“You aren’t serious,” the Algerians told the PLO leaders. “You must kill your opponents!”
That was years ago. The PLO leaders had asked their victorious brothers, the AlgerianLiberation Front (FLN) veterans, for advice. They tendered their counsel generously: “Youcan’t wage a war of liberation when there are internal differences. There can only be oneparty. There is no place for internal opposition. Opponents must be liquidated.”
As an example, they pointed out one of their facilities on the Algerian-Tunisian border. Itwas a house of three rooms, to which opponents of the leadership were brought. In the first roomthey stood trial, in the second judgment was pronounced, in the third they were executed. Thewhole process lasted but a few hours. The only way they left the house was on a stretcher.
This story was told to me this week by a senior Palestinian official. “We, the Palestinians,listened and said to ourselves: This will never happen in our movement!”
And indeed, in order to understand what is happening now in the Palestinian territories, onehas to understand that this is a unanimous national resolve: Avoid a civil war at any cost.
This resolve stems from a Palestinian trauma. In 1936 the “Arab Rebellion” (in Zionistsparlance: “The Events”) broke out. Jewish immigration had been rising sharply afterHitler’s advent to power in Germany, the Arabs felt that the land was being taken from undertheir feet. In a desperate attempt to save their national existence, they declared a GeneralStrike, which turned into an armed rebellion. It was led by Haj Amin al-Husseini, Grand Muftiof Jerusalem.
The mufti seized the opportunity in order to eliminate all his domestic opponents. In thebloodbath, almost all the Palestinian leaders who did not accept his leadershipunconditionally were assassinated. When the moment of truth came at the end of 1947 (after theUN partition resolution), the Palestinian people had no national leadership to speak of.
Now Ariel Sharon wants to compel Arafat to start a civil war. That is the meaning of his demandthat Arafat liquidate the Hamas and Jihad leadership and destroy their institutions. Heexpects the Hamas and Jihad will then take revenge and murder the Palestinian Authoritychiefs. The mutual killing will put an end to the Palestinian struggle, perhaps forever.
Neither Arafat nor his opponents intend to fulfill this hope of Sharon’s. In his address to thenation, Arafat declared that continued attacks on Israelis are harmful to the nationalinterests of the Palestinian people. Most Palestinians understand that Arafat is right. TheHamas and Jihad disagree, but do not want to be dragged into a civil war. Therefore there is a”dramatic decrease in the number of attacks”, according to Israeli security officials.
All this reminds one of a similar phase in our own history. After the assassination of LordMoyne by the Lehi ( Hebrew initials of “Fighters for the Freedom of Israel”, called by theBritish “Stern Gang”) Ben-Gurion decided to turn the “dissidents” over to the Britishpolice, who tortured them and then sent them to a prison camp in Africa. Some of the Irgunfighters (Irgun – short for National Military Organization, another underground) werekidnapped by Ben-Gurion’s Palmah (“shock troops”) and turned over to the British, otherswere arrested by the British themselves with the help of a list of 700 suspects, submitted tothem by Ben-Gurion. This episode was called “the saison” (pronounced the French way),meaning the hunting season.
If at that time a bloody civil war did not erupt, it was thanks to Menahem Begin, the Irguncommander, who was determined to prevent a fratricidal war at any cost. Irgun fighters wereordered not to fire on the Palmah members who came to kidnap them. (The leader of the Lehi,Nathan Yellin-Mor, decided otherwise. As he told me years later: “I went to a meeting with theHaganah chiefs. I put a loaded pistol on the table in front of me. I said: ‘Every Lehi fighterwill use his gun to defend himself.’ As a result, not one man of ours was kidnapped.”)
Ben-Gurion played a complex game. At one time he ordered the “saison”, at another he set up the”Hebrew Rebellion Movement”, which coordinated the actions of his own Haganah, the Irgun andLehi. He used diplomacy and violence alternatively, in varying doses. Actually he used theactions of the Irgun and Lehi for his own purposes.
Arafat is now doing exactly the same. When there is hope of achieving a Palestinian state bypeaceful means and a confrontation with the Americans has to be averted, he prevents theactions of the “dissidents”. When this hope fades, he gives them the green light.
All this is done by mutual understanding. Contrary to his image created in Israel, Arafat is nobrutal dictator. On the contrary, some of his aides accuse him of being too forgiving, nottaking revenge on those who betrayed him and not punishing those who damage the Palestiniancause. He adheres to an ancient Arab tradition: the “Ijmaa”, decision by general agreement.(The elders of the tribe sit and discuss a controversial issue until every single one of thosepresent is convinced and supports the proposed decision, making it unanimous.)
That is his way of stopping the violence. The Palestinian people will not commit suicide bycivil war. They will be persuaded to stop the violent struggle only if they see that theirnational existence can be assured by peaceful means. And in the meantime, they will collectweapons, for any eventuality.