NATION

The camera bulbs had barely stopped flashing, but Mahmoud Abbas was already on the spot. After exchanging a handshake with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon at a Red Sea resort on February 8, Abbas went into his first meeting with Sharon since Abbas' election as President of the Palestinian Authority. Sharon reiterated to Abbas his demand that the Palestinians take immediate steps to disarm the militants of Hamas before Israel agrees to resume peace talks. "Wait, wait, give me a break," Abbas said, according to Israeli officials who attended the meeting. "I've only been in office a couple of weeks." Sharon showed no sympathy. "You've got to move faster," he said.

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Abbas—who was elected in January 2005—is beginning to realize that if he hopes to make progress toward peace, he can't afford to wait. With the recent declaration of a truce between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, relations between the two sides have reached their warmest level in years—owing in large part to Abbas' willingness to confront the violence that wreaked havoc on Palestinian society under Yasser Arafat. But Abbas is in an excruciating bind. While he needs to move fast to accommodate Israeli demands, he also risks reprisals from his own people that could cost him his job and possibly his life. No sooner had Abbas agreed to a cease-fire than Palestinian militants staged two brazen attacks. First they fired mortars and rockets on Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip. Then 300 gunmen staged an assault on the Saraya, the main prison and Palestinian Authority military base in Gaza City. In response, Abbas took his boldest step yet to assert his authority, firing at least 25 top security officials and going to Gaza to rebuke Hamas leaders.

Born in Safed, a town now part of Israel, Abbas grew up in Damascus after his family fled when the Jewish state was founded in 1948. As a young member of Fatah, Arafat's faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization (P.L.O.), he made his name as a fund raiser while avoiding involvement in the group's terrorist attacks. He was among the first Fatah leaders to build bridges to Israeli peace campaigners and in 1977 issued a declaration in favor of a two-state solution, a break from p.l.o. doctrine, which called for wiping out the Jewish state.

Like few other Palestinian politicians, Abbas staked out his independence from Arafat, condemning the intifadeh and pushing for reform of the corruption-plagued Palestinian Authority. In March 2003, at the behest of the Bush Administration, Arafat appointed Abbas as Prime Minister. Six months later, Abbas quit because Arafat would not cede control of the Palestinian military.

But despite a promising start, Abbas still has to prove to Sharon and the U.S. that he can be as firm with the militants as he was with Arafat. Close aides say Abbas doesn't want to start a civil war, but he's ready to force Hamas to respect the authority of his government. "He's a very patient person," says Rafik Natsha, a Palestinian lawmaker and close friend. "He swallows his anger." He may have to let it out soon. —from TIME, February 21, 2005

Questions

1. What did Abbas do in 1977 that set him apart from other members of Yasser Arafat's Fatah faction of the P.L.O.?

2. In what ways did Abbas establish his independence from Yasser Arafat?

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