MacOS 10.3 trouble with Windows DNS

I am using MacOS 10.3 and a Windows 2003 Active Directory. I
am unable to resolve addresses for local machines, though the
DNS will forward me for external addresses. I am able to use dig
and host to resolve names to addresses and pinging addresses
works fine. All of my windows computers are having no trouble
resolving local or external names. I am using a domain.local
name for active directory and the internal search domain. Why
can’t the Mac resolve internal names to IPs?