Military Strategy of the PFLP (1970)

7/27/2019 Military Strategy of the PFLP (1970)

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INFORM TION DEPARTMENTP F LPBEIRUT97


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committment of the Popular Front as expr essedin its above-mentioned political and organjzational report.

O f course, this contribution which has b e e nmade possible by the initiative of Al-Hadaf* j saimed primari ly at deepening and enlargingupon, progressive resistance thought and strat-e g y . It is intended to be submitted to the massesand the f ighters as part of the intense revolu-tionary discussion Which is taking place inmany circles. This discussion aims at enrichingrevolutionary thinking, establishing it f i r m l yand ensuring th e continuation of the struggleuntil victory is achieved over th e oppressorsof the people. P F L PInformation Department

* Al-Hadaf: official o rgan of the Popular Frontfor the Liberation of Palestine, published inBeirut since July 1969.


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established themselves on the A r ab - I s r af r o n t be fore the d e fea t . However , the ba-beginnings and o r gan iza t io n a l s t r u c tu r e s ^veloped after the defeat . Even those which h a dar isen be fore J u n e 5 th had not t aken on t h e jbroad f o rm o r d imensions unt i l a f t e r J u n e 5 t k

This means tha t th e r es is tance movementbegan as a r eac t ion . B ut we r e co n d i t i o n s r e a d yfor the s ta r t o f t h i s movement or not ? T h e answer to th is quest ion del ineates the devloprnentof the m o v e m e n t o r , r a th e r , the r oad on w h i c hit p resently proceeds.Condi t ions were no t comple te ly r ipe f o r the

start of an o rganized, deep- rooted , f a r - reachingresistance movement. Only one of those c o n d it ions was present, i .e., the ex is tence of aggres-sion. However , at the t ime, i t w a s n t possibleto speak o f pos tpon ing the resistance un t i l theobject ive cond i t ions had ripene d in the t r a d itional sense, and on ly then begin to resist.Not at a l l . That w as impossib le , and indeedwould have been a c r ime. For the p r i n c ip l e oflegit im ate de fen se prescr ibes reacting to ag-gression promptly and w i th a ll poss ib le means.whatever the c i rcumstances .

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the ranks of the masses, the development ofucadres and its f ighters , and their armam eil^preparation and training, w e find tha t the retistance movement has take n extensive sterforward, and tha t it has proceeded on the e ssential path toward forming the appropriateinstrument capable of governing those c o r u j j .tions favorable to the creation of a genuine p o .Ipu la r war of liberation.

There are some who say that the war of l j .berat ion has already begun and tha t we h a v ebegun advancing within the war of liberationfrom one phase to another. Were we to considerthe resis tance movement from this angle,wewould see it in a way to tal ly different fromou rprevious view which sees it as a revolutionarynucleus which fosters a climate leading to thecreation of a revolu t ionary force to undertakethe advancement of revolut ionary act ion andthe launching of a popular war of liberation.


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On the psychological level, the Israeli mil j .ta ry a lways a ims a t reassuring the Israel i citi-zen t ha t it is capable of p ro tec ting h im ,h is l ifehis survival and his economic a d v a nc e m e n tth rough the suppress ion of any e n e m y .

Afte r June 5th and the quick victory whichIsrael effected, var ious long- range a im s of thew ar were supposed to m a t e r i a li z e , a im s whichmay be s u m m a r i z e d as the imp lemen t a t i onofsecurity and s tabi l i ty for the Israeli citizen.However , the resistance m ovem ent has prevent -ed Israel from rea l iz ing tha t a im and from be-ne f i t t i ng from its vic tory . It depr ived her ofth e f ru i t of victory peace of mind w i t h inIs-rael, whether in terms of mi l i tary expendi turesor of the disrupt ion of development programs,etc . The resistance movement , through i ts blowsat ecpnom ic and civi l targets w ith in the terri-tories occupied in the 1948 and 1967 wars, hasbeen able to render that peace of m i n d and se-cur i ty absolutely non-exis tent . Consequent ly ,i t has put the Israel i m il i tary in a con stan t lydif f icul t position before its cit izens. O f course,the resistance has not reached the point ofren-de ring i t im poten t , as i t som etim es reacts to

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side to wi thin the occupied territories. Isra eicalls this movement inf i l t ra t ion. It is in f ac the re turn of citizenswho left their land due tooverpowering force to the land which is legit}m a tely theirs across illegitima te borders whichdivide the Arab people. This concludes the dis.cussion of the psychological aspects of the ef-fect of the res is tance movement on Israel.

As for the mate r ia l and mili tary aspectsthere is the m a t t e r of the defence l ine or thewarning l ine w hich Israel has extended alongthe borders to p reven t the commondos fromentering from barbed wire to simple electricalinstal lat ions to va r ious forms of en t r ench-ments. A very small p rt is electronic. Contraryto w ha t the Israelis claim rega rding the irhaving installed elcetronic devices on a widescale these devices are in fac t l imited electric-a l warning devices form ing the largest par t .All these devices of whatever type cost thoses ta tes wh ich instal l them large am ounts ofmoney . The Maurice l ine the M cNam ara lineand the other defense l ines of this type areacknowledged as being financially exorbitantburdens.

