Early on Sunday morning I posted here a note about an article by Khaled Abu Toameh in the Jerusalem Post pointing out that some Palestinians are beginning to figure out that their "internal clashes" may be destroying their chances for a state. "Internal clashes" is a non-abrasive phrase in the lead sentence of a confirming dispatch--"Palestinians Fear Infighting Hurts Their Case"--by my friend Steven Erlanger in tomorrow's Times, available now online. Indeed, this infighting does hurt their case and the cause. What will happen next is that other myths of the Palestinian movement will begin to unravel, among them the one about the fidelity of fellow Arabs to their "brothers." What are their Western partisans going to say now when the essential minimum of peoplehood turns out to have been sheer rhetoric? Javier Solana and Jacques Chirac and--what's his name?--Kofi Annan have been spouting nonsense. How long will they persist? The lie is petering out, finally. Steve's article will be more persuasive to sceptics because he cites more substantial Palestinian figures than did Abu Toameh, much more substantial. He also reports on a tell-tale contretemps between two Fatah figures: Tawfiq Tarawi, the West Bank intelligence chief, arguing with Jibril Rajoub, the former head of security in the West Bank. They shouted at each other, and then Tarawi threw his shoes at Rajoub. This, apparently, is crossing the line in Arab circles, the pelting of your enemy with sandals and flip-flops and loafers and scuffed black shoes with loose laces. Your adversary has no dignity. The rhetoric now shows itself to be empty, the rhetoric--Edward Said's rhetoric--about the nobility, the delicacy of "the children of stones." The Palestinians were so more civilized than the other Arabs. So much more advanced. But how much can you prove by sending the one pathetic, sad Sari Nusseibeh--his pathos being his cachet--around to Harvard and Oxford to show that the thugs have their betters? This is cold comfort to the Israelis. Their enemies can still maim and kill. It is entirely preferable for the Palestinians to have their rump and run it as they will or can. But, please, enough about how civilized they are. They are on their way to being Iraqis.