Hajj Isma`il. Who would have known. Abu Mazen, we read, has brought back Hajj Isma`il (Jabr) from retirement, and appointed him chief of all PA security forces in West Bank. He was previously dismissed from his position in a token campaign against corruption. Those of us who lived through the Lebanese civil war, knew of Hajj Isma`il. He was the man most responsible for the fiasco of PLO's incompetent plan in the face of the Israeli invasion of 1982. `Arafat, who had little regard for competence or merit in his appointments, insisted on appointing Hajj Isma`il despite overwhelming evidence to his incompetence. In fact, when the Fath-Uprising split off from Fath in 1983, Hajj Isma`il was cited as the main reason for their rebellion. So he will now work closely with PA's chief thug (or thug-in-chief) Muhammad Dahlan.