There will be strong ties with Israel but no place for Palestinians in the new Iraq, a leading member of the Iraqi National Congress (INC) told me late Wednesday night.


The Washington-backed organization, a secular, democratic umbrella for Iraq's Shi'ite, Sunni, and Kurdish communities, is committed to a unitary state, with a large measure of autonomy for what they envisage will be three federal components.

Until recently, the vigorously pro-Western movement was based in London. Now most of its leaders have relocated to various parts of Iraq, planning to converge on Baghdad within the coming days and preparing, with American support, to announce the formation of a provisional government.


One of the most elegant and eloquent princes of the INC is Nabeel Musawi, right-hand man of INC leader Ahmad Chalabi and scion of a prominent Shi'ite family from Baghdad.


Musawi fled into exile aged 18 when his father was arrested and later executed. Now in his early 40s, he is destined for a key role in a future Iraqi administration.


Speaking from Dokan, in liberated northern Iraq, Musawi took pleasure in describing the unbridled celebrations the spontaneous, uninhibited joy on the streets of Iraq's towns and cities as ordinary Iraqis celebrated the toppling of Saddam's statue in Baghdad's Paradise Square.


"All our cities are euphoric," he told me, the allied bombing of nearby Kirkuk clearly audible in the background over our satellite phone link.

Musawi reminds me that hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were expelled from the Gulf states after the 1991 war in retribution for their complicity with Saddam, particularly in Kuwait, where they collaborated with his enforcers in identifying key personnel after the Iraqi invasion. All were arrested, many were never seen again.


Today, the large Palestinian community is regarded by INC leaders as a loathsome fifth column, among the most faithful followers of Saddam Hussein.

Will the Palestinians be welcome to remain in a new, post-Saddam Iraq?


"Absolutely not," Musawi snapped.


Nor, for that matter, will Arabs who had opposed the US-led war to deliver freedom to the Iraqi people.


And the UN? "They did not play a very honorable role when it came to dealing with Saddam," he said. "We believe the UN needs to put its own house in order before it can play a credible role here."


Musawi is equally unequivocal when talking enthusiastically of his hopes for the closest possible ties with Israel.


We had spoken before of the INC vision of an "arc of peace" that would run from Turkey, through Iraq and Jordan to Israel, creating a new fulcrum in the Middle East. Does that concept still stand?

"You know we have always wanted that," he said.


When Musawi flew out of London for his personal date with destiny, he left behind a thriving IT business. Now transplanted to his old-new homeland, he commands some 1,200 of the 3,000 US-armed and trained INC fighters who are now deployed in Iraq.


After the toppling of that statue in Baghdad on Wednesday, Musawi decided to test the water by taking a walk through town without his ubiquitous security detail. To his surprise, he was mobbed by the local people, anxious to kiss his hand.

He does not believe that Saddam is dead or that he has left the country, although he strongly suspects that Syria has become a "safe haven" for Saddam's considerable assets, as well as his wife and daughters. His eldest son, Uday, might also be there.


The tyrant-turned-fugitive is on the run, and Musawi suspects that Saddam's traditional followers in his supposed power-base of Tikrit, aware of America's ferocious response if he seeks refuge there, will not be welcoming.