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it not for her fear of the establishment of con-tacts between th e interior and the exteriorA dd to this th e fact that Israel in order todominate all the areas lying within th e occu-pied territories and especially those occupied

after th e June war is compelled to distributeher forces in a superficial occupation throughuse of the quadrangle tactic. This tactic isbased on motorized units separated at fixed dis-tances and coveringall intervening ground witha network of land posts. These posts are intouch with airborne t roops or aircraft whichare capable of respon ding imm ediately andswiftly to any infiltration into th e occupied ter-ritories. This counters th e guerrilla practiceofachievng a tactcal superiority of 5 to 1 despitean overall strategic inferiority of 1 to 5. Thisis done so that once a guerrilla force has en-tered and been observed at a given site tha tquadrangle zeros-in so as to overcome the lo-ca l supremacy of the commandoswho had in-tended to use that suprem acy against a fixedtarget. The combat ratio thus becomes reversedin favor of the forces opposing th e guerrillas.And in this way Israel tries to coun ter local

guerrilla supremacy in gThis form of fanning cupation wears down thth e over-extension of hisin g an d prevents th e exisembled striking force. Uhowever the enem y costriking forces and is ableat tacks on the state level.ment has not unt i l now ball the Israeli forces th rouquadrangular form nor

engage the Israeli army incourse is one of the futurance movement.It is well-known that rives benefit from the dilemy faces: ei ther to occupy thquadrangular netwforces and destroyigroupw hich penet rthereby we aken ing

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which enables guerrilla forces to strikeat any of his dispersed units. or toadopt another solut ion, whichwouldbe to concentrate in order to respond toth e blows of the revolut ionary army ,

thereby leaving some areas vacant .This,however, provides the gue rr i l las w i thth e opportuni ty to occupy and dominatethese areas and thus toharas sthe enemyand strike at his rear.This anxiety and contradiction with which

every army trying to resist guerri lla w arfa relives, this wav ering between dispersion in aquadrangular network and concentrating inth e form of striking forces for counterat tack,has clearly not yet seized th e Israeli army. Thisis due to the fact that th e guerrillas have notyet grown sufficiently either materially or nu-merically within the interior although theycertainly will eventually) to necessitate suchsweeping dispersion. Nor has the Israeli armyyet found itself endangered by an offensiveaimed at its weak points, which would force it

to concentrate and therethe guerrillas to work fre

In the coming develolas, af ter their expansiontheir assaults in the intedoubtedly coerce the Israover-extension. A t that prevolutionary force in thed and trained in systemtionary cadres and leadethe guerrillas and is joinea rmy) would be capable oin any locale. Thus, whecentrates to deal the revblow, the guerri l las wouwith ease, cutting off cation. A t that point, th eto the di lemma which whilate i t and, we wouldfinal phase of guerri l la w

It is possible to summin g that the Arab resistases th e enemy and addsness to the taste of his v

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ing him of much of wha t he aims at achieving.But the continued growth of the movement, thedevelopment of its method s, the gradual in-crease of its cadres, and the expansion of itsrange of operations will enable it to create thenecessary climate for a popular war of libera-tion. This war has not yet started, but it in-evitably will, with the cooperation of the guer-rillas from whom th e revolutionary army willdevelop under the guidance of their cadres.

Guerrilla Warfareand the Enemy

Al Hada f The general conctopic leads to the question: th e activities of the resista regular mili tary activity,glance that th e enemy s armthing resembling guerrilla wregular armies ordinari ly d o.regular Arab military activitmy sometimes appears in tociples of guerrilla war fare ethe operations of the resistself. For example, the enem

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southern Lebanon south of the Dead Sea etc.Al-Hadaf: But why are we notc apable o f car-rying out such operations either on the com-mando or regular army levels?Answer: O n the Commando level we maynotice that all operat ions which th e enemy un-dertakes spring from th e same spirit. The spiritof the specialized operation. The spirit of theraid or the ambush . O r a f ixed force assemblingagainst a small objective to strike at it swiftlyand then withdraw. However the existing c a-pabilities of the Ara b guerri llas presently activeare at variance with those of the Israeli armyfrom th e s tandpoint of training th e existence air and hel i copter means of transport or thenumber ofarmored vehic les und erta kin g strikesat a small target and then returning.

But from the tactical standpoint they areon the samelevel So that when a groupofcom-mandos undertake to enter the occupied terri-tories from th e outside or assembles from wi th-in and carries out an assault on a guard postor sets up an ambush for a group of vehicles

within th e limits of its capundertakes to apply the pspecalized operations. Whth e Arab guerrillas are rain training and in arms move to a stage higher thaing- up ambushes fo r movto say they will set up talso capture some of thostheir w eapons taking thedestroying wha t had nottroyed. And rather than asthey will attack an airportoperations will take on anform.

