Return from a triumphant tour

By Rasha Saad

Yassin had arrived in Cairo on Monday after being stranded in Sudan for three weeks because he was denied an Egyptian entry visa. Egypt reportedly waited for Israel to announce officially that it would allow the ailing Hamas leader to return to Gaza. A prolonged presence by Yassin in Cairo is believed to be a matter of some sensitivity to the Egyptian authorities because of Egypt's close ties with Yasser Arafat and Yassin's opposition to the Palestinian-Israeli peace accords.

During his tour of a number of Arab countries, Yassin angered the Israeli government by calling for continuing attacks -- including suicide bombings -- on Israel. This led to controversy in Israel as to how best to control the sheikh's activities. One view favoured banishing the sheikh and preventing him from returning to Gaza. But the opposing view triumphed because Israeli officials felt that he would pose a greater threat abroad than in Gaza, where his activities can be monitored.

Sheikh Yassin first came to Cairo in February for medical treatment. In a courtesy gesture, Arafat sent him flowers as soon as he arrived. During the sheikh's two stays at Al-Galaa Hospital, tight security was imposed. No visitors or telephone calls were allowed.

Yassin, who suffers from total paralysis, is bound to a wheelchair. He also has chronic ear problems.

Yassin's tour included Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Yemen, Syria and Sudan.

Hamas spokesman Mahmoud Al-Zahhar, denying reports that Yassin was given millions of dollars by Arab leaders to finance the group's activities, said the trip was not intended for fund-raising. "This is Israeli propaganda," he said. "They are making false accusations to pressure Hamas and give the trip a bad reputation. At any rate, our operations do not need large sums of money."

According to political analysts, the importance of the trip lies rather in the warmth with which the sheikh was greeted by both governments and peoples. This proved, analysts have concluded, that Hamas has the effective support of many countries.

However, these sentiments are believed to have put a strain on relations between Arafat and Yassin. An opinion poll by the Jerusalem Media and Communication Centre published in May showed that Arafat's popularity had dropped to 38.7 from 46.4 per cent last November. Sheikh Yassin scored 8.4 per cent, up from 5.8 per cent in the same poll. However, both Palestinian officials and Hamas excluded the possibility of rivalry between Arafat and Yassin.

According to Mohamed Sobeih, the Palestinian representative at the Arab League, relations between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas are "democratic". "Accordingly, Sheikh Yassin was speaking as a Palestinian who has the right to express his views," Sobeih said. He noted that Yassin spoke positively of the Palestinian leadership and its relations with Hamas.

However, Sobeih said that he wished there had been coordination between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority before Yassin began his tour. "Had we been informed in advance, we would have briefed Sheikh Yassin on the details of our relations with those countries, so that his visits could have been more fruitful," Sobeih said.

For his part, Zahhar said that Hamas is not a rival of the Palestinian Authority. "We seek to unify Palestinian policies and not to compete. However, the sheikh's trip was a good opportunity for the authority to reconsider its policies and its relations with the Arab countries independently of the Oslo agreements," Zahhar said.

Sheikh Yassin, 61, founded the Hamas movement in 1988, and was jailed by Israeli forces the following year. He regained his freedom in October 1997 after two Mossad agents attempted to assassinate Khaled Misha'al, head of the Hamas political office in Amman, by injecting him with a poisonous drug. The two agents, who were arrested in Jordan, were released in exchange for Yassin's freedom.