'My liberty is when the occupation ends'

Jerusalem - West Bank Fatah leader Marwan Barghouthi, who was handed five life terms for murder by an Israeli court on Sunday, is regarded as the main inspiration behind the intifada and remains Yasser Arafat's natural successor in the eyes of many Palestinians.

The sentence was handed down at Tel Aviv district court on Sunday, nearly three weeks after Barghouthi was found guilty of being directly responsible for four militant attacks in which five people were killed.

He was handed two additional 20-year terms for being a member of a banned terrorist organisation and for conspiracy to carry out another attack.

Barghouthi's lawyer said that he would not appeal against the sentence in what has been recognised as the highest-level "terrorism trial" held since the uprising broke out in September 2000.

"The intifada will triumph," Barghouthi shouted as he was led away, his hands raised in a victory sign.

Just minutes before his sentence was read out Barghouthi, who has constantly denied the charges, said he was indifferent to his fate at the hands of the court.

"This occupation is the ugliest colonial occupation that humanity has known, but this occupation is dying and they had better start preparing for its funeral," he told the court in Arabic.

"I don't care whether I am sentenced to one life sentence - or 10 or 50 - my day of liberty is the day the occupation ends."

Although rival Islamist groups and their leaders have largely taken the centre stage since Barghouthi's arrest in April 2002, the firebrand leader has never been replaced as head of Arafat's mainstream Fatah group in the West Bank.

Not only is he widely accepted as the only possible leader besides Arafat, Barghouthi is the only one who enjoys sufficient legitimacy to impose his will on militants while at the same time retaining the ability to talk with Israel.

Those distinctions have earned the squat and pugnacious Barghouthi a place in the national mythology and a variety of nicknames, including Father of the Intifada, the Palestinian Napoleon and the Palestinian Moses.

Despite months in solitary confinement, Barghouthi has always remained defiant during his open court appearances, with his stubble, dry humour and fiery eyes putting a face on the Palestinian resistance.

But from his Israeli prison cell, he also remained a powerful behind-the-scenes player and was the architect of a short-lived truce by Palestinian factions in summer 2003.

Barghouthi, who celebrated his 45th birthday on Sunday, rose to prominence after the outbreak of the intifada nearly four years ago.

Following a failed Israeli missile strike on a convoy in which he was travelling in August 2001, Barghouthi vowed to escalate the resistance and promised more military operations against Israel.

And six months later, when the army launched a vast operation in the West Bank aimed at flushing out militants, Barghuti was a major target who was eventually captured on April 15, 2002.

Educated in political science at Beir Zeit university near Ramallah, and fluent in English and Hebrew, he spent some of his teens in an Israeli jail before being exiled to Tunisia during the first intifada in 1988.

He returned after the Oslo peace accords were signed in 1993 and was elected to the Palestinian parliament in the first elections after the territories became autonomous.

Known as a tough politician, Barghouthi has remained implacably opposed to the occupation and ready to mobilise public opinion - or according to the Israelis, armed resistance - against the Jewish state.

From the early days of the intifada, Israel accused him of orchestrating the crowds of stone-throwing youths who clashed almost daily with the Israeli army.

But he always insisted that "the people run the intifada, not me."

When Israel's hawkish prime minister, former general Ariel Sharon, was elected in February 2001, Barghuti commented: "Sharon is the Israelis' last bullet. Let them shoot it."

Despite the five life terms handed down against him on Sunday, many believe Barghouthi may not yet have fired his last bullet.

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