RAMALLAH, July 6: Hundreds of officers loyal to the West Bank’s ousted security chief Jibril Rajoub vowed on Saturday not to work with his successor, in a challenge to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s authority.

Captain Sabri Tmezi said he and some 600 Rajoub loyalists met Saturday in Beitunia, a village outside Ramallah, and “decided not to cooperate with the new chief of preventive security appointed by President Arafat.”

Arafat signed a decree Thursday replacing Rajoub with Jenin governor Zuheir Manasrah, despite the West Bank strongman’s initial refusal to accept the decision announced two days before.

The burly security chief blasted the handling of his dismissal as “disrespectful” and reportedly turned down an offer to become Jenin’s governor.

Rajoub, once touted as a potential successor to Arafat, was dismissed at a time when Washington has not only demanded security reform to stop attacks on Israelis but also sought Arafat’s ouster as a condition for Palestinian statehood.

“The decision to relieve Colonel Rajoub of his duties was not a good decision and will affect (the security) service,” Tmezi told AFP.

A delegation of Rajoub loyalists was to meet with Arafat later Saturday in Ramallah, he added. However, the delegates said they were still awaiting Israeli permission to make the visit.

Tmezi said the delegates would ask Arafat to name Rajoub to a more senior position. Asked if they would back him as interior minister, he said, “Why not? He deserves more than the Jenin governorship.”

They also recommended someone more “competent” as the new security chief, saying Manasrah would weaken the preventive security forces.

The delegation would finally say now was the wrong time to make such changes, all the more so as the organization is not tainted by corruption and is one of the largest and best organized security institutions, Tmezi said.

An official in Arafat’s office earlier played down any suggestion that the security members’ refusal to serve amounted to a rebellion.

“It’s not very important. It’s not a rebellion or whatever,” the official said on condition he not be named.

Participants in the Beitunia meeting, who were unarmed, later staged a peaceful rally in Manara Square in Ramallah.

In the southern West Bank town of Hebron, some 200 members of the preventive security held a meeting instead of a support rally for Rajoub, which has now been postponed until Sunday, a participant at the meeting said.

A pamphlet was distributed calling for both “support of the legitimate government of President Yasser Arafat” and keeping Rajoub in his job.

Rajoub, however, was considered close to the US Central Intelligence Agency and often involved in security talks with the Israelis before the current Palestinian uprising.

A preventive security officer, who asked not to be named, bristled at Rajoub’s dumping.—AFP