Freed prisoners nurse their wrath in Jericho

ABDEL Kader Kadour has been in many jails. Now he sits in one called Jericho, and he says it is little different from the rest. 'I cannot go home. I cannot work. The Israelis guard the entrance and the exit. My family want to come and visit me but they cannot afford to travel.'

Mr Kadour, whose home is near the West Bank town of Ramallah, is one of nearly 600 Palestinians released over recent weeks from Israeli jails. They have not been allowed home but 'exiled' to the small self- rule enclave of Jericho, where they live off charity, humiliated and angry. Their presence is potentially explosive and Israeli and Palestinian leaders ignore the growing anger at their peril.

Most are supporters of Palestine Liberation Organisation chairman Yasser Arafat, and were released because they supported the peace agreement. Some also signed forms agreeing to remain in Jericho. Now they say the deal was a trick to divide the prisoner population. 'Many of us wish we were back in prison. We feel guilty about those still in jail. We will make another uprising until all the prisoners are released and can go home.' said Mr Kadour, their leader.

Burnt tyres lie on the road into the town - remnants of a protest held by the prisoners at the weekend, when clashes erupted outside the Palestinian police station. Next they threaten to attack Jewish settlers who pass through Jericho, and Israeli bases on the perimeter. The prisoners say they have nothing to lose, and they are probably right.

Once they were heroes in the fight for Palestinian liberation. Now their hard and ageing faces are scarred with bitterness. Among them are the toughest of all Mr Arafat's fighters - those who carried out orders to kill fellow Palestinians charged with collaboration. Khaled Zaki Salameh, aged 24, was jailed for 11 years in 1989 for stabbing collaborators who passed on information to Israeli agents. Salim Jabari, 24, was jailed for five years in 1989 for stabbing a Palestinian woman teacher who collaborated.

Sitting in the dust of Jericho they wonder what it was all for - a square mile or so of parched desert. Moreoever, they are wondering who to blame for the trick which has placed them in the jail they call Jericho. It was, after all, Mr Arafat who signed the peace agreement which decided their fate.

No aspect of self-rule has been as botched as the clauses dealing with Palestinian prisoners. Every Palestinian family has had a member jailed in recent years, and no single gesture would have inspired confidence as the release of Palestinian 'prisoners of war'. When Mr Arafat came to Jericho two months ago he promised to ensure the release of all his 'brave soldiers' whose uprising did as much to bring about the peace agreement as anything.

Since the signing, just under half the 11,000 prisoners held in jails for action against the Israeli occupation have been freed. Recently Israel has insisted that only those who supported the deal could be released, and the PLO appeared to give tacit approval, sharing a joint interest with Israel in keeping Palestinian opposition behind bars. Few members of Hamas, the Islamic resistance movement, have been freed.

Now Israel insists that even released prisoners who agreed to support the peace process must remain in Jericho, and Mr Arafat has been powerless to object. The anger brewing may now be directed as much at Mr Arafat and his security forces, as at Israel.