THE SIGHT of Palestinian fighting Palestinian in the Bek'aa valley will have alarmed many friends of the Palestinian struggle. that differences inside Organisation are settled with guns? What do the difThe affair started in when Yasser Arafat • the chiel Fatah commanders in the Bek'aa valley, and replace them with others loyal to himself.
The commanders who Arafat wanted out, cuang me leaaer or wilal is now the dissident group, HOU Musa. OCCI critical of the role which Arafat played as the PLO leader.
On the one hand they accused him of downplaythe armed struggle against Israel, the other they accused him of diplomacy which compromised the interests of the Palestinian people.
Arafat tried to replace the dissident commanders put the Palestinian forces Syria under the sole command of Ahmed Affani, an Arafat loyalist whom the dissidents consider to be pro-Egyptian.
The dissidents refused to accept this reorganisation denounced Aralal s moves, supportcu by the Central Committee of fatah. as a hvpocritica action by Arafat and his cohorts designed to split the movement'.
The dissidents, with obvious Syrian connivance, took over PLO military installations Why has it come to this, the Liberation ticular his support for the Fez summit agreement and with sing svacuate the peo forces sein, and his Beirut during the Israell Ilyasic Without doubt the Fez summit agreement, drawn up by the reactionary Saudi regime, involves some compromises in long-standing positions of the PLO.
Basically the Fez summit proposed a state for the Palestinians on the oc. cupied West Bank of the Jordan. in return tor PLO recognition of Israel. This plan is acceptable neither to Israel nor to the United States, Israel's main backer. They see a West Bank state as being a permanent threat to Israel's existence.
Begin want the Palestinians out of harm's way in Jordan - not in any part of the occupied territorie: certainly not in Lebanon.
But the objection of the dissidents is that the Fez plan involves promise on the PLO's objective of a 'democratic secular Palestine' • which would involve the end of the Israeli, Zionist state.
dissidents saw Arafat as relying on diplomacy after the military defeat rather than making further preparations for armed struggle.
Abu Musa declared that the dissidents had opposed the PLQ withdrawal Beirut, had threatened to open fire on the departing ships. They also demand democratisation of the PLO leadership structure.
The or other wise or tne complaints and demands of the dissidents is outside the scope of this article, but certainly as leaders of the Palestinian revolution they had the right to raise them within the structures of Fatah and the PLO Arafat's to remove the dissidents was incorrect. But the alliance of the latter with Syria is a grave potentially disastrous error.
Abu Musa has said, Syria rejects the and is pointing tanks in the direction of That is my position too. If Syria retreats, I will take the same position as l did in Sidon' (a reference to his leadership of a PLO unit which destroyed Syrian column attacking the PLO in 1976).
The problem with this position is that Syria is not at all concerned with the success of the PLO strug • 2C Syrian president Assad is concerned witr consolidating position in the Middle cast. and wants to bring the PLO under Syrian domination and control to make it 'Syria's card'.
In 1976, when the PLO and Lebanese leftists were on the verge of destroying Ansar prison camp — at least 5000 Palestinians are still held here by the Israelis the right wing Phalangist gangs, Syria intervened to prevent their victory Assad, if he brings the PLO under control, will then make a deal with Israel and the imperialists Palestinian expense of the forcing them to recognise his cen tral role in the dica would be a crime against the Palestinian revolution if Syria were allowed to take control of the PLO.
present plight of the Palestinian movemen is first and foremost the responsibility of the bourgeois rulers of the Arab states, who while giving lip-service to Palestinian rights have always acted impede their the fight for justice for the Palestinian people inreatens to spill over into their own countries in a revolutionary way The leaders of coun tries like Jordan and Saudi Arabia are hand-in-glove with imperialism. Assad WILl perialism but on his own terms. Once again, it is obvious that the fight for the rights of the Palestinians is intimately bound up with the fight to carry forwara ine wnole Arab revolution Syria should get out of the quarrel in the PLO Both PLO factions should put down their guns, and settle the long-overdue on strategy and leadership through democratic debate. Right now break his alliance with the Svrians which threatens the whole future of the Palestinian movement.
----- pull-quotes -----
ferent forces fighting one another represent and what role are the Syrians playing?