As for the reason that thcarry out such operationsin their basic formation ahave been defensive armiphases from 1948till the psisted of forces concentrato guard against aggressiraelis were always carryinsion the Arab armies would simply carry out a

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Arab strategy has been static anddefensiveto the extreme. Ev en its defen se has been anon-dynamic one, a stationary defense antici-pating a blow without knowing when i t wouldcome. And when it did come,this defensewouldrespond to it w ith gun fire and not w ith mobilityAll th e hostilities which Israel has carriedout against the Arab borders have been of thiskind : a swift attacking operation, carrying outits assignment then withdrawing, and met onlywith defensive fire from th e Arabs. The Arab

armies would be called up for a period butafter a time w ould return to their norm al de-fensive status w itho ut responding to Israel'saggressive act with a deterring one.This follows from th e fact that th e Arabmili tary apparatus, throug hou t this periodoftime, has been unable to put into effect th epolicy required to f i t , a policy of liberation. Ithas not been predisposed towards escalation andachievement for the purpose of acon fronta t ion

of wide scope and is incapable of acknow-ledging that before th e masses.

coming to power , of its osystems and its accus ationtems of their inability to bold front, is that it is cIn fact, it is not . This fe atofmy and of being f rank wiways caused it s posi t ion towards coveringup matterspansion of any entanglemtion. As long as the enemyand no t advance , th e mattAnd if the enemy wi thdredeemed as t an t amount toth e issueThe Arab armies havesively at all. They have nranging offensive operattraining and spirit have bdue to the danger of thements,one eye has alway s band the other outwards. Twards a ims to mainta in poa t tempts to ha l t th e enem

The justification of its existence, of its Cont ra ry to this, th e


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since its inception has been an offensiverelying on the surprise blow and the conceptthat if itdoes notstrike first it wil l be struckThus it strikes according to the principle thatthe best method of defense is a good offence.This type of offensive attitude takes rootwith time within the f ighters and trainingevolves on the basis of the offense. The enemyknows that Arab circumstances do not permitArab armies to under take offensive action.Consequently it strikes at a suitable site aim-ing its blows and raising th e morale of its armyand population knowing fu l l well that therewill be no response or counterblow. Were it ex-pecting the contrary it would not have under-taken that sort of adventure which it mountswhenever it sees that it is propitiousquickforays aimed at raising the level of morale ofits soldiers and people carried out in fullcon-fidence that the Arab military apparatus willnot move against it .

If we consider the ratio of paratroopers andcommandos in proport ion to the number oisoldiers in the Israeli army in comparison w i tthat in the Arab armies we would f ind thatthe

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terrain is small. It is compelled to respond toand tostrike at anumber offronts. Consequent-ly its forces must be capable of mobility fromone front to another before the latter has be-come active. Th us Israel moves against andstrikes at the first front usually the strongestone then returns to settle accounts with theother fronts having already pinned them downbefore striking at the first.

In order to enable any state to carry outsuch a plan as did G erm any in W orld W ars Iand II and as did Israel in the 1948 war andeven more clearly in 1967 its forces must allbe highly mobile.After th e 1967 w ar it became clear to theIsraeli military that the expansion which itmanaged to achieve within the occupied terri-tories necessitated more than troops m erelycarried by land or armored or borne by half-

tracks. Rather it was also necessary for her tohave large helicoptor-borne striking forces ona wide scale.

The problem of transport from th e Syrianto the Egyptian fronts has now been exacerbat- 8

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or land operations against isolated Israeli out-posts inSinai However we must here considerthese units realistically and objectively andinclude in our appraisal and assessments thedifference between units which have previous-ly achieved numerous victories over a periodof twenty years and those belonging to an armyexposed to two large consecutive defe ats with-in a short period of time.

Thin

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nswer The spirit o f daring, offensive s a c r j v ^fice latent within the commandos, the psychol 0.gical and mental roots from which commandoaction stems their categorical rejection of thedefeat , their rush to plunge into th e battle 0{liberation, th e operat ions o f confrontat ion c a rried out by the commandos in spite o f their be-ing small all this has c o nfirm ed th at they en-jo y that creative spirit o f offense. I am cer-tain that wh a t prevents the commandos froinundertaking operations resembling the special}.zed ones of the Israelis is merely a material im.pediment , as represented in weaponry , equip-ment , and the s tandards o f training and com-mand. All the com mando organizat ions willmake an a t t empt to overcome these materialimpediments in the course o f their develop-ment.

As for the Arab armies, th e tenet o f d e -fense, o f r eac t ion, o f prevent ing th e wideningof entanglements , th e absence o f a comprehen-sive plan for a ful l -scale war of l iberat ion, th eloss of the spirit o f enterprise and dar ing of theArab establ ishments all this prevents th eexistence o f such operat ions. For Israel, th e

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has attained and has been able to e f f e c tua t e i^a way d i f f e r en t f rom the rest of the Arabar-mies. Although this development i s undoub ted -ly taking place within the other Arab a rmiesaswell what hasoccurred within the Egyp t i anarmy is more visible.

With regard to the other Arab armies thisis taking place on a relatively lower level.Andall that of course follows f rom th e strength ofthe impetus comingf rom behind.The armyactsinaccordance with political conviction.And theboldness of that political conviction or its in-troversion f lows f rom i ts conf idence in whetherthe masses are behind i t or not whether theyare able to stand f i rm no matter w h a t t h e ex-tent of the struggle or whether the internalf ront is u r i f i rm . From these beginningsthe tenet of of fense and daring are created.This is present on the Egyptian f ront in newfo rm. Thus we see that the Israelis ca r ry ou tan amphibious operation while the Egypt iansundertake th e occupationof acontrol post;thenthe Israelis undertake a strike and the Egypt-ians respond witha raid.

