Yasser

JERUSALEM -- Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin demanded yesterday that Yasser Arafat pledge in writing to uphold the Israeli-Palestinian peace accord after the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization appeared to suggest that the pact was only temporary, little more than a tactical maneuver.Israel warned that if Mr. Arafat resists, it would not implement subsequent stages of Palestinian autonomy and might break off further talks with the PLO.Police Minister Moshe Shahal, speaking for the government, said Israel would suspend implementation of the agreement on self-government, which is just going into effect in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank town of Jericho, if Palestinian attacks upon Israelis do not end and if Mr. Arafat does not retract his belligerent statements.

GAZA CITY -- The Islamic group Hamas showed its political muscle to Yasser Arafat's self-rule government yesterday, drawing as many as 20,000 supporters to one of the bigger rallies held in the Gaza Strip.With tensions still running high after deadly battles nine days ago between the Palestinian Authority police and street protesters, all sides tried to keep the gathering from spinning out control and igniting fresh violence. They succeeded.By prior agreement, Hamas radicals kept their guns hidden, and Mr. Arafat's police stayed away from the soggy soccer field where the rally took place.

THE FRUIT of U.S. mediator Dennis Ross' trip to the Middle East was the establishment of a joint committee in Tel Aviv to sift and share intelligence on the suicide bombing in the Jerusalem market on July 30 that halted the peace process.Members are the CIA station chief, the Israeli intelligence chief and two of Palestinian chief Yasser Arafat's intelligence operatives who have already worked with Israeli counterparts in preventing terrorism.In other words, they don't know who did it, they have a common interest in finding out and they are cooperating in a professional manner toward a common goal.

AMMAN, Jordan -- Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, who has cast his lot with Saddam Hussein for better or for worse, said yesterday that the Iraqi president remains cool and confident of victory should his peace plan fall on deaf ears.But even if Iraq goes down to crushing defeat, Mr. Arafat said, his own Palestine Liberation Organization will rise from the ashes like "the phoenix bird" to play a key role in postwar negotiations in the Middle East.Mr. Arafat, who made his remarks at a crowded, unruly afternoon news conference, met with Mr. Hussein in Baghdad a few days ago to discuss the war. He said Mr. Hussein told him in advance about the Iraqi peace proposal offered Friday.

PARIS - Senior Palestinian officials, after consulting with doctors treating Yasser Arafat and visiting his hospital, said yesterday that his condition had deteriorated sharply and acknowledged for the first time that preparations were under way for his funeral and burial. Arafat, in a coma since Nov. 3, slipped deeper into unconsciousness early yesterday, but reports that he is brain dead are untrue, said Palestinian Foreign Minister Nabil Shaath at a news conference here. "His brain, his heart and his lungs are still functioning, and he is alive," Shaath said, hours after visiting the hospital southeast of Paris where Arafat has been treated since Oct. 29. "He will live or die, depending on his body's ability to resist and ... the will of God."

JERUSALEM -- The three winners of the Nobel Peace Prize left behind a dark cloud of pessimism as they flew to the festivities surrounding their award in Norway today.World figures will applaud the presentation of the prestigious gold medals in Oslo to Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.But their own people are in a glum and sullen mood. Polls this week show 46 percent of Israeli Jews do not think that their leaders should accept the prize along with Mr. Arafat.

JERUSALEM -- For Saeb Erakat, a college professor long involved in Palestinian politics, the brief disappearance of Yasser Arafat offered "the 10 most scary hours of my life."It was not just affection for Mr. Arafat that caused his anxiety, but the realization that, politically, the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization would leave "a big vacuum that, to be honest, I don't think would be filled."The crash of Mr. Arafat's plane and his dramatic rescue Wednesday from the Libyan desert aroused a demanding question: Who comes after Arafat?

IN 1983, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was hiding out in Nahr al Bared refugee camp in northern Lebanon waiting to die.Israeli bombers, guided by ground spies, had just missed killing him in a Beirut apartment building; he left minutes before they flattened it. Then the Israelis kicked him and his guerrilla forces out of Beirut.Several months later, the Syrians, eager to seize control of the Palestinian movement, had him surrounded and were waiting to deliver the "coup de grace."I sat listening to a shrunken Mr. Arafat, in an abandoned building in Nahr al Bared, as he cursed each Arab leader, one by one. Who would have predicted that 11 years later he would arrive in Gaza and Jericho as the leader of Palestinian autonomy?

WASHINGTON -- Leaders of Israel and the Palestinians concluded a two-day crisis summit at the White House yesterday without settling any of their deep disagreements, but they agreed to nonstop negotiations, starting Sunday, on advancing Palestinian autonomy."

JERUSALEM - For a deal to be reached at the Camp David summit, which starts next week, the leaders of Israel and the Palestinians will have to risk heavy political punishment and break free of a straitjacket created by their own rhetoric. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat go to Washington politically weakened, though not crippled. Barak's fragile hold on his coalition was further strained yesterday by the announced resignation from his government of Natan Sharansky, a respected figure and a leader of Israel's large community of Russian immigrants.