Now if we get political power we should get economic power as well.”Many families in the south suffered in Saddam’s retribution after the Shia uprising of 1991 – encouraged by the Americans who then failed to help – collapsed. It was he who was the manager and the correct figure was 85 per cent out of a constituency of 7,000.The enthusiasm, however, was genuine for the first free vote in 50 years which – with a built-in demographic advantage and the knowledge that with the expected Sunni boycott of the polls – will give the Shias control in the country. One exploded near the Abu Alusawad Aldurali School at around 10.30am. The manager, Mohammed Ali Yaqoub, told the voters inside that it was a gas main explosion.

The women ululated, he claimed, in a gesture of defiance.The exact numbers who did vote, however, remained unclear. Queues formed in the morning at many of the voting centres, though not all By the afternoon, they had shrunk to a trickle And confusion reigned within some stations. At the Khadijah Al Koubra school in central Basra, Nufar Kaamal said that, as the election manager, he could vouch that half of the constituency of 6,000 had voted by lunchtime That, declared Jaffar Sattar Jabbar, was “nonsense”. “The Israelis should not be allowed to dictate the pace of movement. There won’t be a solution unless there is a role by the international community.”. Iraq’s Shias came out in force in their southern heartland yesterday to vote in an election which will give them power for the first time in 100 years. The London conference on Palestinian institution-building due on 1 and 2 March is “an important step on the road to statehood” for the Palestinians, their envoy to the UK says.

We should not fall into the trap of previous attempts, in which too much was left to the local parties [Israelis and Palestinians], which allowed Israel to dictate conditions to the Palestinians,” Afif Safieh told The Independent.He said US alignment with Israeli policy had led to “European abdication, Russian decline, Arab impotence and hoped-for Palestinian resignation”. But now, he said, with hope again in the ascendancy after the election of Mahmoud Abbas as Palestinian President, the international community should be actively involved in the peace process again and putting pressure on Israel.”I don’t think Israeli will be allowed to have a veto on international diplomacy,” he said. “The wall alone will not save us.” Palestinian militants, he says, will be able to dig tunnels below it within 12 or 18 months – as experience in Gaza shows.In the meantime, however, he retains an unshakeable conviction that peace is possible.”We are Siamese twins And to create each one’s identity we have to separate But you cannot cut them apart in one day.”. If it turns out that the brutal explanation given last year by Mr Sharon’s most trusted lieutenant Dov Weisglass that withdrawal from Gaza was a means of putting the peace process in “formaldehyde” and hanging on to the West Bank settlements, then Labour should walk out.With all the authority of a former intelligence chief, he is scornful of the idea Mr Sharon’s separation barrier will preserve security.

He was – and is – in favour of joining the coalition to see through disengagement from Gaza but sees a real danger that the party will hang on to its ministries whatever follows.If that is to be followed by a return to the road-map and the clear subsequent possibility of withdrawals from the West Bank, then fine. “You have to have a two-state solution, you have to be much more active.”That’s why, he says, Condoleezza Rice has made them a priority. And why, he confidently expects, George Bush will now “balance” the notable concessions he gave Mr Sharon in Washington in April – including on the right of return – by publishing a vision for the Middle East which will “say something to the Palestinians, something about the swap of territory, something about Jerusalem. While acknowledging that its reputation for political cleanness helped, he says: “If Palestinians are asked who will lead us in a war with Israel, then Hamas will prevail. But if Palestinians have a political horizon, and believe ‘we can get our freedom, less humiliation, a better economy, a Palestinian state, less corruption’ if they ask themselves who will get a better political deal, then the forces of pragmatism led by Abu Mazen may prevail.”In answer to the view of many around Mr Sharon, that an “interim agreement” could last for many years, perhaps indefinitely deferring the “final status” issues, Admiral Ayalon says he accepts that the “execution” of a final agreement could take anything between three and 10 years, but “unless we define in a very clear way what will be the principles on final status we shall not have security and stability. We paid a painful price because people reached the position too early.”The examples he cites are the first – though not of course the second – premiership of Yizhak Rabin and the “huge failures” (Mr Ayalon does not mince his words) of the premierships of Benjamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak.But he is something of a heretic on the decision of the party under Shimon Peres to accept jobs from Ariel Sharon in the new “unity” government. But he also freely admits “that, finally, my goal is to be as high as possible, if possible to be prime minister”.As a very fit 59-year-old, he has never, he says, suggested that wouldn’t take time “It should take time.

And he will bring the American vision closer to our set of principles”.Acknowledging that he has a “lot to learn” he is clear that he is not going to stand for the Labour leadership in the coming primaries. The Americans needed international allies and regional coalitions, from Europe to Egypt, Jordan, Turkey and Saudi Arabia to handle Iraq and Iran.It had finally begun to recognise, as the Europeans had been telling them for some time, that “the roads to Baghdad and Tehran go through Jerusalem.” The Israeli-Palestinian issue was the “one common denominator” if such coalitions were to be struck. We can’t just evacuate settlers from the West Bank, uproot Jewish people from their homes with their children and grandchildren, and the dead they have buried But what for? They deserve an explanation. You have to listen to the Palestinians.”The Palestinians will not be able to in the long run to fight terror and deliver the security we expect unless they understand what it is for.”And it’s the same for us. Both men will argue in a joint lecture this week at St Antony’s College, Oxford, that the principles’ time has come.Under them, Palestinians would forgo their historic claim for refugees from 1948 to return to Israel as a quid pro quo for a two-state solution based on 1967 borders in which any territorial adjustments would give Palestinians equal amounts of new land in compensation. There would be no Jewish settlements in the new Palestinian states and both would have Jerusalem as their capital.The reason he wants those principles – which he says command majority opinion poll support among both Israelis and Palestinians – spelt out by Mr Blair and the rest of the international community is that he doesn’t believe that progress is possible until an endgame, “the main piece missing from our regional puzzle” has been identified. “If people will see a political horizon, it will change almost everything.”He isn’t, for example, surprised that Hamas did so well in last week’s local elections in Gaza.