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pie of defense, believing only in the principkof offense as the sole means ofwar. For the So,viet doctrine, accordingto which the cadres j*the Syrian, Egyptian and other Arab armieswere trained in the .Socialist countries, main,tains that the principle o f offense is fundamen. ltal,while that ofdefense is a temporary phasewhich the army might benefit f rom to upsetthe enemy s equilibrium while anticipating th eoffensive. It is the phase which precedes theof fense .and thus i t is not considered as a detensiveone.The offense" isbasic, while th e defense mustbe a dynamic anddaringone,where raids and re-connaissance activities go on, so that thereisno silence. For silence gives the fighter the i mpression of the lessening of tension which, hiturn, develops into a static defense. And s t a t i cdefense, according to military principle, yieldsnothing but more defeats. It is presupposed,f rom the standpoint of Soviet military doctrineas adopted by the Arab armies, that those a r rmies are both offensive and daring ones. Theability of these armies to assimilate and imple-ment that doctrine, however, is another matterLikewise, th e entire political mentality and c i r

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The Confrontation the Armiesand the Organizations.

Al-Hadaf:This would mean, then, that as longas there exists th e technolog ical ability and doc-tr ine of the offense with which th e A r ab armiesare supposed to be injected, the problem willcome to the point of being solved. Throughoutth epast tw en ty years, however, the situationhasu l t imately wound up in a stateof impotence,fa i lure and collapse. This is clear from what ishappening now on the borders and has led usto conclude tha t there exist other factors be-sides the t echnological one or the vision of anofficer or a l eader ; i.e. the mat ter of organi-

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fight with Arab weapons. The struggle is notbetween Arab and Israeli industry as it wasfor example between Germ an and French in.dustry amatter in which the one which equipsits army with better weaponry has an advant-age over the other.

There are the Arab weaponscoming from the Socialist Countries whichare likewise industrially advanced. The wea-pons from both sides are at a correspondinglevel of excellence. It is true that Israelmanu-factures some light weapons improves uponsome heavy equipment and is now diligentlytrying to attain independence in weaponsma-nufacture. The possibilities of using weaponryof patrolling and of training are not impossibletasks however but rather are quite possible.The Arab establishments have implementedthese fo r period of time while Israel has al-ways done so.

But the issue here as we have already saidis the political thought which exists behind th euse of those weapons. W e have noted that theIsraeli political notion is one of exp ans ionism

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spearhead implanted by the advancedimperial ,ist world, then i t is incumbant upon the Arab Istates andthethird worldto practise some formof f ighting which corresponds to their under.development. This is so because their technolo-gical ability is not suf f icient to confront Ameri-can technology, knowing, as we have said, thefact that we have access to Soviet weaponryand technology , equal in quality and quantityto that which they possess.

Whenever the underdeveloped countriesof thethird world confront advanced states, theyuse the strategy of . a protracted war. Such astrategy requ ires a peop le ready to bear all itsstipulations and imbued with adeep-rootedandradical doctrine which makes them believe thatthiswar is in their interest, andthat the leader-ship in power is part of them, acts on theirbe-half, and does not constitute a petri f ied classabove them. At that point, it is within theircapacity to conduct a long-term war in whichthey might exhaust their more advanced f o ewhile simultaneously upsetting the balanceofpower, with they themselves undertaking thecounterattack.

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type of state, in which th e masses are coalescedwith their leadership, and where the leadershipthrows itself into the struggle with all its powerbecause of its knowledge that the masses arefully behind it: countries whose leadership isprepared to hold out before a rough way of lifeand to carry out continuous assaults, to exposeitself to an unsettled life and to killing for tensof years; and as long as what does exist con-sists of establishments and armies that are neu-tralized by simply being de fea ted ; then theissue will remain one of building up the army.Once again Israel will advance and annihilateeach arm y separately. Tha t w ill be followed bya period of s tagnat ion and then a period of re-building along the same lines. Then anotherstrike and another period of stagnation andso on.

W ha t is needed is a people com pletely mo-bilized and armed, so that when Israel strikesat the a r m y , there will be a gun in each homeand a grenade in the pocket of each citizen. TheIsraeli a rmy, at that point, would be unable toenter any city, or at least not until having paidthe price. Even an attempt to occupy a village,

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ing and another class exists which is subieto exploitation. Nor can it do so as long s ,,class which so benefits acquires all gains ?ing peacetime, and then obliges the exploitclass to pay the price with its blood in the tnidof the.hell of the struggle.

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Answer: ThePopular Front does what is with.Iin its capability, to develop its role in the resist,fance movement, and to proceed f rom its pre.sent role to a more evolved phase in the guer -1rilla war. However much the issue develops,within guerrilla warfare,we must bear in mindthat reaching the point of a popular war of\\ \n fare plus psychological warfare. For a popularwar of liberation consists o f a revolu t ionarywar which utilizes an indirect revo lu t ionarystrategy which depends, according to Lenin,upon postponing activities until such time a s ;the demoralization of the enemy is permittedby directing the decisive blow against it withease.

The answer here is directed towards p s y lchological warfare, which aims at the follow-ing:

1 . to demoralize the enemy and to f r a gment it materially, -while draining i tin the long-run until it is ready fo r t h edecisive blow, and

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Whymust the fighter necessarily be aMarxistLeninist? And why does the Popular Frontassume a Marxist-Leninist stance in the sens?that it induces all its rank and file and its cadres to embrace Marxist theory?

