Who Will Lead Them Now?

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The vote for a new President, optimists say, holds the key to progress. Bush had joined Sharon in spurning peace negotiations on the grounds that Arafat let violence flourish under his corrupt, incompetent authoritarian rule and so was not an acceptable partner for peace. For more than two years the U.S. and Israel turned their backs on the Palestinians. For those who construed Sharon's rejection of Arafat as an excuse to avoid negotiations altogether, the prospect of new management offers the Palestinians a chance to call the Israeli leader's bluff though Israel was happy to ignore Arafat's legitimacy as elected President of the Palestinian Authority. A democratic vote could empower Palestinians with the mandate to make peace. And that could present the Bush Administration with an opportunity to press Sharon into expanding his unilateral withdrawal from Gaza into a negotiated pullback from much of the West Bank.

Many analysts believe that Abbas could win the election. If he did, his record is encouraging. Born the son of a shepherd in northern Galilee, the trained lawyer known as Abu Mazen was an exile for 50 years, a dedicated nationalist and, like Arafat, a founding member of Fatah, the primary faction in the P.L.O. As the big man's deputy, he charted his own path. In the 1970s he opened channels to Israeli peace activists, and in the early '90s he led the Palestinian side in the secret negotiations that culminated in Oslo. Under pressure to reform the dysfunctional Palestinian Authority in 2003, Arafat appointed Abbas as Prime Minister. Abbas called for an end to the armed uprising. Unable to compete with Arafat's autocratic ways and undercut by Israel and the U.S., Abbas quit in frustration after four months but worked to position himself as Arafat's likeliest successor.

Abbas and Qurei have signaled their intention to go ahead with elections, viewing them as essential for a credible post-Arafat government. Even the radical outfits Hamas and Islamic Jihad have called for a vote and a "collective leadership," which could bring them inside the political circle. The Bush Administration has signaled its willingness to assist the Palestinians in setting up a vote. A White House official says the U.S. has "already conveyed our concern that the elections be facilitated by Israel." That means leaning on Sharon to open up travel in the tightly constricted territories and to make arrangements for a broad vote.

There should be no illusions that any of the above will come easily. Israeli intelligence predicts privately that the Palestinians will never pull together elections by Jan. 9, the deadline Qurei set last week. For a treacherous period, Palestinians will be in a state of anxiety as they mourn the loss of the father figure who symbolized their national aspirations. After years of fruitless struggle, Palestinians remain united only in grief and fear of chaos. Their economy has been shattered, their government is bankrupt, and militants continue to gain strength. Most Palestinians yearn for peace but doubt that whoever leads them next will achieve it. "I am not hopeful," says Fawzi, 35, a Ramallah phone-company worker. "The Palestinian-Israeli problem has reached the point of no solution."