Financing the Fedayeen
SAMUELS, GERTRUDE
DONATION AND TAXATION Financing the Fedayeen BY GERTRUDE SAMUELS The armed Arab terrorist groups now dramatized in the non-Arab world as revolutionary or resistance movements of the dispossessed,...
...Israeli spokesmen and studies show that the Russians have inserted themselves, through huge military help and economic support, in key areas throughout the whole region...
...Middle East News Agency, Cairo, February 4, 1970...
...Another theory is that since the Russians now have control of Egypt and influence the entire Middle East, a peace on their terms would enhance their influence...
...Akhbar al-Usbua, Amman, January 15, 1970...
...There are reports of 100 Russian pilots who fly operations and missions (for defense or attack, whatever the order from the Soviet commander...
...The pflp, despite its success in capturing the headlines, numbers only around 2,000 operatives and was first organized after the Six Day War of June 1967...
...As-Sitdan al-Jadid, August 14, 1969...
...Estimates of their membership are also widely argued, ranging from "some hundreds" in the smaller groups to figures of 25-40,000 used by several writers...
...including 12 million pounds [about $30 million] for the support of the Palestine revolution...
...George Habash...
...The Moroccan Minister of Economic Affairs stated in a press conference that Morocco would grant special financial assistance to the Arab resistance movement...
...Much of the backing given the terrorist organizations is well known...
...Cairo Radio, December 25, 1969...
...and advisers go right down to company levels...
...In addition to destroying Israel, the declared aims of this Marxist-Leninist-oriented group are the elimination of Hussein's government in Jordan, and of American interests and influence in the Middle East...
...They were welcomed and informed that Sudan has contributed 20,000 pounds [$57,000] to reinforce their struggle...
...Hence the conciliatory moves by the Soviet Union in the recent round of salt, the strategic-arms-limitation talks in Vienna, where Russians enthusiastically shook the hands of American officials...
...Contributions reached a peak when a man from Haleb paid 250,000 Syrian pounds [about $50,000] for the gun of a terrorist martyr, which was auctioned at a party in Haleb...
...But who will restrain the jedayeen...
...The Libyan Popular Committee lor the support of Fatah has transmitted 400.000 Libyan pounds [$1,120,000] contributed by the locat...
...October 9, 1969...
...It has been learned that Libya has decided to help by underwriting 25 per cent of the Palestine revolution budget...
...Here is a description of how the fedayeen are financed, taken from a sampling of Arab press and radio broadcasts during the period August 1969-February 1970 as compiled by the Research Division of Israel's Ministry for Foreign Affairs: "Abd al-'Aziz al-Nassri, Sudanese Ambassador to Jordan, had a meeting with a delegation of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, headed by Dr...
...Finally, there are people in Israel who deeply believe that it is the Russian aim to destroy Israel...
...With a second turn of the wheel, toward the Middle East, Moscow is back to its policy of direct involvement, of aggressive posture, evidently because it feels it has the upper hand there...
...DONATION AND TAXATION Financing the Fedayeen BY GERTRUDE SAMUELS The armed Arab terrorist groups now dramatized in the non-Arab world as revolutionary or resistance movements of the dispossessed, called fedayeen, have evolved partly from extreme feelings of Arab nationalism, mostly from an avowed, mutual commitment--the destruction of Israel...
...Wynfred Joshua of the Stanford Research Institute, who formerly worked on national security studies for the Department of Defense, writes in her July 1970 report published by the National Strategy Information Center, "Soviet Penetration into the Middle East": "The USSR's decision in early 1970 to assume a major share of Egypt's air defense indicates a more determined effort to demonstrate the credibility of its commitment to the Arabs and to undermine American influence in the Arab world...
...Some analysts put the groups at around 10...
...The former, the largest group and apolitical, is headed by kaffiyehed, mustached Yasir Arafat, who has been praised by Egypt's President Nasser and other government leaders of the 14-na-tion Arab League...
...Later, I asked him, "Which are the principal Arab governments financing these fedayeen...
...This declaration was made during talks held in Tripoli on uniting the Palestine revolution...
...Cairo provides the resistance movement with much assistance...
...of every Palestinian, wherever he may live...
...Jordan and Lebanon have housed and given support to guerrillas who long before the 1967 war were making forays against Israel's border settlements...
...Rozal-Youssef, Cairo, December 22, 1969...
...population to support the armed struggle...
...Headed by Dr...
...Documentation of the Ambassador's accusations can be gleaned from one authentic source, the Arabs themselves...
...Arafat has genuine status, heads a Palestinian parliament-in-exile, and has been an equal with King Hussein...
...As seen by Gabriel Padon, press officer of the Israeli Consulate in New York and adviser on Arab Affairs to former Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, there are three basic theories: "One holds that the Russians are not interested in an all-out peace or an all-out war, but want to keep the area simmering with tension...
...Take all the arms you want, and take whatever the fighters need from our production, which is abundant," Nasser told Arafat at the Rabat summit...
...Ad-Difa, Amman, November 6, 1969...
...absolve the Arab governments...
...No one has reliable statistics on their numbers or membership...
...Even during the recent hijackings, the Popular Front's Habash was conveniently in Hanoi...