The answer is that the Popular Front pr0 ceeds along this definitive course on the basisof a socio-politicalevalution.The Popular Frontconsiders the proletariat class workers pea.sants residents of the re fugee camps and theimpoverished as the substance of the revolu-tion its instrument its fue l and its ob jec t ive .Itis thus incumbent uponus to adopt that theorywhich makes the interests of that class its o wnin the revolution. Likewise class unity and thecoalescenceof the leadership with the rank andf i le of which we have spoken in the previoussection as two basic pre-conditions for a l o n gterm war and for i t s continuation can be ac -complished only after having reached a h i g hdegree of class awareness and understandingof the class theory which advocates revolutioni.e..that o fMarxism-Leninism. This does not

mean that Marxism-Leninism is no more t h a na tool with which to achieve victory. Rather

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areas which are nominated to become the re-volutionary centers in the near fu ture , such asthe East Bank and south Lebanon? How willthe Popular Front approach those tasks? Andhow will it attempt to perform them with re-gard to its relationship with the villagers ana the masses and with regard to the existingsocio-economic reality?* nswer ThePopular Frontconsiders the crea-tion of a revolutionary climate tomean thepre-paration and the cultivation of aproper g round- ;work for the revolution. In view of the fact thatthe Popular Front considers the workers thepeasants and the residents of the refugeecampsas the basic implement and the genuine fuelofthe revolution it takes it upon itself to con-struct its political and militaryorganizations tothe widest extent possible, in the midst of thisclass. It simultaneously attempts to attractwhatever sections possible of the petit bour-goisie and to induce revolutionary intellectualsto leave their class positions and to join thestruggle along with the dispossessed classes.

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whether it will limit itself to the occupied ter-ritories and the East Bank or whether it willexpand to south Lebanon and other areas it ispossible to saywithout breaching security thatthe Popular Front is already active within theoccupied territories aswell aswithin some sur-rounding Arab areas. Moreover th e range o fits activity will expand to comprise all that ter-ritory surrounding Palestine and that areawhich m ay become part of the Arab Hanoiin the future.

In this fashion,with th e continuation of thebattle within the occupied territories and thecontinuaion ofassaults on the Imperialist-Israelienemy everywhere and by mobilizing the re-volutionary masses all over th e Arab worldtobecome the supportof the resistance movementits propogators and its backbone the move-ment will not be depleted of its capacities a ctivity and political backing.

Bymeansof all this thePopular Front w i l lignite the fires of revolution protect it, and i n lduce the popular masses to reject the d e f e tand the fact, whether of occupation or of the

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The ResistanceMovementand its E f fe c t Upon the Enemy.II

Al Hadaf: W i th regard to the controversialrelat ionship between the resistance m ovem entand the enemy in the process of the struggle,has the resistance movement , dur ing the periodbetween June 1967and the present, producedapolitical effect upon Israeli society, has i t deep-ened the con tradict io ns with in i t , and wh at arethe possibilities for the future?*Answer: The relat ionship between the enemyand th e l iberat ion movem ent exists wi th in th ef ramework of the Arab-Israeli issue, as was

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If Western societies consist of a climatewhich is of only average receptivi ty to notionsrelated to the Arab-Israeli struggle, this is soby force of their origins, their interests and the Ianteced ent notions which they have inhe ri ted ,Israeli society consists of a soil un rece ptiveto quick results. This is not because it is f u n 1damental ly unreceptive to such cultivation only]but because of the ef fects sraeli propogandawhich has gone on unopposed for a long periodof t ime, and which has been reinforced by d eceptions and confessional , chau vinist matters.All this has contributed to the emergence of a nIsraeli inferiori ty complex, to fear , and to afeeling of danger .

Then the 5th of June came along to upsettheir conceptions, and to fill them with f e e lings of arrogance and insolence.These things have rendered even the Israeli;

proletar iat^tha t class whose interest lies in thet e rmina t ion of the sraeli entity, of little e fficacy. It thus engages only in passive resist-ance, and plays a two-fold role: it exploits theArabs and oppresses them, while it , itself, if

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territories occupied before une 5 1967. Someof those sectors will then act positively whilesom e others w ill co ntin ue to w ait it ou t. An dwhen the t ime comes for the counter-offensiveof the revolutionary forces to begin thesepockets will go into action and work behindenemy lines helping to fragment this hostilesociety thereby dissipating its power. Thefor-mat ion of those pockets is proceeding satisfac-torily. Moreover the counter-offensive has notyet begun which thus m akes them app ear tobe smaller than their actual size.

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movement is unavoidable. In the first Place.what is the military conceptionofthat re la t i0ship and secondly what is its politicaltion?

:P - renswer With respect to the Palestiniansistance movement there exist numbertendencies which present the Arab-Isra eii

struggle as one between the Palestinians andth e Israelis in the area. These tendencies assertthat this struggle bears no relation to the Arabsituation, or that th e Arab situation is inde-pendent of the issue at least at the presenttime. W e must consider the matter to be a P a-lestinian one and f ight the enemy withintheoccupied territories. The error here is clear lytwo-fold:

1. It renders the issue an exclusivelyP a -lestinian one and the struggle a Palesti-nian-Israeli one a nd2 . It ignores the f a c t that the causeof thispresent reality is the Arab reality in itsentirety a nd does not visualize the es-sential underlying causes of that P a -lestinian reality.

