Surprise: Mahmoud Abbas Promotes Terrorism Again

Abu Mazen/Mahmoud Abbas may be considered a "moderate," and in the extreme world of Palestinian Arab terrorism he is apparently on the less extreme end of the spectrum, but he obviously has never cut his ties to terrorism.

Besides being the chair of the half of the Palestinian Authority based in Ramallah, he's also the leader of Fatah, the terrorist group which hasn't even pretended to amend its charter to accept the existence of Israel. (The PLO itself has claimed it was going to amend its charter, but never did, although it sometimes pretends it did.)

Fatah is also the parent group for the Tanzim and Al-Aksa Martyrs Brigade

Abbas has now declared three days of mourning to "honor" George Habash, leader of the "Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine" (PFLP) when it hijacked an Air France plane, leading to the Entebbe raid. He was also responsible for the Achille Lauro hijacking and the murder of the wheelchair-bound American tourist Leon Klinghoffer, and countless other terrorist attacks.

Note the inaccurate reference to an alleged "mass expulsion committed by the Israeli army." The overwhelming majority of Arabs who fled in 1948 did so because of the violence of the war started by the invading Arab armies and because they were urged to by their leaders. Had the Arabs accepted the re-establishment of Israel on just a tiny portion of the land promised in the Balfour Declaration, there would not have been a single refugee.

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Ma'an News Agency

PFLP founder George Habash, 1925-2008

Amman - Ma'an - George Habash, the founder of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and a godfather of the Palestinian struggle, died of a heart attack on Saturday in the Jordanian capital, Amman, medical sources said.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has declared three days of national mourning to honor Habash, who was known as "Al Hakim," the Wise Man.

Habash was born in Lydda, in Mandate Palestine in 1925 into a Greek Orthodox family. Like hundreds of thousands of other Palestinians, he became a refugee during the mass expulsion committed by the Israeli army in 1948.

He graduated from the American University of Beirut (AUB) in 1951 with a degree in medicine. With a focus on pediatrics, he went to work in Palestinian refugee camps in Amman. While at AUB he met Hilda Habash, a Palestinian from Jerusalem.

In in 1952 he co-founded the Arab Nationalist Movement, which later spun off into several parties in individual countries.

Wanted by the Jordanian regime for his political activities, he fled Amman in 1957 for Damascus, where he was imprisoned several times, also for political reasons.

After leaving Jordan, Habash shifted his focus from Pan-Arab to Palestinian issues. His view was that the Palestinians should embrace Marxist-Leninist revolution.

In December 1967 he founded, with Abu Ali Mustafa, the PFLP. He remained the Secretary General of the Organization until 2000. He was succeeded by Abu Ali Mustafa.