Enraged Arafat pulls pistol on his security chief

A trembling Yasser Arafat whipped out his gun and pointed it at the chief of his West Bank security services during an argument over the growing disorder among the Palestinians of the occupied territories.

One of his officials said the 72-year-old Palestinian leader was shaking so intensely that the semi-automatic machine-pistol, which he routinely carries, fell from his hand.

Some sources say he slapped the colonel – Jibril Rajoub, who has links with the CIA and is one of the of the most ruthless and powerful men in his inner circle – across the face, and had to be restrained by his frightened aides. Others claim he repeatedly screamed: "You want to replace me!"

Last night international diplomats were scrutinising contradictory reports of this encounter to see whether Yasser Arafat is finally cracking up, after being trapped in his West Bank compound by Israeli tanks for more than two months as Palestinian institutions crumble around him.

The Palestinian leader has a condition that causes him to tremble. Or was this another deliberate cameo from an accomplished showman, designed to con the outside world into believing that the pressure on him is reaching unacceptable levels, and must be eased? Yesterday, the pressure rose still further, undiminished by the presence of Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary. While Mr Straw was glad-handing senior Israelis – but not the Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, who cried off with flu – the Israeli army was rampaging through Gaza in its largest raid into the Palestinian-run strip since the start of the 17-month intifada. By mid-afternoon, its troops had killed five Palestinians and invaded a refugee camp and three towns, withdrawing from all of them later. Three of the dead were policemen.

Evidence at the scene of their death, near Deir al-Balah, suggested they been running away from their post when it was hit by an Israeli tank shell, packed with hundreds of "flechettes" – tiny, deadly, darts.

The latest reprisals by Israel began on Sunday after guerrillas from the Islamic nationalist Hamas movement fired two new rockets out of Gaza into Israel, digging craters in fields but injuring no one.

Israel's publicity machine moved into overdrive, describing the "Kassam II" missiles – makeshift, unguided weapons cobbled together in the back streets of Gaza, but with a range of up to five miles – as a dangerous escalation in the conflict. Their warheads carry about 13lbs of explosives, a payload that can blow the roof off a room. But they were dwarfed by the 1,000lb laser-guided bombs blasted into empty Palestinian security buildings in the heart of the densely populated Gaza City by Israeli F-16 warplanes in reply.

While Israel stepped up its military actions – amid threats that it was planning to create anti-Kassam "buffer zones" in the occupied territories – Mr Straw sought to send friendly signals to Mr Sharon. He said the Palestinian leader must make the first move towards restoring calm by clamping down on the "terrorism which emanates from the occupied territories", such as suicide bombers, who have killed scores of Israeli civilians.

Speaking after lunching with Shimon Peres, Israel's pragmatic Foreign Minister – who is brandishing another wildly optimistic two-state peace plan – Mr Straw spoke of the "terror" that "affected the daily lives of everybody who lives in Israel to a degree that is impossible to imagine for us in the United Kingdom".

He called for the implementation of the Mitchell peace plan, omitting to mention that Mr Sharon has systematically blocked it.

He also pointedly distanced himself from a French-led European Union plan for immediate Palestinian elections, followed swiftly by the declaration of a Palestinian state, as the starting point of negotiations.

But diplomacy seems incapable of stopping this crisis. Whether Mr Arafat's pistol-flourish at his security chief was sincere or not, there is no doubt that Palestinian institutions are beginning to disintegrate. His row with Jibril Rajoub – patched up yesterday by an oath of loyalty from the colonel – appears to have been over his forces' failure to control a mob which stormed a police station in Hebron and released 14 Islamic militants from jail.