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struggle or not? Do they attract to theitispart of the battle or part of those forcesare carryingout the struggle or not? D0 t)draw to themselves part of the Israeli a eyf o r t and the Israeli army or not?

It is from- this angle that we must crmc . - j, , . llibicthe issue.The Popular Front does not consider I

battle as anexclusively Palestinian one.Ratheit sees it as an Arab one. It also discerns th 'horizons of this battle. If it is made to be anArab one in which the masses participate andwhich the entire Arab region pushes itself in.to , with the Arab people putting into it all jtspotentialities human, psychological, econo-mic and the capacity for guerrilla war fa re ,ifthere was a Hanoi in a state adjacent to oc-cupied Palestine which would permit an ArabViet Cong to ariseand engage in dailyclasheswith the enemy in the entire Arab area atthat point, it would be possible to enter awarof long duration.

Without this range ofvision, victorywouldnot be possible.


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Arab struggle the Palestinian resistance move-ment presently existing create a revolutionaryclimate by showing that it is possible to con-f ront an oppressive power that technologicalsuperiority is noteverything and that the tankand airplane are weapons which can beoppos-ed. Inshort its roleinthis sphereistantamountto being the yeast of the revolution and aschoolfo r the masses in all the Arab countries dis-playing before them that an army is, in fact , apower which can be overcome by the masseseven poorly armed masses. The lesson here isthat the Palestinian resistance movement inspite of its numerical smallness has seriouslyaffected the largest andmost powerful army inthe region the Israeli army which was ca-pable of defeating the Arab armies within amatter of hours and of inflicting substantialdamage. In this sense it constitutes an examplefo r those masses qualified tocarry out arevolu-tion and for every force which desires a Ha-noi, measures each Arab state in order to de-termine whether that state is capable of beinga Hanoi, and then takes action towards thatend.

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isapproaching.For itsexistenceis aform ofvic-tory, a step along the road.Going on to answer the rest of the question,

it is necessary to speak about cooperation be-tween the guerrillas and the regular armies. Onthe strategic level, as we observe from Arabmilitary writings in general, there is a conside-rable and grave distoriton regarding this mat-ter which many have slipped into. I myself,was among those who were thus deluded andwho, after the defeat of June 1967,did not knowhow to distinguish between their broad hopesand whatpart of those hopes the regular A r a barmies were in fact able to realize. They triedto deceive themselves with unrealistic notionssimply in order to cradle those hopes whichwere all that they had left. There m ay be inthe writing of these words an element of self-criticism which I have directed inward afterhaving found sufficient time and the atmos-phere to read up on these matters more deeply.Those who call for cooperation of the guerril-las with the regular armies, or at least withsome ofthem, ordinarily use as theirbasis asI have done more than once the teachings of

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mies on the tactical level. As for strategic co-operation, however, this is subject to the na-ture of those armies, their range of vision, theclass which they serve, the nature of theircadres and their strategy. Is it the strategy ofa quick war, or one of long duration? Are theyqualified for such a war? All these questionsmust be answered before presenting the sub-ject of cooperation between th e guerrillas andthe regular armies. As for true and deep-rootedcooperation which needs no discussion, it isthat which will exist between the guerrillas, orwhat will be left of them, and those of themwho will develop into an army in the longrun. If they continue toexist that is forcon-tinued existence means that it is accompaniedby the development culminating in the stage oirevolutionary arm y wh ich undertakes regularoperations.))

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nswer W e Will begin with th e word basesThe base in the sense which it has for the Po-pula r Front in particular, and for all the com-mando organizations in general, is constitutedof a group of f ighters located a t some site in -side or outside the occupied territories who areactively striking at the e n e m y . I t ma y be asingle base aiming those blows or the concen-tration of a num ber of bases striking at one tar-get, in order to e f fectuate thei r tem pora ry andlocal superiority and then to disappear. In itsdaily life, it pu r sues a program of military orpolitical preparation keeping in contact withthe masses , and ma in ta in ing i ts own continuedexistence. For the continuation of its existenceis pa r t of the process of creating a revolution-ary climate.

W e do not require of every base or, moreexactly it is not required of it to carry out aspecific num ber of mi l i tary tasks dur ing agiven period of t ime, since it does not simplyconsti tute an assault posi t ion for special unitslocated on the borders, or w h a t in c om ba t is cal-led an advanced outpost from which raids or

72

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without the occupied territories. It goesout saying that the bases without are moremerous, while those within are fewer.Theup of those inside is more precisely secret.methods are likewise tact ical ly,distinct frorrithose of the external bases, which practicethemethods of guerrilla warfare , while th e inter-nal ones apply th e methods of secret warfareIt goes without saying that we do not considerthat there is an interior or an


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context, bases takes on the meaning o f purelymil i tary barracks which carry ou t m i l i ta ry ope-rations exclusively, and have no o the r taskO ur question relates to this sort o f genera l de-f ini t ion. W h a t is the p roper def in i t ion , or i tsnecessary elements?)) nswer The mean ing of the word bases d i f -fe rs w i th the make-up of each o rganizat ion . I fsome organization believes t ha t present activi-ty should be purely mili tary activity, then thebases in this case will be mil i tary or semi-mili-tary ones which represent outposts that performspecial tasks on a given level. But if the make-up of a resistance organization is political andmil i tary , and it deems itself to be a revolution-ary nucleus more than an yth ing else, and in aphase of preparing for a popu la r war of libera-t ion, then the role of the f ighters in that orga-nizat ion would be s imultaneously poli t ical andmilitary. T he Pop ular F ront considers i ts basesto be of this type, and it is possible to apply thesame assertion to those of comrades in some ofthe o ther organizations.

