At the Fatah Congress meeting in Bethlehem, eighteen people were elected to the Central Committee of the group which rules the Palestinian Authority and will determine if there is going to be peace with Israel. 



Four more will be appointed by PLO and Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas, who will also serve as the

There are no more than three people who belong to any given faction capable of coordination.

committee's chief. Only two (three, when Abbas is added) will continue from the old committee. So, indeed, this is a generational transition, and a transition from returnees who were in Tunis to indigenous West Bank people. The fact that only one member is from the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip - though that area contains almost half of all Palestinians living under the Palestinian Authority - will no doubt cause trouble later.



We will be told two things about this election: that this is a peace-oriented leadership (not true), and that this is a great victory for the Young Guard (misleading).



This is indeed a significant and relatively democratic election (remember, though, that between one-third to a majority of the delegates were handpicked by Abbas). Power has, to some extent, been transferred to a new generation. But keep in mind that there is no unified "Young Guard". In fact, it might be said that there are no more than three people who belong to any given faction capable of coordination.



Moreover, while this is almost a wholly new committee, at least 15 of the 22 members will be old-style leaders (presuming Abbas will appoint such people to the four seats whose nomination he controls). To give another example, while it's true that the leader of the Fatah grassroots' group in the West Bank, Marwan Barghouti, was elected, not a single one of his followers was added to the committee.



On balance, I would say it is slightly more moderate than its predecessor, but the difference should not be exaggerated. For example, there are at least four members of the 18 who are capable of leading a war on Israel. Another four - including Fatah's probable future leaders - are extremely hardline. At the same time, though, there are also a number of individuals who have many Israeli contacts, and who can pick up a phone and call or be called by counterparts.



In short, there are a wide range of views from hardline to relatively dovish. This is neither a group that will make peace with Israel, nor one which will ally with Hamas. In other words, this is a group with which Israel can work on status quo issues, but not on a comprehensive agreement.



However, there is one aspect of this result so dangerous that it might outweigh everything else. At number one, with two-thirds of the vote - a remarkable sign of popularity - is Abu Maher Ghneim. He is increasingly being spoken of as Abbas' successor.



Ghneim is an unrepentant hardliner, an open opponent of the Oslo agreements. If he becomes the leader of Fatah, and hence of the PA and PLO, you can forget about peace. Violent conflict becomes far more likely. Watch this man: he is the future of the Palestinian movement.



The people everyone will be watching are the four guys with their own base of support, three security agency heads - Muhammad Dahlan, Jibril Rajoub, Tawfiq Tirawi - and West Bank grassroots' leader Marwan Barghouti. Since Barghouti is in an Israeli prison, however, he will probably play a smaller role. It is easy to call these three "leaders of a Young Guard", but remember, they are all personal rivals, and that is what is most important.

If he becomes the leader of Fatah, and hence of the PA and PLO, you can forget about peace.





There are four real hardliners: Ghneim, Salim al-Zanoun, Abbas Zaki, and Nasser Kidwa. Zanoun is the former head of the Palestine National Council who rejected changing the Charter to accept Israel's existence; Zaki is an old-style Arab nationalist; and Kidwa is seen as representing the legacy of his uncle, Yasser Arafat.



There are two who can be called moderate: Nabil Sha'ath and Muhammad Shtayyeh.



Then there are Abbas' supporters: Saeb Erekat, Hassan al-Sheikh, Tawfiq al-Tirawi, Othman Abu Gharbyeh, and probably Muhammad al-Madani. He can presumably also count on Nabil Sha'ath.



This is not a group which will be eager to make concessions to get Hamas into a partnership. A Fatah-Hamas reconciliation is not going to happen.



Is this a group that will return to armed struggle? This is possible, though they are not eager to do so. Dahlan and Rajoub are realistic about Palestinian military weakness, though Barghouti is probably more eager for confrontation. If Ghneim becomes the leader, however, Fatah could revert to the Arafat era.