Nov.15 saw Israel Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom set out on his way to the US for a visit. At the meeting of the Jewish Association of North America Shalom elucidated the Israeli new policy towards the Palestine. This includes the Israeli army is ready to give up the "go-it-alone" policy for pulling out and to coordinate with the Palestinian side, changing the "go-it-alone" scheme to a scheme of bilateral actions and so on.

The passing away of Arafat, the ex-leader of the Palestine has caused a sudden downfall of the relationship framework formerly existed between the Palestine and Israel, the fall-apart of the relatively balanced relationship of an interactive pattern, thus forming a transitional zone that is sure to take place. In the past, the Israeli Prime minister Sharon took Arafat as a foe, labeling him the "king of terrorism", considering that there was no counterpart in the Palestine and so he closed tight the door for peace talk and with a "go-it-alone" scheme to take its place. However, actually without the coordination of the Palestinian side for the Israeli army to pull smoothly out from the settled-down spots in Gaza area without casualty it was by no means an easy job.

Now the quit of Arafat made Sharon to have one short of his old foes. The assumption of the new Palestinian government has actually pulled off the pillar on which Sharon's "go-it-alone" scheme could continue to exist. The death of Arafat would possibly turn out a new turning point for the development of the political situation in the Middle East, Sharon said. Obviously he means more in what he said, indicating that it is likely for him to recognize the new Palestinian leaders, deciding a keynote for the two parties to sit down for talks. And the visit of Shalom to the US is to seek for the US support by consulting with it on the new policy towards the Palestine. In view of the situation since Bush administration will, in his second tenure of office, make the road of the map as a breakthrough for Palestinian Israeli talks Israel would be quite likely to get its "go-it-alone" scheme into the scope of the road map as an integral whole.

However, the Israeli connection with the new Palestinian leaders is attached with vehement terms and conditions. Shalom stressed that the new Palestinian leaders had to prove to Israel their determination in the actual stopping of terrorism. He said, "it's by no means enough only to make a change of personnel and we have to see the real changes of the political situation in the region. They should make peaceful education to take the place of instigation on violence, must eradicate the basis of terrorism. If we see appear a partner of suchlike we will shake hands with him for cooperation".

The Israel holds, so far as the Palestine is concerned the departure of Arafat from this world has made appear on the Palestinian political arena a "zone of faults" or a "vacuum area". This would mean a situation either filled with jeopardy or contained a new opportunity and so Israel is waiting calmly the changes that are now taking place. On 14 November, Rauhi Fattouh, President of Palestine National Authority signed an act nominating Ahmad Qurei, Prime minister of the autonomous government to be the president of the National Security Commission. Therefore, up to now the several posts used to be taken up by Arafat alone have been assigned to different persons respectively. The general election day in the Palestine has been made set on 9 January next year in which the president of the Palestine National Authority will be officially elected.

In view of the present situation, The Palestine power transition is now being carried out in an orderly way with the collective leadership mechanism already in operation and there sees no turmoil in the area as people worried. But at the next step how to further consolidate the political power, eliminate differences and win over more support from the people, especially how to allocate the power in the process of election to make all parties satisfied it is a very big thorny and troublesome problem to be solved. In the meanwhile, who is going to stand out and be recognized by all parties in the election is also a very big problem. The new leader, on the one hand taking his deep root in among the people and getting their support and on the other being accepted by the US and Israel, anyway how to make a balance between the two, is really a very difficult problem to handle.

On 14 November, Abbas, the newly elected president of the Palestine Liberation Organization went to meet the other 13 Palestinian factions in Gaza. Before the meeting when he was paying homage to Arafat there occurred an incident of gunfire. A Palestinian armed gang of 6 opened fire, killing 2 Palestinian security personnel with 6 wounded. Abbas said this was not an assassination aimed at him. But this roused a lot of guesses in the press circles. After the incident, Abbas called up a meeting of the heads of all security and information department, decided to set up a special committee to dig into the matter, and in the meanwhile made determination to call off some military organizations and clean up the security department. On the very evening Hamas and Jihad and some other radical factions expressed their resistance to the election after their talks with Abbas, holding that the election to be held when the territory is still reduced to fragments would mean recognition and encouragement to the Israeli occupation.

At the very moment Israel sent its foreign minister to visit the US. This means to take the advantage to strengthen the connection and exchange with the newly appointed Secretary of the State because Rice as compared to the already resigned Colin Powel favors more for Israel. And the visit of Shalom to the US this time is quite likely to decide on the keynote of the policies for the Israel and the US to deal with the Palestine in future. However, what we have to point out here is that Israel is definitely the stronger and positive side in the Palestinian-Israeli talks and is backed up by the US while with the internal complicated cases, the development of the situation within the Palestine is faced with many uncertainties. Especially, those radical forces showed no respect to Abbas and others, persisting in the policy of advocating armed resistance to Israel and so the situation there will not be "pulled along" as Israel wishes for.

By People's Daily Online