Guerrilla activity, in its re lation to the

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eU P

dargeOperationsanbShelling

Al-Hadaf: Th i s takes care of the term bases .N o w , wha t abou t such terms a s large ba t t lesand shell ing w i t h rockets ?.Ans w er : W i t h regard to large opera t ions , th esize of the opera t ion is a ques tion w hich cor-responds to the s t ra tegic evaluat ion of the phaseth rough which th e resistance movement is pas-sing. If one of the res is tance organiza t ion s con-siders i tself in the phase of making ready, orof b eg inn ing the f i r s t s tage, or in the h ea r t ofth e f i r s t stage, i ts bas ic concern, then, would

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to the estimation of those o rgan iza t ionsthe stage through which we are currently p aing . Whoever estimates that we are still in thf i r s t stage, preparing ourselves to beg in , arthose organizations which are carrying out o rdinary activities.

The organizations which announce thatare undertaking large operations on ascale and are going for broke with large num.bers o f commandos a re those that undoubted lyeva lua te the situation a s having f inished withthe first stage and started th e second. The sig-nif icance here is not the issue of unde r t ak inglarge operations o r not, for these operationsconst i tute a tactic which serves a given strate-gy . Rather, th e s ignif icance lies in the use o fa tactic of one given stage in another one. Usingthe tactic of the small operation in the secondstage of guerrilla warfare is a form of hesitat-ing,while the use of the large operation in thestage of making ready, is rash and wasteful .

The basic issue here is not a matter of thelarge or the small operation, but is the defini-tion of the stage that we are passing through.

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Striking at the enemy w ith ro ck ets or mor-tars constitutes one form of harrassing the ene-m y, wh ich inflicts losses up on him, exposeshim to be on con stant alert , w ith all the ma-terial and psychological discomfortsofthatstateof alert.This type of striking is in keeping with th eprinciple which advocates striking at the ene-m y wherever you can, and at a time of yourown desire and choosing. The important pointis to infl ict damage upon him, todra in his blooddrop af ter drop unti l they accumulate to forma hemorrhage which will lead to anemia and,consequently, to altering th e balance of powerin favor of the weak over th e strong.

There is one small reservation here. Whenwestrike at the enemy with long-range weapons,he will respond. This response will be directedtoward the bases carrying out the strike. Thus,these bases must be mobile. In addition, how-ever, th e enemy will also take that shelling asa justification to occupy more land. To this,we say that the enemy has no need for justifi-cations to occupy more land. Thus, it is neces-sary for us to have forces toprevent deterrent

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Operations Abroadro the Military Standpoint.

Al Hada f In the exposition of your discourseon c o m b a t ,y ou cited th e principle astr ike at thee n e m y w h e r ev e r you can, and at a t ime ofy o u row n desire and choosing. This principle callsfor a look, from th e mil i tary s tandpoint ,at the operat ions outside occupied Palestinecarried out by the Popular Front . H ow do youview th is?Answer The external opera t ions of the Popu-lar Front proceed from the basic political policywhich th e ront uses in appraising the enemy

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military man is the d i f ference between thosewho use armed force and those who (d o not .W hy s trike outside the occupied territoriesall over the wor ld? W hy d o n t the Palestinianpeople exercise their r ight to s trike withintheir occupied territories, but not the rest o fthe wor l d? The reason is t ha t the Palestinianpeople, unlike other peoples, were ousted f romtheir land a f ter the occupa t ion , and so they no

longer possess a land. A nd they were evictedby a conspiracy against them on the p rt o f alarge number of states. The world, therefore,is responsible fo r their condit ion. It is unna-tura l for the wor ld to comm it a crime, and thenno t have to bear its consequences.These states, due to the indi f ference o f

their people, took a decision to eject the Pa-lestinian people f rom their land ; it is there fo rethe responsibility of the resistance movementto keep this matter before the a t tent ion o f thosepeople and to keep alive in their minds the fac tthat our external operat ions are the inevitableresult o f their host i l i ty towards the Palesti-nians, manifested th rough co n t inued suppor tof Israel.

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which accu m ulate "as they perceive th tare impotent in warding off tha t danger.When people tell the Popular Front to

strike only within the occupied territories, itis as if they were saying, Come on and fightyour enemy. B ut firs t, give him the chance todetermine the place and the weapon. Comeonand take the bull by the horns N o. Guerril lawarfare does not accept this logic. N or does itaccept exposing itself to enemy strong points.It only a ccepts exposure to the w eakest poin ts,s tr iking at them with maximum strength, andthen disappearing.

From this point of depar ture , external ope-rations achieve this goal. For they face an iso-l ted objective, and a sensitive one which issusceptible to the jolt . They strike swiftly,andthe blow causes losses to the enemy.

