Palestinians doomed to crisis as authority approaches collapse

The US, the UN and Israel agree that the Palestine National Authority is approaching collapse. Indeed, the State Department and a UN envoy, Mr Terje Larsen, have warned Israel that it must lift its economic siege on Palestinian enclaves and transfer $50 million in tax rebates. This money is owed to the authority so it can pay its civil servants and policemen who have not received their January salaries. If this does not happen soon, the authority could disintegrate in two or three months.

Arab donors to the $1 billion fund created to sustain the victims of the rising, the Intifada, have been urged to transmit money. So far only a fraction of the sum deposited has been transferred because donors fear money will disappear into the pockets of corrupt officials.

The authority has bounced cheques issued to families entitled to assistance, including that of a 12-year-old boy, Muhammad Dura, whose death last October was recorded by a television team.

Established in 1994 by the Palestinian president, Mr Yasser Arafat, it suffers from its own inadequacies, mismanagement, lack of transparency and accountability as well as the impact of violence and disruption.

The Intifada, originally a popular movement protesting the Israeli occupation, has been transformed into a low-level war of attrition waged by lightly armed Palestinians against the Israeli army with its panoply of modern weaponry.

Israel has responded to Palestinian attacks by prohibiting the movement of Palestinians between the West Bank and Gaza. Some 3,400 civil servants resident in Gaza have not been able to get to their jobs in ministries in the West Bank.

Tax collection and the issuing of licences, permits and travel documents have ground to a halt. Only two arms of the authority continue to function, education and health. By encircling and enclosing the 20-odd Palestinian enclaves in the West Bank and half a dozen population centres in Gaza, Israel has also halted economic activity.

It is estimated that 250,000 Palestinians are out of work. The loss to the economy so far is $2 billion out of an annual gross domestic product of $5 billion.

The isolation of Palestinian enclaves and the administrative vacuum have led to the rise of local Intifada leaders who are challenging the authority and its officials.

Furthermore, the gulf is growing between West Bankers and Gazans, on the one hand, and the "Tunisians", loyalists who returned with Mr Arafat from exile in Tunis, on the other.

The drift into anarchy is worsening. Armed gangs associated with a variety of secular and opposition factions carry out random attacks against Israeli settlers and soldiers and execute Palestinians accused of collaboration, including policemen.

Criminal elements are taking advantage of the anarchy to stage raids on prosperous households, steal cars and peddle blackmarket goods.

While Mr Arafat escapes in travel, impotent opposition figures debate what to do. The highly respected Dr Haidar Abdel Shafi, who headed the Palestinian delegation to the Madrid peace conference a decade ago, says the authority should be dissolved and replaced by a "national unity government".

But, he admits, elections are impossible at present: nor has he proposed a mechanism for creating a unity government. Since no one has a plan, the Palestinians are doomed to go from one disaster to the next.