PALESTINE COMMANDOS’ “ACUTE ANXIETY”

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32382, 22 August 1970, Page 17

PALESTINE COMMANDOS’ “ACUTE ANXIETY”

(N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) BEIRUT, Aug. 20. The announced execution by a Palestine guerrilla group of 10 alleged collaborators in the Israeli - occupied Gaza Strip reflects the ' acute anxiety of the Palestine commandos as Middle East peace moves gather momentum. The radical Popular Front for the Liberation of Pales- 1 tine announced on August 16 J that the 10 executions carried • out in late July were of Pal- 1 estinians who had'been work- f ing with the Israelis.

Further killings have been reported in the Strip this month. Political observers in Beirut said that political assassination might become one of the commandos’ weapons to deter Palestinians, whether in Israeli-occupied territory or in exile, from responding to the peace efforts. Status Quo Statements in Amman by resistance movement leaders and by the newspaper “Fatah,” also reflect commando anxiety that the American peace initiative would simply restore the status quo before the 1967 June war and destroy their hopes of replacing the Zionist State in Israel by a multiracial demo-

cratic state of Moselm, Jew, and Christian. The commandos’ anxiety is partly based on the Egyptian and Jordanian acceptance of the American peace initiative, but they are also concerned because a section of the Palestinian community apparently acquiesces in the peace moves, if no activity supporting them. “Certain Quarter” In a recent issue, “Fatah” newspaper referred to efforts by a “certain quarter” in Jordan, presumably meaning King Hussein and his Government, to find Palestinian partners to the settlement. It said that contacts had begun with members of Parliament, notables and elders in the Israeli-occupied West Bank of Jordan to win their support for a settlement It predicted that some of them would be promised ministerial posts to win them over.

In another issue, the newspaper referred to petitions being signed by some Palestinians ih the West Bank and the occupied Gaza Strip for the same purpose. . It described those supporting the peaceful settlement as “farm owners and mono-

polists who care about their own interests." It also said more bluntly that “there are traitors and agents among us who accept the peaceful settlement.” “Palestine Rovelution” The newspaper told its readers that these Palestinians were not representative and that the only representative of the Palestine people was the “Palestine revolution.” Similar warnings were given last week in a speech made by Abu Iyad, the second in command of Fatah, the largest of the Palestine commando organisations. He was addressing a rally at a Palestine refugee camp in Amman which ended with the adoption of the resolution rejecting the peaceful settlement. The resistance movement has good cause to be nervous if it loses the support of the Palestinians in whose name it speaks. Indirect Pressure The movement is already understood to be under indirect pressure from governments which are said to have withheld support in arms and funds that are essential for the survival of the movement as a fighting force. If it also lost the support of Palestinians from whom it drew its strength and its recruits, its future would be grim. The Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been living under Israeli occupation for more, than three years. Reports from these areas say that they are unhappy and lacking in the necessities of life, besides suffering the humiliation of foreign occupation. It would hardly be.surprising if many of them agreed to a settlement which would extract them from their present dilemma. The reports say that the support for a peaceful

settlement is quite substantial and this is giving the resistance movement cause to worry. The masses of Palestinians in the occupied areas are beyond the reach of the commandos and can be addressed only indirectly. If the settlement provides for the return of the refugees of the 1967 war, numbering about 400,000, to their homes, and also solves the refugee problem outstanding since 1948 either through repatriation or compensation, emptying the refugee camps, then the resistance movement might become stranded like a fish out of water. Observers in Beirut fear that if the resistance movement is faced with such a bleak future, it might strike hard—out for self-preserva-tion—at those supporting a peaceful settlement.