In this respect the network of settler roads, largely constructed since the Oslo agreement to connect Jewish settlements to Israel (and each other) in a manner that circumvents Palestinian towns and villages, is a case in point. Built on the principle of apartheid (the infamous Dutch/Afrikaans word, meaning "separateness," is equivalent to the "separation" that Barak and other Israeli officials frequently recommend as a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict), in order both to consolidate the Israeli presence within the West Bank and Gaza Strip and to provide the settlers who use them with a sense of security, these have to the horror of their planners become the most dangerous roads in the Middle East. Because they are the only ones settlers use, and are in many cases used only by settlers and the military, any vehicle traversing them is a potential target.

Isolated settlements--such as those in the Gaza Strip and colonies that, like Gilo on the edge of Beit Jala and Psagot in al-Bira, abut the communities on whose lands they were established--have on the basis of the above principle been exposed as equally vulnerable. To the obvious satisfaction of the uprising's armed activists, the total settler population, which increased by approximately 50 percent in the seven years after the Oslo agreement was signed, has as a result of their attacks experienced (with the possible exception of 1988) its first net reduction since 1967. Additionally, numerous Israeli and foreign press reports have documented the pervasive fear and sense of imprisonment felt by those who remain, and many appear eager to leave if their government will provide them alternative housing and/or compensation. (The irony that the settlements were established by Israel for the explicit purpose of encircling and suffocating the Palestinians, and that the military provided the settlers with guns and green lights to terrorize their neighbors, is entirely lost upon the majority of such correspondents.)

While the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade and most similar groups are known to the PA and are believed to enjoy operational support from senior security officials (which is unlikely to be provided clandestinely and through which the leadership would seek to retain a measure of influence over their activities), these are not PA units established to pursue an official policy under the cloak of plausible deniability. Rather, they represent an autonomous and at times independent force within the Palestinian national movement, with an agenda increasingly divergent from that of the PA. Its backbone consists of the activist, militant wing of the Fatah movement, which espouses its policies and positions both independently and through the proclamations of the National and Islamic Forces (NIF), a coalition of fourteen Palestinian political factions that constitutes the operational command and organizational infrastructure of the uprising.

The NIF, which includes the gamut of PLO, secular opposition and Islamist factions save the Fatah-Revolutionary Council of Sabri al-Banna (Abu Nidal), the Fatah-Provisional Command led by Sa'id Maragha (Abu Musa) and the Palestine Communist Party-Provisional Command of Arabi Awad, is not a national political leadership and cannot (yet) be compared to the United National Leadership of the Uprising (UNLU), which led the 1987-93 intifada until it was entirely subsumed by the exiled PLO leadership in Tunis and Damascus. Rather, and by tacit agreement, its role is limited to popular mobilization and the planning and organization of the uprising's calendar (e.g., "Days of Rage"), as well as the conduct of activities such as the consumer boycott of Israeli products, which--constrained by formal commitments--the PA cannot itself undertake. According to the rules of the game, the formulation and implementation of national policy is the exclusive preserve of the PA.

In practice this is no longer the case. The NIF and its constituent organizations have been increasingly critical of the PA, particularly with respect to its domestic policies (or rather lack thereof) and its conduct of relations with Israel and the United States. On February 10, for example, at a time when most PA officials were proclaiming the view that the election of Ariel Sharon was an internal Israeli matter, with Yasir Arafat emphasizing the point by calling the victorious candidate to congratulate him and express his desire to resume negotiations after the formation of a new Israeli government, the NIF issued a statement openly vowing to bring about the downfall of the "terrorist criminal" Sharon, like Barak before him. It said the "new phase of confrontation," which it predicted, "requires that all Palestinian, Arab and international forces work to isolate this raging bull by all means." Indeed, the NIF "stresses the need to reinforce the isolation of Sharon," which "requires the escalation of the intifada and resistance in order to make his aggressive policy a burden upon Israeli society." "Any Palestinian or Arab attempt to market Sharon's spoiled goods," the NIF pointedly warned, "will fall into the trap Sharon seeks to use to destroy Palestinian national unity, eliminate the intifada, and paralyze the Palestinian National Authority."

Perhaps more than any other event, the election of Sharon has thrown the differences between the PA and NIF into relief. To the PA, Sharon is above all a challenge to the successful conclusion of the peace process. If it can utilize its regional and international alliances to ensnare this uncompromising rejectionist in permanent-status negotiations on the division of Jerusalem, return of refugees and dismantling of settlements despite his having been elected to cut the Palestinians down to size, it will have vindicated the PA's decision to enter into the Oslo agreements and its performance prior to and since the Al-Aqsa Intifada. Under no circumstances can it settle for less than was discussed during the final round of permanent-settlement negotiations in the Egyptian resort of Taba, and it must establish the understandings reached there as a baseline for further negotiations with Sharon's government. The uprising is therefore an instrument of diplomatic leverage, to help and remind the international community to prod Sharon to resume negotiations at the point where they left off, and to shorten his tenure if they don't or he refuses. Keeping alive the prospect of Oslo's resumption and successful conclusion, without which neither Israel nor the international community has much use for the PA, is the red line Arafat has tacitly communicated to the NIF. The comparative absence of organized Palestinian attacks across the Green Line, which cannot be solely attributed to previous Palestinian and current Israeli campaigns against Hamas and Islamic Jihad, suggests the message is generally being understood.

To the militants within Fatah and the majority of the NIF, the uprising is an instrument of a very different sort, and Sharon is the opportunity to prove its effectiveness. Through its consistent escalation, the Al-Aqsa Intifada (and attendant Arab support) will, according to this view, force Israel to surrender its vision of a Palestinian protectorate under Israeli hegemony, retained even during Taba's final moments, and thus allow the Palestinians to transcend the entire Oslo framework.

In the confident words of Fatah West Bank secretary general Marwan Barghouti, Sharon is Israel's "last bullet" before it surrenders to the realization that it can have "either peace and security or occupation and settlement, but not both." The uprising is thus a war of national liberation in which the only negotiations to be conducted are those that formalize the end of the occupation. If it is, however, exploited as a negotiating tactic and made hostage to political pressures and the demands of the moment, it will inevitably be prematurely aborted and end in failure. Memories of the fate of the 1987-93 intifada are in this respect particularly strong, and are further reinforced by the stark contrast between Israel's consistent disregard of signed agreements with its Palestinian "peace partner" and its generally scrupulous respect for informal understandings with its bitter enemy Hezbollah. The red line for the militants, which has until now been respected by Arafat, is the continuation of the uprising until the end of the occupation.

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