INTIFADA
A contribution to the discussion THE preceding interview with George Habash was conducted by far We sent Drashe themes the act the themes that we wanted him to deal with and he sent us his replies. Thus it was not possible for reasons of distance to have a direct dialogue with the leader of the PFLP as we would have wished. In order to stimulate a discussion that we we would like to be able to pursue in the future, here are some remarks on Dr. Habash's contribution.
### SALAH JABER
T HE preceding interview with
George Habash was conducted by fax. We sent Dr. Habash the themes that we wanted him to deal with and he sent us his replies. Thus it was not possible for reasons of distance to have a direct dialogue with the leader of the PFLP as we would have wished. In order to stimulate a discussion that we would like to be able to pursue in the future, here are some remarks on Dr. Habash's contribution.
Needless to say, we did not choose to interview the PFLP by accident. It was a deliberate choice that reflected our assessment of that organization. The PFLP is the main organization of the Palestinian left and contains the majority of the more radical Palestinian militants. That is why it is both possible and necessary to have a dialogue with the PFLP including its leadership.
Different theoretical and programmatic framework
It is clear, to be sure, that our programmatic and theoretical framework is not the same as that of Dr. Habash, and the same is true of our political orientation, beyond the inevitable areas of agreement between those struggling against imperialism, Zionism and the Arab regimes dependent on the United States. In an overall sense, the PFLP leader has a lot more in common methodologically with the currents traditionally tied to Moscow than with us. This is shown, for example by the way in which he rubs out the differences in the attitudes to the Intifada of the different classes and social layers of the occupied territories in the name of the national struggle. A comparison between his views and those of the Palestinian Marxist that we published last year (see IV 158) is eloquent in this respect.
In our series of articles of last year (See IV 156 and 157), we have already criticized the way in which the PFLP, as well as the other left-wing currents in the PLO have swallowed bitter pills handed to them by the rightist leadership of the PLO in the name of national unity. In this regard we would have liked to be able to ask Dr. Habash how he imagines the carrying out of the fifth of the tasks he mentions, that is, the democratic reform of the PLO. It seems like nothing more than a pious wish, given the institutionalized and immovable character of the Arafat leadership's majority in the PLO. In the same way, when Dr. Habash talks "in all seriousness and responsibility" of his desire to see a change in the attitude of the PLO's leadership, it is hard to see things as more than a powerless wish, since he has deprived himself of the means for influencing that attitude.
Muffled criticisms from left-wing factions
If the only price that the Arafat leadership has to pay for its endless concessions to the enemies of the Palestinian people from the ranks of this people is these muffled criticisms from the left-wing factions, they will not be too bothered. The Palestinian left must show its determination to become an alternative leadership for the mass struggle, while maintaining unity in action with the right wherever possible. It is not enough moreover to try simply to put pressure on the right; what is needed is to break its hegemony over the mass movement and move towards the construction of a majority leadership totally independent of the feudal and bourgeois Arab regimes and expressing the point of view of the proletarian and semiproletarian masses who make up the overwhelming majority of the Palestinian people.
