The Blade · Toledo, Ohio · 11 October 1970

CP-1970-002

Glimpse At Words, Style Of Palestinian Commandos

Transcribed from the clipping

“An Egyptian leftist in Paris had referred me to Ghrassan Kanafani, editor of the Popular Front’s ‘Al Hadaf’ magazine and who is Dr. Habash’s representative in Beirut. He is a charming young man who has written several novels based on the Palestinian plight, and is generally regarded as an intellectual hero of the Palestinian revolution. His office looked like a political campaign headquarters. In one corner he had a pile of captured Israeli bombs, and in another the seat taken from the American Embassy in Amman. Walls were papered with posters of Dr. Habash, flanked by others of Lenin and Che Guevara, and there were photos of alleged Israeli brutality in the occupied West Bank, slogans for the liberation of Palestine, and a detailed street map of Jerusalem. While we spoke, Leila Khalad, the skyjacker who spent some time in a London jail, was typing herself into a frenzy in an outer office. I asked Mr. Kanafani to describe the Popular Front’s ultimate goal for Palestine, and he outlined a secular, democratic binational state in which Jews and Arabs would live together as brothers — ‘after we have driven out the Zionists’… Shortly, a man with very proper deportment, accompanied by a woman journalist, walked in and introduced himself as Bonn’s representative in Beirut… began by admiring Mr. Kanafani’s toys. He oh-ho’ed the American Embassy seal, and then started bouncing one of the Israeli bombs in his hands. ‘What have we here?’ he chuckled. ‘I would advise you to be careful — that bomb is live,’ Mr. Kanafani exhorted, looking up from a letter with icy nonconcern. The German looked abashed and gently replaced the bomb to its corner… ‘You know,’ the diplomat said, ‘some people are calling you barbarians and criminals, and surely you don’t want that.’ Mr. Kanafani exploded: ‘You dare to speak to me of our “crimes.” How long will these Zionist agents of imperialism commit crimes against our people? Where is the truth about these new Nazis, these murderers who do worse things to Arabs than were ever done to Jews? We are the Jews, we are the ones being butchered. Moshe Dayan is far worse than Hitler — and the only thing keeping him from exterminating all the Arabs under his rule now is that he lacks the technical means.’… ‘There are no Palestinians on the West Bank,’ he asserted, ‘only so many Quislings. The Palestinians are all in prison, or here with us, fighting for the liberation of our homeland.’ Those practicing law in Ramallah or operating a business in East Jerusalem, for example, evidently have no right to call themselves Palestinians, in the guerrillas’ view.”

Photograph caption

“GHASSAN KANAFANI — Writer and editor”

Context added by this archive

Twenty-one months before he was killed, and this paper’s caption under his photograph reads Writer and editor. It is also the clipping in which he is hardest to defend: he compares Moshe Dayan to Hitler, and he tells the reporter that the million Palestinians living on the West Bank are Quislings and not Palestinians at all. The reporter puts the million back in. Both stay.

Cite this item

"Glimpse At Words, Style Of Palestinian Commandos," The Blade, 11 October 1970. Covering Palestine archive, CP-1970-002. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-1970-002

Elsewhere in the archive

• ‘Palestine Solution’Florida Times Union · 2 August 1970 · the same year