All these reasons make the Popular Frontdetermined to persist in this line of action andto escalate it. And it calls uoon the other or-ganizations to par t ic ipate in this method themethod of violence which liber tes in order

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Propaganda Consequencesof Striking at Civilians

Al-Hadaf: The Israeli enemy sometimes claimsthat the resistance mo vem ent places chargesand explosives in buildings pu blic places orparking lots wh ich injure innocen t civiliansand considers this as sabotage. Their state-ments sometimes f ind an echo in some circlesof world public opinion.How does th e PopularFront feel about this? nswer There is a great deal of falsificationin such claims. The make-upof Israel th e formof colonialist imperialism which it practices

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the Israeli military. They form part of the hos-tile activity and are the basic justifica tion fordrivng out the Arab populaton from the occu-pied territories. They are thus directly respon-sible for the conditions under which th e Pales-tinian people have lived for more than twentyyears. In addition to this, the mere existence o fthis population structure constitutes a power-fu l factor in their morale, and makes the Is-raeli soldier, while fighting, not think of re-treating as much as of protecting th e familywhich he b rought and settled there. Thus didth e colonialists come to the country, drive itspeople out and begin to prof i t from it . For thisreason, they are all equally exposed to thedanger of the reaction of the original posses-sors of the land.

There is a point which we must treat here.W hy don t we at the same tim e inquire ho wIsraeli planes, during their raids o n cities, areable to distinguish the civilian f rom the sol-dier. Do esn t the entire world know that thecasualties of air raids in all wars inc lude.morecivilians than soldiers? A nd that the number o fsoldiers in general and commandos in par t icular

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The P.F.L.P. and the PalestineArmed Struggle Command PASC)

Al Hadaf From the mil i tary standpointhow do you feel a bou t the lack ofpart icipat ionon the pa r t of the Popular Front in the Pales-t ine Armed Struggle Command?W e know thepolitical position which the Popular Front hasannounced of course. B u t w ha t a bou t the de-tails militarily speaking?Answer If w e look at this issue as a subjectby i tself th en it w ou ld appe ar as if i t we re neg-ligence on the p art of the Po pu lar Front andnon-participation in the unity of the resistancemovement.

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The basic course of action at present is tostudy th e possibilities for cooperation and uni-ty of commando action and the forces of theresistance movement alestinian or Arabwithin a minimum program and agreement up-on both short-range and long-range points. A f-te r agreement isreached by the political leader-ship on these matters, creating the formula formilitary cooperation will require little effort.With respect to what th e Palestine ArmedStruggle Command has accomplished from th emilitary standpoint, it is not yet possible toconsider it as constituting a general staff forth e organizations which have j o i n e d it ,

in spite of all the effort expended. There willbe no operations command which gives strategic direction to participating organizations aslong as the guerrilla w ar permits decentralizedaction.T he Palestine Arm ed Struggle Com mandup to the present has not taken this line. It nowconsists of a command which restricts itself tocreating military discipline. It also contains anarrangement to solve differences among th e

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The sraeli Military and the Future

A l - H a d a f : N o w tha t w e have covered nearlyall aspects of the resis tance, can we lay out abasic idea of the f u t u r e p robabi l i t ies on thepractical level? What d o y o u th ink the nextstep o f the I s rael i mil i ta ry wi l l be? W h a t w o u ldbe its consequences?))Answer The Israeli a rmy has achieved a mi-l i ta ry v ic tory . But i t has no t yet a t ta in ed theobject of the war i.e. th e c rea t ion o f a s i tua-tion o f permanen t peace in w h i c h it could de-vote itself to economic cons t ruc t ion an d pene-tra t ion within the a r ea w i t h o u t d a n g er . How-

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to put the Arab people in a defensive posi-tion so that they do not advance to an offen-sive posture.to prevent the commando movementspreading, especially in Jordan. fromto prevent th e commandos from operating inLebanon andSyria.to prevent the commandos from penetratingdeeply within the occupied territoriesto prevent the people from aiding the com-mandos, and toisolate them from each other.to heighten the contradiction between whatis promised and what is achieved by thecommandos and the Arab governments.and, finally, to set the co m m andos and theirleadership on the one hand, and the leader-ship of the Arab armies and Arabrulers onthe other, at odds, and to force them eitherto assume a nega tive position no t to reac t)or a positive one striking at the com m andoson the part of the system). Israel has in factsucceeded in heightening these last tw ocon-tradictions and hascreated awide gapamong

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dissension among the various commando o r-ganizat ions or between the organizationsand the Arab states.7 to increase the b lowing up of homes andforced em igration along w ith increased re-warding of collaborators.

For these missions Israel uses troops ofspecial un its such as airborne commandos frog-men and a rmored forces to the level of the bri-gade in add i t ion to the air force which enterswithout opposit ion the air space of Jordan, Le-banon Syria and with some difficulty Egyp t.

Howev e r it wou ld not be feasible for Is-rael to occupy territory and remain there, atleast not as long as the Big Four continue tomeet and as long as there exist possibilities fora peaceful so lu t ion or more apt ly a capitula-t ionist solution.

O n the other hand should all these possi-bil i t ies disappear that being due to the pres-sure of a m ass movem ent and the meetingsof the Big Four be suspended then Israel wouldbe compel led to p lunge in to ano ther war and

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Documents

Military Strategy of the PFLP (1970)