Rula Amin: Arafat's tour of the West Bank

CNN's Rula Amin

(CNN) -- Cheering crowds greeted Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat on Monday as he made his first tour of the West Bank since December.

Despite his popularity among the Palestinian people, Arafat faces some difficult issues as he tries to reassert control over the Palestinian territories following Israel's military operation.

CNN's Rula Amin traveled with Arafat in the West Bank and filed the following report:

AMIN: This is the first time Yasser Arafat [has left] Ramallah since early December. He took off from Ramallah [on Monday] morning in a helicopter that he borrowed from the Jordanian government.

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Two helicopters took Yasser Arafat and his security personnel to Bethlehem. His first stop was at the Church of the Nativity. He went and visited different quarters in the church, where there was a standoff between the Israelis outside and the Palestinians inside for five weeks.

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He said that he was inspecting the damage. He spoke to the church leaders inside. He went to the Armenian sector. He went to the Greek Orthodox sector. He went to the Catholic sector of the Franciscans. And he said that he offered the church leaders there -- he said that his Cabinet is on standby, ready to help, to fix any damage that has happened to this church during that standoff.

From the church, he went to the mosque next to the church in Bethlehem and then to the municipalities.

The message he had was to the international community, saying that he hopes the international community will not allow what has happened in Bethlehem to be repeated. He urged them to intervene.

Now, on the other hand, he was also talking to his people. This is his first time to be in touch with Palestinians in five months, Palestinians from outside Ramallah, because this is the first time he has left. And from [Bethlehem] he went to Jenin, Jenin town and Jenin refugee camp.

The camp had been the site of fierce fighting between Israelis and Palestinians, and the Palestinians have been claiming that war crimes were committed there by Israeli soldiers. The Israelis deny these charges vehemently.

However, Yasser Arafat will have to face the people there, many of them are angry and furious that the fact-finding mission that was composed and commissioned by the United Nations to come to Jenin refugee camp had been abandoned. There is a lot of damage and a lot of destruction in that camp, and this is something that Yasser Arafat has to tackle there.

CNN: He doesn't really have the resources to rebuild much though, does he?

AMIN: Well, it's not just the money. It's also the ability to have control over these areas. He is being promised help from different parties, from the U.S., from the European community, and the United Nations says it wants to help. However, he still is not in total control of these areas.

We saw, for example, in Bethlehem, we were trying to get on his helicopter to go with him on this tour, and they said no way, because we have to get as many security personnel with him as possible, his own guards, because the Palestinian Authority is not in complete control of these areas anymore.

The Israeli army has just pulled out of Bethlehem three days ago, four days ago. And that means that for Palestinian police, Palestinian security don't really have the upper hand yet, and this is something Yasser Arafat will have to face as he is also pressured to crack down on Palestinian militants, and he will have to use his Palestinian police and his authority to do that.