IT was a state visit to a stateless people. For 21/2 hours yesterday the West Bank town of Ramallah received the French President in a tumultuous outpouring of joy.
No other head of state has made such a journey, and Palestinians saw Mr Jacques Chirac's gesture as a sign they will succeed in building a Palestinian state, despite recent violence and the failure of the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Benajamin Netanyahu to abide by past agreements.
"This moment will be engraved in the memory of our people as a historic event of the first order," said Mr Ahmed Qurie, the head of the Palestinian Assembly.
Tens of thousands of men, women and children crowded the "3 km route taken by Mr Chirac. Old men in peasant's robes, women in Palestinian embroidered dresses, schoolgirls in red tartan uniforms and boy scouts with neckerchiefs waved at the French President's entourage.
Some wept. Others laughed and shouted: "Thank you, thank you, thank you." Banners said: "Mr Chirac, We Need You" and "Chirac, Soldier of Peace".
Mr Chirac's address to the Palestinian Legislative Council was frequently interrupted by applause. He hailed the Palestinians as "a dignified and brave people" who were "victims of a history that was not their own".
French sources said the council venue was deliberately chosen to remind the Palestinian Authority President, Mr Yasser Arafat, that Europe wants the future Palestinian state to be a democracy, not a dictatorship run by Mr Arafat. Mr Chirac used the words "democracy" and "democratic" five times early on in his speech.
But the most severe warning was reserved for the Israelis. Mr Chirac's recipe for saving the peace process read like a litany of the Netanyahu government's misdeeds.
"New settlements must stop," Mr Chirac said. "The changes in the status quo in Jerusalem, the culling down of houses, the expulsions, the construction and, use of restricted highways must cease ... There must be freedom of movement within the West Bank and between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip."
Mr Chirac also appealed for an end to the closure of the Israeli occupied territories, which strangles the Palestinian economy by preventing some 50 per cent of Palestinian men from working.
The closure was prompted by suicide bombings which killed nearly 60 Israelis early this year. Palestinians say it is collective, punishment, banned by the Geneva Convention.
Fears of imminent, wide-scale confrontation between Arabs and Israelis lent a grave note to the celebration. "Time is not on the side of peace," Mr Chirac noted "Each new confrontation shows the mortal danger that lies in not moving forward and I have here with a feeling of urgency." Two Palestinian men from Ramallah were killed by Israelis in the two days preceding Mr Chirac's visit.
"Our people see in you the cope of a better tomorrow," Mr Arafat said at the end of Mr Chirac's address. The Palestinian leader mystified journalists by referring to him as "Doctor" Chirac. At a joint press conference, Mr Arafat turned to Mr Chirac and explained: "You said to me at [the March 1996 summit at] Sharm el-Sheikh, `When you need help, call Dr Chirac on the phone'. Today I say from my heart to your heart, with all my, soul, yes, we need Dr Chirac to save the peace process."
In repeating a message of almost biblical simplicity this week, Mr Chirac is saying out loud what western leaders and many Israelis have long known that peace could be achieved in the Middle East if Israel would return occupied Palestinian, Syrian and Lebanese land.
