Professor Sets Sights on Filling Arafat’s Shoes

The first man to officially declare his desire to succeed Yasser Arafat as president of the Palestinian Authority is a die-hard Missouri Tigers basketball fan who does not condemn suicide bombing attacks on Israeli civilians.

“Palestinians have the right to do whatever possible to regain their rights and their land,” said Abdel-Sattar Qassem, a 53-year-old political science professor with ties to Hamas and Islamic Jihad, radical groups that have claimed responsibility for dozens of suicide bombings against Israeli civilians.

Qassem, who teaches at An Najah University in the West Bank city of Nablus, said Saturday that he plans to challenge Arafat in a vote that the Palestinian leader’s aides say could be held within six months.

Last week, Arafat agreed to implement a list of demands from Palestinian lawmakers, including new elections for president and parliament, and a fresh and leaner Cabinet. He appeared to back away Friday from the promise of elections, saying Israel must first pull back troops from the West Bank and Gaza Strip. But the push for change continued Saturday as 20 Cabinet ministers--two-thirds of the Cabinet--offered to resign, saying it was a gesture to spur reforms.

Arafat won 88% of the vote in elections in 1996, and few people expect Qassem--or any other challenger--to unseat him. But there is growing dissatisfaction with the Palestinian leader and his Cabinet, and Qassem is hoping to tap into those sentiments.

Qassem said his platform would emphasize two main points: the need to return millions of Palestinian refugees to their homeland in what is now Israel, and to stamp out what he and many other critics say is rampant corruption in Arafat’s government.

Qassem’s stubborn opposition to both Arafat and Israel and his blunt writings advocating the establishment of a free Palestinian state have landed him in jail several times.

He was imprisoned three times by Israeli when it controlled the West Bank. In 1996, Palestinian police arrested him briefly after he assailed the 1993 Oslo peace accords between Israel and the Palestinians, saying they offered Palestinians little freedom and turned Arafat into Israel’s chief policeman in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Three years later, Qassem spent six months in a Jericho prison after depicting Arafat in a book as a Machiavellian ruler who maintains control by pitting his underlings against one another.

“Look where Arafat’s rule has gotten us,” Qassem said in an interview Saturday. “The refugees are still in camps, the Palestinians on the West Bank and Gaza are still oppressed by the Israelis, but the men closest to Arafat are well taken care of.”

Many Palestinian towns and villages are still reeling from Israel’s recent six-week offensive in the West Bank, launched in late March after a suicide bomber killed more than two dozen Jews in a crowded seaside hotel in the Israeli city of Netanya.

Israeli troops remain in many Palestinian areas of the West Bank, controlling roads and preventing residents from traveling freely. Soldiers carry out almost daily raids in some towns and villages. Dozens of Palestinians whom Israel describes as suspected militants have been arrested in the last week.

Casualties continued to mount Saturday. A Palestinian riding in a car was killed in the West Bank when Israeli soldiers opened fire on the vehicle, which the army said attempted to run a roadblock.

Qassem studied in America’s heartland, receiving a master’s degree in political science from Kansas State University and a doctorate from the University of Missouri, where he was a regular at Tigers basketball games. He said he keeps abreast of the team’s progress through his 20-year-old son, Mohammed, who is a computer engineering major there.

“I like the American people,” Qassem said. “I just don’t like their government’s support of Israel. The United States, which is quick to [trumpet] human rights around the world, should be helping to champion human rights for the Palestinian people.”

Although Qassem said he does not belong to any political party or religious group, he said he plans to court Islamic fundamentalists--including Hamas and Islamic Jihad--in his campaign for the presidency.

“I’m not far away from them,” he said. “We might disagree on the issue of women: I believe that women should have full rights, and they might have some problem with that. But we can talk about it.”

Ghassan Khatib, a Palestinian political analyst, said Qassem would be easily beaten by Arafat.

“He will get some votes because people are disenchanted with the [Palestinian] Authority,” Khatib said. “But in the end, Qassem is too extremist for the Palestinian people.”