...They actively cooperated with the hijackings...
...So long as the Russian stake in the Middle East remains high, the danger of escalation continues to exist...
...A London research center in 1968 reported that no fewer than 30 fedayeen groups had announced their formation, but "some" had not seen action and had probably disbanded...
...Gertrude Samuels is a writer for the New York Times Magazine...
...I don't believe that it's a Russian national aim to destroy the State of Israel...
...and the Russians do not compromise on their position, which is the Egyptian position, when it comes to the refugees and Israel's withdrawal to pre-1967 war borders...
...The second 'Week of Support for Terrorist Operations' in Damascus and the Syrian provinces is now in its fifth day...
...Saudi Arabia...
...hence the new treaty with West Germany...
...The Arab kings and presidents have decided to allocate 26 million pounds [about $65 million] to meet the financial commitments of the Palestine Liberation Organization in the coming war...
...Fedayeen is Arabic for irregulars fighting against Israel...
...Speaking in hard tones, Yosef Tekoah...
...If there's peace, according to this reasoning, the Arabs could say, thank you very much, we don't need you any more...
...The objective of Soviet policy in the Middle East is clearly to expel all remnants of Western influence and fill the resulting vacuum permanently itself...
...In the Six Day War, the Egyptians lost close to $1 billion of Russian materiel and planes...
...George Habash, 43, a Palestine-born physician, it takes credit for all the mindless airliner hijackings since the initial one involving an...
...And who is to say when the jedayeen will want more from Moscow, perhaps recognition as a government-in-exile opposing Moscow's own clients--threatening blackmail by aligning themselves with Peking...
...Beirut Radio, December 31, 1969...
...There are no principal ones...
...Syria and Iraq maintain their own fedayeen...
...Egypt has supported the Fatah with arms...
...But if Israel stands in the way of Russian ambitions in the Middle East, then the Kremlin won't hesitate to try to sweep Israel away, letting the Arabs do the job...
...The poorer ones not so much...
...I support the first theory...
...Quite possibly that purist Omar asks the best question of all: "Who is the Potter, pray, and who the Pot...
...Al-Ahram, Cairo, January 14, 1970...
...Meanwhile some 300 Egyptian pilots have gone to the Soviet Union for training in flying mig interceptors, bombers, fighter-bombers, and helicopters...
...The Palestine Liberation Organization Executive Committee [a central coordinating body of terrorist groups, also headed by Arafat] has imposed a liberation tax ranging from 3-6 per cent of the incom...
...Most of the fedayeen's weapons are Russian-made, coming from Egyptian and Syrian arsenals...
...The Russian press in referring to the Jarring mission never mentions the United States initiative for settlement...
...Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations, told a press conference after the September hijackings, "One cannot, and one should not...
...Inside Egypt, analysts assert, there are several thousand Russian instructors in aviation, anti-aircraft, tank warfare, commando operations...
...In fact, it is a Soviet goal to improve the efficiency of the terrorists Soviet publications call them "national liberation forces"--along with that of the Egyptians...
...Last month's hijacking dramas in the desert tend to confirm that Al Fatah was not clued in to the explosive strategy of the most militant of the fedayeen, the Popular Front...
...and if there's war, Moscow runs the risk of a confrontation with the United States...
...The paradoxes inherent in the Russian strategy stem from various theories about Soviet policy...
...It is known that Russian units operate and move around the sam missile sites in the Suez area and inside Egypt...
...Egypt supports the terrorist organizations...
...The current level of turmoil offers unique opportunities for Soviet advances...
...It has been reported from Kuwait that the government of Kuwait told Yasir Arafat that it intended to allocate a fixed annual sum for terrorist operations...
...Syrian Arab News Agency, Damascus...
...The Libyan Revolutionary Government has expressed its readiness to pay one million sterling [$2,400,000] annually to the terror organizations...
...Experts note that the Soviet Union seems to be trying to check its Arab clients...
...The word comes from the root "sacrifice," implying suicidal sacrifice...
...Many thousands are certainly in training camps in Jordan and Lebanon...
...They're all financing them one wav or other...
...El Al plane over Rome in July I968, which it pirated to Algiers...
...The two best-known groups, of course, are Al Fatah and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (pflp...
...But it is questionable whether there is any more real unity among these competing guerrilla organizations than exists with the host governments on whose soil they are housed, honored and supplied with ample funds...
...I had also asked Ambassador Tekoah, "Is there evidence that the USSR is financing the jedaveenT' "We do know that they're arming the Egyptians," he said, "who are in turn arming the jedayeen...
...With one turn of the wheel, the Russians appear eager to pursue peaceful coexistence with the West...
...In recent months, the loosely-aligned terrorist groups formed a Presidium of the Central Committee in Amman, apparently to coordinate policy...
...The plo office here appealed to Palestinians working with unrwa...
...Just what is the game of Russian roulette today...
...On this subject we are in constant touch with Arafat...
...he replied...
...The richer ones are sivin" them more--Kuwait, the Sudan...
...This, say Middle East experts, the Russians have not only replaced but increased, outfitting Egypt's new Air Force, armor divisions, and artillery units at a cost of $3 billion...
Vol. 53 • October 1970 • No. 19
