Once-legendary Fatah figure makes a comeback
Mohammed Dahlan, driven into exile and blamed for 'losing Gaza' to the forces of Hamas, has once more maneuvered into the Palestinian movement's inner circles.
Palestinian figure
Reporting from Al Birah, West Bank - He ran the Gaza Strip like the Godfather, dispensing brutal punishment and benevolent largess. But that was before his summer of disgrace, two years ago, when Hamas militants drove out his armed followers and allowed looters to pick apart his seaside villa.
Mohammed Dahlan, the once-legendary chief of Fatah's forces in the enclave, watched his own defeat helplessly from exile. Then he felt the sting of blame for "losing Gaza," a debacle that split the Palestinians into hostile camps and crippled their drive for statehood.
Stripped of his authority in the late Yasser Arafat's movement, he dropped from the limelight and plotted. But his target was not Hamas; it was the many detractors among his Fatah brethren who branded him a has-been.
After 18 months of quiet but tireless politicking, Dahlan is back in play. His recent election to Fatah's Central Committee put him in an elite circle of advisors to Arafat's 74-year-old successor, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, and positioned him as a contender to lead the movement someday...
More.
And I wonder, how big were those cups?
Dahlan's new stature was evident the day of the interview in his top-floor office suite in a government building in Al Birah, a city adjacent to Ramallah. A trim, poised figure in a navy blue blazer, he greeted a stream of well-wishers and favor-seekers. His aides said they served 300 cups of coffee to visitors that day.
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