In Politics, Hamas Gains in the West Bank

"Do we have a part in helping Hamas get strong? We do," said a senior Israeli army officer with the division responsible for the West Bank. "Did we do it on purpose? No. Could we have done it differently? That's for history to judge. But you have to remember that a number of these measures were taken at a time when there was blood everywhere."

Mahmoud Abdul Khalil is one of an estimated 17,000 people from Qalqilyah and its surrounding villages who lost jobs in Israel because they can no longer secure permits to cross into the country. He supports the new Hamas-linked leadership.

"We want to change faces here," said Khalil, 60, who supports his wife and eight children with the help of a monthly stipend from Hamas for food and health care. "We've never benefited from the peace process, not once," he said. "I'm convinced they will change the situation."

Israeli officials say the barrier rose here first because of the large number of attacks originating in the northern West Bank during the intifada. According to figures provided by Israel's General Security Service, 28 Israelis were killed in four attacks by suicide bombers from Qalqilyah during the intifada that began in September 2000.

Hamas political officials declined to discuss the operations of its armed wing, the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades, inside the city. Membership in the brigades can bring long Israeli prison sentences. Israeli military officials, however, say intensive army operations against the armed wing during the intifada have left it largely lifeless in the city.

The main avenue here is lined with shuttered shops, evidence of an unemployment rate that exceeds 70 percent by U.N. estimates.

Palestinian police swept trash and dirt from the stoop of their station one recent morning. In new fluorescent vests, officers directed traffic at intersections.

They do not carry guns. That will come when Israeli forces officially cede responsibility for the city's security to Palestinian authorities. But Israeli military officials say the Palestinian Authority has not yet done enough to control armed groups here, an accusation Fatah officials dismiss. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas at a meeting Tuesday in Jerusalem that he intended to hand the city over to Palestinian authorities in two weeks, pending a security evaluation.

"This is all an Israeli game," said Mohammed Hazah, Fatah's general secretary in Qalqilyah, as he sat hunched glumly over a cup of strong coffee, discussing his party's trouncing. Slight, and graying at 57, Hazah spent a total of 22 years in Israeli jails, arrested for the first time in 1969 for taking part in an attack on an Israeli water pipeline.

Fatah chose the wrong people to run, he said, but he also suggested it was simply a bad time to be on the side of peace talks with Israel. "We have gotten no help from Israel, no support whatsoever," Hazah said. "This reflected on us in bad ways."

Many residents say their greatest burden is securing permits to enter the closed military area, which includes villages and farmland, between the barrier and the Israeli border, known as the Green Line. More than 70 sheep died during a pox outbreak last month in that area because the veterinarian did not have a permit to enter, residents here said.

Although it would likely benefit the Palestinian Authority politically, the official transfer of security responsibility to Palestinian police will not end the irksome permit system, which complicates trips to orchards and the transport of produce to markets.

"The wall made Qalqilyah famous, but it has had an extraordinarily negative effect on the city," said Hashem Masri, the new Hamas deputy mayor, sitting behind his large, tidy desk in city hall. "The wall was a factor in our election, generating the anger from the Palestinian people who are so much in need."

Masri, a pharmacist by training, is essentially the city's acting mayor. He said Wajih Quawass, the 39-year-old owner of a photo studio here and the elected mayor, has been held by the Israelis in administrative detention for the past 22 months for membership in Hamas.

Within the last three weeks, Masri said, two British diplomats visited him to talk with the new Hamas leadership. The conversation centered on Hamas's agenda of improving water and sewer service, completing the first public hospital and improving the local economy. Masri said he made clear that his focus would remain local.

Now, Masri and his colleagues are the ruling party at this local level for the first time. The people are watching and waiting for results. Ibrahim Halal, 37, owns a cell phone shop a few blocks from city hall. Business is poor, he said, but he has little faith that Hamas will improve matters.

"Hamas doesn't want peace," said Halal, who supported Fatah in the elections. "If they say the Palestinian Authority only gave us the wall, well, let's see them try to move it."