Democratic Palestine : 20 (ص 3)
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- Democratic Palestine : 20 (ص 3)
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Editorial
The Shift in Amal’s Role
The fierce battle between the Palestinian resistance and the
Amal movement, which is now raging from the Beirut camps
to South Lebanon, dates back to Amal’s unprovoked attack on
Rashidiya camp on October Ist. The very fact that Amal has
been besieging this relatively small camp for two months
proves that this is no local incident, but one prong in Amal’s
overall plan. Despite intense efforts by Palestinian and Leba-
nese nationalist forces to end the war, Amal has persisted in its
campaign to enforce the downfall of Rashidiya. To this end,
Amal reinforced its murderous shelling with an embargo on
food and other essentials, and psychological warfare against
the camp residents, using methods reminiscent of Zionist-
fascist terror.
When all this failed to cow the people and fighters of Rash-
idiyva, Amal broadened the range of its aggression and
attacked the Palestinian camps near Beirut and Sidon. Not
even the Popular Nasserite Organization of Sidon, stationed to
enforce the mutually agreed upon ceasefire, escaped Amal’s
aggression. Thus, Amal blocked all efforts at a peaceful solu-
tion among allies, and proceeded in efforts to impose its secta-
rian conditions, not only on the Palestinians, but on Lebanese
nationalists as well. In the quest for hegemony over the natio-
nalist areas, Amal has engulfed the anti-Zionist, anti-fascist
forces in a side battle and enforced a rift in Palestinian-
Lebanese relations. The battle assumed wider, dangerous
dimensions as brigades of the regime’s sectarian army involved
themselves on Amal’s side, supplying helicopters, arms and
manpower in the Beirut and Sidon areas.
Pivotal to Amal’s military campaign were its positions in the
hills of Maghdousheh, overlooking Sidon from the southeast-
used for shelling Ain Al Hilweh and Miyeh Miyeh camps, and
as a connection point for the transfer of supplies from Amal
strongholds in Beirut to the South. On this background, the
Palestinian resistance undertook an operation on November
24th, designed to enable defense of the camps, and force Amal
to accept reasonable calls to end its suicidal project. Palesti-
nian freedom fighters gained control of Maghdousheh from
the Amal forces. (It is noteworthy that Amal is not an indige-
nous force in Maghdousheh which is a Christian village; Amal
had simply established military positions in this village because
of its strategic location, halfway hetween Beirut and Tyre,
enabling control of the coastal highway.)
From the time of gaining Amal’s positions in Maghdousheh,
the Palestinian organizations declared their readiness to with-
draw immediately in the context of a genuine ceasefire, gua-
ranteeing the camps’ security. The Palestinian revolution does
not seek to occupy or control any Lebanese territory, and has
exerted every possible effort with their brothers in the Leba-
nese national movement, to bring about a political solution to
end this dirty war.
Instead of responding positively to the Palestinian propo-
sals, Amal’s leadership escalated its political and military
aggression against the Palestinian people and revolution, using:
the same pretexts as Lebanon’s enemies, such as the dangers of
Palestinian ‘expansionism’ and resettlement in Lebanon. The
results of the numerous meetings and ceasefire agreements,
since the first camp war in 1985, have clearly shown that
Amal’s leadership is determined to execute its criminal project
against our people and revolution. Amal’s insistence is due to a
set of factors that paved the way for Amal to move from revo-
lutionary positions to counterrevolutionary ones. The main
factors in this shift are as follows:
First: Amal’s sectarian nature predetermined the future of
this movement and the horizons for its development. Secta-
rianism is an avenue to isolationist and reactionary positions.
It leads to a form of harmonizing with the plans of the Zionist
enemy which relies on sectarian divisions to divide and weaken
Lebanon, fragmenting it into cantons that would justify the
Zionists’ own sectarian ideology and existence. Amal’s secta-
rian nature limited the movement’s role in fighting for libera-
tion and democracy. Influential circles in Amal assumed a
passive position during the 1982 Israeli invasion, in contrast to
the nationalist resistance mounted by other sections of the
movement. Amal was late in assuming Its place in the Lebanese
National Resistance Front. Then, as the Israelis began their
staged, partial withdrawal, some circles of Amal turned their
energies to striking Lebanese nationalist and democratic
forces, along with continuous attacks on the Palestinian
masses and nationalist presence.
Second: Changes in Amal’s structure have created an
internal balance of forces, whereby those circles connected to
the reactionary Lebanese authority and to the Zionist enemy
have augmented their influence in the movement as a whole. A
major element in these changes is that Amal members who col-
laborated with the Zionist occupation forces in the aftermath
of the 1982 invasion, have been reinstated in their posts.
Third: During the past few years, Amal’s leaders began to
feel that there was a possibility for a sectarian solution to the
Lebanese conflict in the foreseeable future. Thus, they strove
to arrange the conditions in the patriotic and Islamic arenas in
a way that would guarantee their own hegemony. With this
motive, Amal waged wars on the Palestinian camps, and killed
and expelled patriotic Lebanese from West Beirut. In the end,
none of the Lebanese nationalist forces were able to operate in
South Lebanon. Thus, Amal hoped to usurp the right to speak
for the nationalist-Islamic forces, as a prelude to gaining more
privileges in the context of the Lebanese regime’s sectarian
game. Related to this was the feeling of Amal’s leaders that it
was possible to make a deal with the Zionist enemy in the
South, allowing Amal to impose its influence and eventually
build its own sectarian canton - the ‘Shiite state’. This would
mean playing the same role as Antoine Lahd and his South
Lebanon Army. This pushed Amal leaders to invent formulas
for security arrangements which would guarantee Israeli secu-
rity upon withdrawal from South Lebanon, in return allowing
Amal to build its ‘state’. The Palestinians are to be the scape-
goats for these security arrangements.
Amal leaders thought that the internal conflict in the PLO,
and the PLO’s deteriorating relations with some Arab natio-
nalist forces, especially Syria, would enable the execution of
their project. Amal tried to cover its dirty actions with slogans
such as the «deviating resistance» and opposition to Arafat’s
policies. Ironically, in reality, Amal’s own policy marks a sur-
render to the enemy conditions and serves to spread the policy
of capitulation in the Arab arena.
In the light of all these factors, influential circles in Amal
decided that the time had come for executing their campaign
against the Palestinians, even at the risk of exposing their true
intentions. Recent statements by Amal leaders, though ambi-
guously worded, confirm that complete control of the South,
in preparation for building the ‘Shiite state’, is at the top of
their agenda. To achieve this goal, they will not stop at attac-
king the Palestinian armed presence, but aim to drive Palesti-
nians to emigrate. The next stage would be eliminating Leba-
nese nationalist presence in the South as well. The campaign to
liquidate the Palestinian revolution as the price for this ‘state’
will be broadened to include massacres against Lebanese
patriots in Beirut and other regions, in order to impose Amal’s
sectarian hegemony. The fate of the Abu Al Aswad camp, near
Tyre, is a clear example of Amal’s methods and a warning
about its ultimate goals. This small, relatively isolated camp, - هو جزء من
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