Israeli troops seized an entire West Bank town yesterday as Yasser Arafat conjured up the spectre of his own death in the struggle to establish a Palestinian state.
The Palestinian leader's speech - extraordinary even by the standards of political rhetoric in the Middle East - followed a searing personal attack by the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, a few hours earlier.
The invasion of Tulkarm (population 34,000) began early yesterday morning when dozens of Israeli tanks, supported by helicopters, entered from all sides and took over the main square.
Curfews were imposed throughout the city as soldiers took up positions, imposed checkpoints and went from house to house in search of Palestinian fugitives, forcing people outside their homes.
Although there have been numerous Israeli incursions into Palestinian-controlled territory since the uprising began, it is the first time the Israelis have taken over a town.
Speaking in Ramallah from his office, which is also surrounded by Israeli tanks, Mr Arafat said the latest invasion had "crossed all red lines".
"Our people cannot stand with their eyes closed ... this is a most dangerous thing," he continued.
Later, at a "solidarity meeting" with Palestinian artists, Mr Arafat said: "The Palestinian state will be established with al-Quds al-Sharif [occupied East Jerusalem] as its capital. By God, I see it coming, martyred or alive. May God give me the honour of martyrdom in my steadfastness for Jerusalem."
Mr Sharon rejected calls from some ministers to remove the Palestinian leader from the occupied territories at an Israeli security cabinet meeting on Sunday. Instead the prime minister emphasised the public humiliation that Mr Arafat faces from his virtual imprisonment in Ramallah.
"It is preferable that he remain here, locked in, and not cause harm from the outside," Mr Sharon said. "He opens up a window in Ramallah, sees the tanks and knows he doesn't have anywhere to go. He is dying to travel, to fly. He is ill from the fact that he is closed in, in his pen".
Yesterday's incursion into Tulkarm met sporadic armed resistance, which was especially fierce around two refugee camps, holding 21,000 Palestinians. A 19-year-old Palestinian was killed in the fighting and seven wounded, one, a 42-year old civilian, critically.
The Israeli army said in a statement that the aim of the invasion was to "locate and destroy terrorist infrastructures" in the city, including the Palestinian military cell affiliated to Mr Arafat's Fatah movement responsible for killing six Israelis at a bat mitzvah ceremony in the Israeli town of Hadera on January 17.
Tulkarm's Palestinian Authority (PA) governor, Izz al-Din al-Sharif, whose headquarters was bombed by Israeli jets last week, called through mosque loudspeakers for his people to resist the reoccupation.
Palestinian sources said soldiers were taking over PA police positions, sandbagging the roofs of commandeered Palestinian homes and hoisting the Israeli flag in place of the vanquished Palestinian one.
Israeli troop reinforcements were brought in yesterday to guard Israel's porous border with the West Bank and the army tightened its blockade on the northern West Bank Palestinian cities of Nablus, Qalqilya and Jenin.