RAMALLAH - A candidate for the chairmanship of the Palestinian Authority accused Israel Defense Forces troops on Wednesday of detaining him during a West Bank campaign trip and beating him at gunpoint.

Israeli military sources said Mustafa Barghouti and his entourage had refused to submit to a routine security check of their vehicle at an army checkpoint outside the city of Jenin.

Barghouti, an independent running in the Jan. 9 elections to succeed Yasser Arafat, told Reuters he had intervened after troops scuffled with his aides and bodyguards.

"I identified myself as a politician, but was struck with rifles and pinned to the ground," Barghouti said, adding that he was detained for more than an hour and later treated for bruises. "This is deliberate sabotage against the elections."

Israel is under international pressure to allow candidates and voters to travel freely ahead of the vote - the first since 1996. Barghouti is one of 10 candidates running to replace Arafat, who died on Nov. 11.

A military source said that Barghouti had not informed the checkpoint that he would be coming through, as required by the IDF. The source had no immediate comment on the charge that troops had used physical violence against Barghouti and his entourage. Marwan Barghouti sets conditions for quitting race Jailed leader Marwan Barghouti will quit the Palestinian presidential race if his political demands are met by his main election rival, former prime minister Mahmoud Abbas, a Fatah official said on Wednesday.

Barghouti, who was a senior Fatah official in the West Bank before he was jailed and sentenced to life in prison in Israel for links to deadly terror attacks, is running neck and neck with Abbas in opinion polls for the Jan. 9 ballot for Yasser Arafat's successor. Barghouthi's demands appeared mostly in line with traditional Palestinian positions Abbas has already established for dealings with Israel, signaling his withdrawal from the campaign may not be far off. The senior Fatah official close to Barghouti said he wanted Abbas's pledge to insist on East Jerusalem as the capital of a future of a Palestinian state, a just solution to the refugee problem, release of Palestinian prisoners and a halt to Israel's killings of militants. Barghouti also wants Abbas's platform to include calls for Israel to pull back its forces from the West Bank before the election and keep them out afterward, and to halt construction of a vast barrier it is building through occupied territory. "If Abbas agrees to adopt these points, Marwan (Barghouti) will withdraw and an announcement will be made very soon," the official said. A victory for Barghouti could pose problems for reviving long-stalled peace talks with Israel. Barghouti, 45, part of a younger generation of leadership seeking greater clout, announced his candidacy as an independent last week, days after ruling it out. Since then, he has come under intense pressure to pull out of the race, including threats from Fatah leaders to expel him from the movement. An Israeli-Arab lawmaker said Barghouti told him during a jailhouse visit on Tuesday that he was considering dropping out to avoid splitting Fatah, which has named Abbas as its official candidate.