s leader. The PLO’s bloody campaign to destroy Israel earned Arafat a reputation as a ruthless terrorist, but in 1988 he told the United Nations he was ready to recognize Israel. After intense, often secret negotiations, Arafat and former Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin signed the Oslo accords, making limited Palestinian autonomy a reality. The breakthrough won Arafat, Rabin, and Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994. Nearly a decade later, the promises of Oslo—a Palestinian nation existing in peace alongside Israel—seem further away than ever.