Therefore it seems to us completely contrary to the real interests of the Palestinian left for it to dissolve its ambitions to lead the struggle of the masses into a framework that it knows to be solidly dominated by the right. This applies to the PLO. 25 But is also true of the United National
INTIFADA
Sham-ir shameer\n
1: one who perpetuates a sham, fraud or hoax
2: a put-on, a fakeras in "There will be free and deinocratic elections in the West Bank" see also: Joe Isuzu Leadership (UNL) of the Intifada inside the occupied territories, which has been placed under the control of the external leadership of the PLO. Nonetheless, Dr. Habash puts much more emphasis on the role of the UNL than on that of the People's Committees although it is these latter that are the real driving force of the Intifada at the grassroot level and are, furthermore, the most democratic form of organization that the Palestinian mass movement has ever given itself. Besides, we consider the urgent invitation from the PFLP leader for the Islamic fundamentalist movement Hamas to join the UNL as politically short-sighted and stemming from an attitude which threatens dire consequences in the medium term. Hamas has a fiercely reactionary and fanatical, not to say racist, ideology, and has refused until now to participate in the UNL because, among other reasons, the Palestinian Communist Party is a part of it! This current represents a grave danger for the future of the Palestinian struggle, much more serious than that presented by the traditional right. Hamas carefully exploits all the concessions and capitulations of the latter and puts itself forward as an alternative leadership that will replace all other currents. Through its anti-Israeli radicalism allied with its medieval fanaticism, and the sharp and loud criticisms that it makes of the PLO, the fundamentalist movement is gaining more and more ground among the Palestinians, even outside Palestine. It represents potentially a mortal enemy for the Palestinian left as has been shown by similar movements in other countries in the region. It is also the ideal enemy for the Zionist right, an enemy that will make it a lot easier to solidify the Israeli population into a compact antiPalestinian bloc. While not rejecting a priori occasional 26 unity in action with Hamas in the framework of the Intifada, it is of vital impor-
Fian
Palestinues,
• SIGN HERE tance for the Palestinian left to conduct a no-holds-barred ideological and political struggle with this current. This also means denouncing the ambiguous relations that have taken place both in the past and now between Hamas (and the Muslim Brothers from which it derives) and the Zionist authorities. It is necessary to warn the Palestinian masses against the mystifications peddled by the fundamentalists rather than giving them added credibility by getting them to participate in the leadership of the struggle. Dr. Habash may believe that, on a number of questions, Hamas' attitude seems closer to that of the PFLP than that of the PLO leadership. But this would be to give priority to what both reject rather than the basic ideas underlying the different positions.
Fundamentalists reject international conference
Unfortunately and paradoxically, some of the positions that mark Hamas off among the forces on the ground work to its advantage in the long term. This is true, for example, of the fundamentalists' rejection of the "international conference" as a way of solving the Palestinian problem.
The conference project, which, according to the PLO's concept, would see the negotiations between the Palestinians and the Arab states on the one side, and the Israeli government on the other take place under the aegis of the five great powers, is in contradiction with the most elementary right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. It would not lead to the independent state to which the Palestinians aspire.
Dr. Habash does not seem to see that there is a contradiction between, on the one hand, his pointing out that it is the Intifada, not the PLO's concessions, that has allowed gains to be made, and calling on the PLO leadership to concentrate its
International Viewpoint #77 • January 29, 1990 efforts on stepping up the uprising, and on the other his appeal for "unifying efforts with regard to an international conference". This being furthermore, with Mitterrand and his European partners thrown in! Unless one believes, extremely naively, that the conference would be naturally inclined to confirm the gains made by the Intifada....
We were also very surprised to see Dr. Habash avoid our question on the tasks of the Palestinian movement in Jordan, on the pretext that King Hussein's regime no longer represents an immediate danger "for the Palestinian cause" since it has pulled out of the West Bank.
This is a strange reply from someone who was politically active in Jordan for a long time and who knows perfectly well that there are more Palestinians living there than on the West Bank and that there is even worse repression there than is exercised by the Zionist occupiers. It is a exercised by the inni in To strange reply too from someone who was a direct participant of the battles in 1970 when the Jordanian state massacred many more Palestinians than the Zionist power did in 1948. It is, finally, a strange reply from someone who aspires to an independent Palestinian state without abandoning the anti-Zionist struggle: is it not obvious, if only for geographical reasons, that the West Bank cannot be independent of the Zionist state without relying on Jordan?
Let us remark, finally, that, if the PFLP leader feels it right to ask the organizations of the Arab liberation movement "why have they not been equal to the Intifada?" and throw the responsibility for this deficiency onto them, these organizations have just as much right to throw a large part of the responsibility back onto the Palestinian liberation movement, that has privileged, and continues to privilege, its relations with the Arab regimes, even the most repulsive.
Let us recall, in this respect, how the PLO National Council, meeting in Algiers in November 1988, less than a month after the Algerian Intifada was drowned in blood, greeted with touching unanimity the "president and fighter Chadli Bendjedid"! This is not to mention the solid support to the Iraqi tyrant Saddam Hussein or the big service rendered to the Egyptian regime by the PLO leadership which was the first to break the official Arab boycott that followed on Cairo's peace treaty with Israel. It is here, in fact, that we find what is perhaps the main difference that we have with all the factions of the PLO including the dissident wing. We think that the real interests of the Palestinian struggle lie in linking up with the revolutionary struggles of the masses in the countries of the Arab region and not with the governments that oppress them. In the short term that would mean less money in the coffers of the Palestinian organizations, but the Palestinian people would thereby gain the only strategically it could really and directly rely on. *