The New York Times · 26 September 1970

CP-1970-027

Stuff of Arab Legends

Yasir Arafat

Shown from the top. The whole column — 3.5 times taller than it is wide — is in the enlargement.

Scan 326 × 1128 pixels

Transcribed from the clipping

He does not look to be the stuff of which legends are made. Despite his short stature, a rather stocky figure a prominent nose, a receding chin and baldness concealed by his omnipresent kaffiyeh, or headdress, Yasir Arafat is a hero to millions in the Arab world.

For multitudes disillusioned by the failures of established Arab leaders in their conflict with Israel, active hope centers on the soft-spoken Mr. Arafat, the 41-year-old leader of Al Fatah, the largest and most active Palestinian guerrilla group, and the head of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, a coordinating body for about 10 commando groups. Yesterday Mr.

Arafat, who has recently taken to issuing his orders under the title Commander in Chief of the Palestinian Revolution, agreed to a cease-fire in Jordan. These days his leadership among the guerrilla organizations is unchallenged.

His decision to stay on in Amman to lead the outnumbered guerrillas in the bitter fighting against King Hussein’s army has elevated him to a new level of esteem among militant Arabs. … Replying to reporters, he put aside questions of ideology. “As a refugee,” he said, “I have no time to spare arguing over the left and right.

What is important is action and its result.” “We have believed that the only way to return to our homes and land is the armed struggle,” he said. “We believe in this theory without any complications, and this is our aim and our hope.”

How this transcription was made

Transcribed from a scan of the printed page. NOTHING ON THIS CLIPPING NAMES THE NEWSPAPER, so the publication rests on the slide label alone; 'Man in the News' is a New York Times standing feature and the typography fits, but neither is evidence of a masthead. No date is printed either: the date is corroborated from inside the piece, which reports that 'Yesterday Mr. Arafat... agreed to a cease-fire in Jordan', the Jordan cease-fire having been agreed on 25 September 1970. THE EXCERPT CONTAINS AN ELISION, marked with an ellipsis: the opening runs continuously, then about a column and a half is skipped before the three closing paragraphs, so that the subject's own words sit inside the record's press text. The piece is unsigned. 'Man in the News' is set as a cut-in inside the first column and is a department label, not a deck; the italic line 'Yasir Arafat' under the headline is recorded as the deck, which is a judgment call. The printed 'Palestinian Liberation Organization' in the second paragraph is the paper's error for Palestine Liberation Organization and has not been repaired. Read from crops magnified to between ten and twelve times page scale.

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