The Palestinian uprising, the intifada, seems to have taken on a momentum of its own which the Palestinian President, Mr Yasser Arafat, is powerless to stop. This, at any rate, was the opinion expressed yesterday by the Egyptian President, Mr Hosni Mubarak, in an interview in a Kuwaiti newspaper.
Mr Mubarak's assessment seems to be borne out by the interception last weekend by the Israeli navy of a yacht reportedly smuggling rockets and anti-aircraft missiles to Gaza.
Responsibility for the operation was claimed by the Damascus-based Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC), which has no political presence in Gaza or the West Bank. The Front said previous consignments of weaponry had been successfully delivered, presumably to allied groupings.
This development seems to indicate a considerable degree of co-operation between Mr Arafat's exiled opponents and the armed factions which have proliferated in the West Bank and Gaza during the intifada. This can only accelerate the erosion of his control over Palestinian self-rule enclaves.
Two weeks ago he ordered a halt to Palestinian mortar attacks against Israeli settlements. But salvos of mortars continued to fall daily. Mr Arafat reissued his command, but this, too, has been ignored. He has also been powerless to prevent the targeting of Israeli civilians and bombings within Israel "proper". Indeed, Mr Arafat is not even in a position to condemn these attacks because of the resentment felt by ordinary Palestinians over Israel's punitive economic siege and military operations against their towns, villages and refugee camps, which have killed more than 400 civilians and wounded 13,000.
