In the Spotlight:
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC)

 
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) is a pan-Arab, secular, Marxist-Leninist group that stands out among Palestinian organizations for its adamant rejection of any political settlement with Israel and its reliance on state sponsorship. The group maintains a focus on military rather than political solutions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Since its inception, the PFLP-GC has received assistance from radical states such as Syria, Libya and Iran. This has enabled the group to consistently oppose negotiations with Israel and has facilitated its ability to operate in the international arena to achieve its aims.

The PFLP-GC traces its beginnings to the 1959 creation of the Palestine Liberation Front (PLF) by Ahmed Jibril, a former captain in the engineering corps of the Syrian army. The PLF merged with George Habash's leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) in 1967. However, the pro-Syrian Jibril clashed with the PFLP because Habash was increasingly at odds with Damascus. Jibril also refused to accept any of the PFLP's plans for political negotiation with Israel. In 1968, Jibril split from the PFLP to establish the PFLP-GC with headquarters in Damascus.

The Syrian government approved of the PFLP-GC's preference for armed struggle over negotiation. With Syrian financial, military and logistical backing, the PFLP-GC was able to launch a series of international terrorist operations in the early 1970s and gain notoriety in the region. In 1970, the PFLP-GC used a time-bomb to kill 47 passengers and crew aboard a Swissair flight from Zurich to Tel Aviv. In 1974, the group claimed responsibility for the first-ever Palestinian suicide-bombing when 18 hostages near Kiryat Shimona in northern Israel were killed by three PFLP-GC operatives strapped with explosives.

As the PFLP-GC sought to militarize the Palestinian response to Israel and increasingly carried out the policies of Damascus, the PFLP-GC became more marginal and out of touch with other Palestinian groups. In June 1974, the PFLP-GC signed a Palestinian National Council (PNC) resolution to halt the use of international terrorism and accept the establishment of a national authority in the Palestinian controlled territories. However, the PFLP-GC continued to openly oppose moves by the PLO to negotiate and make concessions to Israel, joining a rejectionist front of leftist Palestinian groups and resigning from the PLO Executive Committee and Central Council.

The PFLP-GC also faced internal conflict; in 1977, when an Iraq-sponsored group within the organization, led by Mahmud Zeidan (Abu al-Abbas), broke away to form the Palestine Liberation Front (PLF) - a new group which assumed the name of the one founded by Jibril in 1959. Jibril's alignment with Damascus often prompted him to act in the interest of Syria at the expense of Palestinian interests. The breakaway PLF was repelled by Jibril's activities against Palestinians in support of Syria during the 1976 civil war in Lebanon.

In 1983, pro-Syrian radicals became discontented when Arafat began hinting at possible negotiation with Israel. Jibril once again sided with Damascus. Syria, the PFLP-GC and a renegade faction of Arafat's Fatah movement launched an offensive that drove Arafat out of his headquarters in Tripoli.

In 1984, the PFLP-GC was evicted from the PLO and shifted further away from Palestinian interests. In 1986, the PFLP-GC and elements of Syrian military intelligence were implicated in the Hidawi affair - the bombing of an Israeli El Al flight from London. Syria came under fire from the international community and the United States withdrew its ambassador from Damascus. After that, Syria relied more and more on the PFLP-GC to carry out terrorist operations on its behalf.

Towards the end of the decade, Syria's economy declined, and the PFLP-GC sought additional state sponsors. The group was able to procure the assistance of Libyan leader Moammar Qadhafi in 1986, through which the PFLP-GC received sponsorship for unconventional attacks on Israel using motorized hang-gliders and hot-air balloons. That support dried out, however, when Qadhafi relinquished terrorism in 1989 and expelled the PFLP-GC from Libya. Soon after, the PFLP-GC began receiving funds from Teheran, after which it began using religious rhetoric uncharacteristic of a secular Marxist organization.

Multiple state sponsors made it much more difficult for European authorities to solidly connect the PFLP-GC's terrorist activities to any one of its supporting governments. In 1988, elements of Libyan intelligence were charged with the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, although substantial evidence implicated the PFLP-GC.

Throughout the 1990's, PFLP-GC activity declined. In 1989, the political landscape changed as the Soviet Union collapsed and the Cold War ended. In an effort to appease Washington, Syria forbade the PFLP-GC from operating internationally, mainly using the organization to militarily settle local disputes. The group continued to launch a few operations against Palestinian groups that aligned themselves with Arafat, but was mainly active in providing training and equipment for more influential Palestinian groups, such as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad .

In 1999, Syria agreed to negotiate with Israel and talked seriously of renouncing terrorist tactics in favor of peaceful resistance. In 2000, however, negotiations crumbled and the second Intifada (uprising) broke among the Palestinians. Syria continued to support PFLP-GC terrorist operations along with Iran, although on a limited scale and while maintaining deniability. The PFLP-GC continued to function as a key provider of training and arms from Iran and Syria to Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

In 2001, the PFLP-GC carried out one major attack on Golan Heights settlements, but Syria did not claim responsibility and allegedly reproached Jibril. In 2002, the group launched attacks in western Galilee. However, although the PFLP-GC is suspected, there was insufficient evidence to tie the group or any of its state sponsors to the attack. That same year, the PFLP-GC launched rockets into Israel, protesting Syria's exclusion from U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell's Middle East tour. After a series of crisis talks, Lebanon made public promises to restrain the PFLP-GC in the future. Since then, the PFLP-GC has not launched any further attacks, although the group continues to talk tough and provide arms and training to Palestinian groups.

Sources

David Tal, "The International Dimension of the PFLP-GC Activity," The Jaffe Center for Strategic Studies, JCSS Project on Low Intensity Warfare & The Jerusalem Post, 1990.

Gary C. Gambill, "Sponsoring Terrorism: Syria and the PFLP-GC," Middle East Intelligence Bulletin, Vol. 4, No. 9, September 2002.

Patterns of Global Terrorism, 2000. United States Department of State. April 2001.

"Terrorism: Questions and Answers," Council on Foreign Relations, 2002.

 

By Sofia Aldape CDI Research Assistant saldpa@cdi.org

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