(Ha'aretz) Danny Rubinstein - Almost all senior officers in the Palestinian security services are Fatah members, and it is hard to see these people either giving up their status or giving up their allegiance to Fatah and becoming loyal servants of a Hamas government instead. Many doubt whether an orderly transfer of power is possible and fear that the PA is on the brink of civil war. Fatah's greatest electoral failure was racked up by its younger generation, headed by Marwan Barghouti. Candidates from this "young guard" lost resoundingly even in districts that were considered Fatah strongholds. Kadoura Fares, a former minister and Barghouti's closest associate, lost in Ramallah; Jibril Rajoub, former head of the West Bank Preventive Security Service, lost in Hebron; parliamentarian Khatem Abdul Kader lost in eastern Jerusalem; former minister Nabil Amr failed to win reelection as well. Next week, the PA must pay salaries to its more than 150,000 employees, but its coffers are empty. That is Fatah's fault: In the weeks before the election, it added thousands of people to the PA payroll in an effort to win votes.
2006-01-27 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive