Democratic Palestine : 12 (ص 5)
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- Democratic Palestine : 12 (ص 5)
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Cairo demonstration: «Change comes by people's struggle, not through Mubarak and the guards.»
latter having so far hindered all peace
efforts. Jordan has made concentrated
efforts in Washington, hoping that the
US will shoulder its responsibility as a
«super power» desiring to preserve
international peace. Hussein made no
attempt to conceal his willingness to
make concessions to imperialist and
Zionist pressure. Moreover, he an-
nounced his readiness to enter into «di-
rect and immediate negotiations with
israel» on the basis of UN resolutions
which make no mention of the political
rights of the Palestinian people: «We are
ready to begin negotiations with Israel
under the auspices of a suitable and
acceptable party as soon as possible,
according to UN resolutions 242 and
338...»
On September 29th, Mubarak des-
cribed Peres as being «flexible» and
said: «We can come to an understand-
ing with him on peace.»
Concessions meet violence
US imperialism and ‘Israel’ lost no
time in responding to the concessions
made by Arafat and King Hussein. A few
days after Arafat and Hussein made
their statements, Israeli Phantoms
bombed the PLO headquarters in Tunis,
causing devastating losses, 60 Tunisian
and Palestinian martyrs and hundreds of
wounded. Then Peres and Rabin level-
led a direct warning at countries which
harbor Palestinians, meaning Jordan in
particular. They stressed that the arm of
‘Israel’ is long, and there is no safe
refuge for the PLO. They presented the
raid on Tunis as a lesson and a warning.
Of course, the US did not delay in
making a statement on the Israeli ter-
rorism, describing it as a justifiable act
and expressing understanding. Richard
Murphy, US envoy to the Middle East,
commented on the results of the raid,
saying that it will not slow down the
peace process in the Middle East. He
added that he thought there was a possi-
bility that the PLO would reconsider its
policy with regard to armed struggle.
This is on the level of statements.
On the practical level, the US Administ-
ration, a few days after the raid, gave
orders to its planes on the US warships
in the Mediterranean, to hijack an Egyp-
tian civilian plane which carried the
hijackers of the Italian ship, Achille
Lauro. By this, the Reagan Administra-
tion aimed at achieving more than one
goal:
1) To draw the attention of international
public opinion away from the Israeli
crime in Tunis, and to justify this as «a
legitimate act against terrorism» as Rea-
gan put it.
2) To indicate to Hussein and Arafat that
they have no choice but to accept the
US-lsraeli conditions for a settlement in
the Middle East.
3) To revive the confidence of imperial-
ism’s reactionary allies in the region by
showing that the US is ready to use force
to implement White House policy.
4) To demoralize the Palestinians into
giving up armed struggle, attempting to
show that it results in nothing but devas-
tating those who adopt it.
5) To weaken the Soviet position in the
Middle East especially before the Gor-
bachev-Reagan summit, showing that
the US can flex its muscles in the region
without affecting its relations with the
reactionary regimes, flaunting _ its
privilege over the Soviet Union.
The Reagan Administration was not
content with hijacking the civilian plane,
but also used the incident of the Achille
Lauro to pressure the British govern-
ment into refusing to meet with the Pa-
lestinian members of the joint delega-
tion, unless they agreed to sign a state-
ment including the US-Zionist conditions
for solving the Palestinian cause. That-
cher’s government complied with the US
pressure, and Foreign Secretary Howe
refused to meet with the Palestinian de-
legates.
The right’s response to US and
israeli insults
Yasir Arafat declared that «US and
Israeli terrorism and piracy are conspir-
ing to destroy the Palestinian and Jorda-
nian peace initiative in the Middle East.»
Arafat went on to underscore his deter-
mination to continue with Hussein in
chasing after the US solution, despite
the fact that the US Administration
shows no intention of solving the Palesti-
nian cause.
Abu lyad, member of Arafat’s Cen-
tral Committee, stressed that the reason
for the Israeli raid was «|srael’s finding
5
» - هو جزء من
- Democratic Palestine : 12
- تاريخ
- نوفمبر ١٩٨٥
- المنشئ
- Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)
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