Democratic Palestine : 3 (ص 20)

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Democratic Palestine : 3 (ص 20)

المحتوى

Significance of the
Aden Meeting
An Interview with Comrade
George Habash
The following is an interview with Comrade George Habash, General Secretary of the PFLP, in
which he explains to the staff of «Al Hadaf» and «Democratic Palestine», the significance of the agree-
ment reached in Aden between the PFLP-DFLP Joirit Leadership, the Palestinian Liberation Front and
the Palestinian Communist Party. Comrade Habash expressed great optimism that the results of this
meeting will exert positive influence on the efforts to resolve the crisis in the PLO.
How do you evaluate the Aden declaration in the light
of the crisis in the PLO?
Actually, more important than the declaration is the long,
serious discussion that took place regarding the crisis in the
Palestinian arena and the PLO, and how to deal with this... In
this respect, we can register a very great achievement: the
clarification and unification of the points of view of the Joint
Leadership, together with the Palestinian Liberation Front and
the Palestinian Communist Party, on the Palestinian problems
and how to resolve them.
This takes us back to Arafat's visit to Cairo on December
22, 1983, and its implications as a dangerous, new, qualitative
deviation, whereby Arafat tried to pull the PLO towards his own
position. At that time, there was agreement in the Joint Leader-
ship regarding the danger of this step, its political aims and
implications. The overall position was to condemn and strongly
confront this step.
After that, in light of the dangerous situation resulting from
Arafat's visit, it was natural that, for a period of time, some tac-
tical differences existed concerning the position to be adopted
in order to truly foil this step. The most important achievement
in Aden was that the Joint Leadership, along with the Palesti-
nian Liberation Front and the Palestinian Communist Party,
united their points of view regarding a variety of tactical issues
facing us after Arafat’s visit to Cairo. This achievement has
become an asset in our hands, which in my view is a great
accomplishment.
You are probably aware of the many speculations that
have circulated, even in the PFLP’s leadership and among our
rank-and-file and the masses supporting us, about the experi-
ence of the Joint Leadership. In all honesty, | should say that
prior to the discussion in Aden...we were quite worried that dif-
ferences might continue, which would have had a negative
impact on the Joint Leadership experience. When thinking of
the possibility that differences would continue and have a
20
negative impact on the Joint Leadership experience, | felt a
great objective responsibility. This led me to the necessity of
thinking further to find ways of resolving the differences that
existed.
In our analysis of the crisis of the Palestinian resistance,
even prior to our departure from Beirut, as was clearly stated in
the Political Report of our 4th congress, we believe that over-
coming the crisis is conditional on the growth of the revolutio-
nary democratic forces and their influence in the Palestinian
revolution and the PLO.
Now I can express my immense satisfaction, because the
recent discussion in Aden ended with uniting the points of view
concerning the political questions now facing us. This has
revived anew our hope in the success of the Joint Leadership
experience, and the experience of the revolutionary democra-
tic trend on the Palestinian level. Such unification is a guaran-
tee for continuing the revolution.
| have made this long introduction because the impor-
tance of the discussions and results in Aden goes way beyond
the political declaration issued by the meeting.
What about the initiative which the group of four
(PFLP, DFLP, PLF, PCP) presented to the Central Commit-
tee of Fatah?
Fatah’s Central Committee, via the Yemeni Socialist
Party, presented us (the four) with a working paper to be the
basis of discussion. We read this paper carefully. We in the
PFLP, as well as our comrades in the DFLP, felt that it in no
way addressed the questions existing in the Palestinian arena.
Most eye-catching was that it completely ignored Arafat's visit
to Cairo, as if it had never happened. It was necessary for the
members of Fatah’s Central Committee to realize that Arafat's
visit to Cairo is the major cause of the disruption of Palestinian
unity. This paper should have dealt with the visit, stating a clear
position on this and how to deal with its results. We were agh-
ast to see that this paper ignored the visit which has raised a

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Democratic Palestine : 3

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