Will the Arab rejectionists triumph?
Abbas Kel id ar
Until President Sadat undertook his unprecedented and dramatic trip of peace to Israel, the 'rejectionise front of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and its Arab supporters were completely overshadowed by the concerted Arab effort to seek a peaceful settlement of the ArabIsraeli dispute. The PLO had suffered a number of setbacks since the end of the October war in 1973. Constraints were unposed on their activities by the majority of Arab states, and their presence in the Lebanon was contained by Syrian forces. Ironically, it was Israel's objection to the deployment of the Syrian force in the southern Lebanon that rendered that region a safe haven from which the PLO could defy the authority of three states — Syria, Lebanon and Israel — and mount operations across the border. In doing so, they have Posed a continuous threat to the precarious Peace so painstakingly introduced to the Lebanon. Sadat's visit to Jerusalem has so outraged Arab public opinion that it has given fresh impetus to the rejectionists, and conferred on them a renewed sense of purPose and vigour.
The rejectionists represent an important trend in Arab politics. They seek the complete mobilisation of Arab resources, Including the oil weapon, in the confr.entation with Israel. Their ultimate objective is the 'liberation' of the whole of the Mandated territory of Palestine which would mean the defeat of the Jewish State and the destruction of its national institutions. A generation of Palestine Arabs have been brought up to believe that their national salvation will only be achieved when their country is restored to them. They have always regarded the establishment of the State of Israel as an act of usurpation which they are honour-bound to put right.
It is not surprising, therefore, that countless Palestinians as well as many Arabs, saw President Sadat's address to the Israeli Knesset, and his visit to al-Aqsa mosque with an escort of Israeli security men, as an act of betrayal. His failure in his speech to mention the PLO, when he himself was instrumental in getting them designated and recognised as 'the sole and legitimate representatives of the Palestine people'; appeared nothing short of a .treasonable offence. By addressing Israel's elected representatives in their capital, the Egyptian President was bestowing legitmacy on Israel and implicitly acknowledging Israel's unification of the city of Jerusalem. It would be incredible if he had not taken into account the impact which these moves would have not only on radical political opinion in the Arab countries but also on those who wavered between support and non-commitment. His behaviour may have been aimed at disarming his Israeli audience and the Jewish lobby in Washing ton, but for many of his Arab listeners he was simply pouring fuel on the fire.
The effect of his visit on the PLO will probably be to jeopardise the position of the moderates who had agreed to move with Sadat in his search for a political settlement. It was divisions within the PLO that gave rise to the rejectionist front. On the moderate side, the organisation contained a sizeable body of opinion that did not rule out eventual concessions, but did not wish to offer any before knowing the likely outcome of negotiations with Israel. Palestinians feared that concessions might only beget further concessions, that they might compromise rather than satisfy their own national demands. The problem facing the negotiators was whether to spell out these demands and to define the territorial dimensions of the Palestinian homeland as a necessary step towards the achievement of a peaceful settlement. For more than two decades, the Arabs have insisted that there could be no such settlement if the 'legitimate rights of the Palestine Arabs' were not fulfilled. This was too vague and open to too many different and divergent interpretations.
In 1974, following Arab co-operation with Dr Kissinger in his shuttle diplomacy, the PLO resolved that they should put an end to speculation about what they would accept as the basis of a settlement. After due deliberation, its National Council — the Palestinian Parliament — decided that they would be content with the establishment of a 'national presence', later defined as a 'state', on any part of historic Palestine to be freed from Israeli military occupation. The implication of this decision was that the Palestinians, or the major segment of them as represented by the PLO, would be prepared ta countenance a Jewish state on part of the territory which they had always regarded as their homeland. To some Palestinian radicals, this was an outrageous proposition. The outcome was the formation of what has been known ever since as the 'rejection front'. Its supporters, those who continued to espouse the complete liberation of Palestine, were to find willing allies not only in the Arab world but among the more extreme revolutionary organisations in Europe and the Far East, such as the German Red Army Faction and the Japanese Red Army.
The emergence of the rejection front was to effect a schism that has since plagued the politics of the PLO as well as those of the Arab states. The movement was led by the Marxist-inclined Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) of Dr George Habash and Dr Wadis Haddad, and its more nationalist faction led by Ahmad J ibril, as well as the Iraqi-sponsored Arab Liberation Front. These were ranged against the mainstream movement of Fatah led by Yasir Arafat, the chairman of the PLO, and the Syrian-controlled al-Saiqa , as well as the more doctrinaire Democratic Front presided over by Naiyf Hawatima. It was in many ways a difference between the max imalists, led by Habash and supported by Iraq and Libya, and the minimalists, backed by Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia. Arafat has always been careful not to allow his vulnerable, position to be outflanked by the rejectionists in his own camp, but following Sadat's apparent abandonment of the PLO and his obvious attempt to bypass them in order to please Israel, he may now vindicate the rejectionist posture. Habash is able to look Arafat sternly in the face and say 'I told you so', particularly in view of Mr Begin's failure to offer concessions.
Nonetheless, it is doubtful whether the rejectionists can pose a serious threat to President Sadat's quest for peace. Their support in the Arab world is too fragmented, despite the fact that their claims strike a very sensitive chord in the Arab psyche. Iraq found it convenient to support the rejectionists not only because the Iraqis share their views but also because they are at loggerheads with the Syrians with whom they have been feuding for over ten years, Colonel Gaddafi of Libya, who feels he has inherited Nasser's pan-Arab mantle, and acts as the self-proclaimed guardian of the Nasseriest legacy in Egypt and elsewhere, has backed the rejectionists because of his bitter quarrel with Sadat, The Algerians have been in many ways prisoners of their own recent history. In seeking their own liberation and independence, they refused to compromise, proclairned their country to be the land of one million martyrs, and have thus served as an example for the Palestinians. As such, they could not but support the rejectionists. South Yemen, the maverick of the peninsular states, is ideologically biased towards the side of the rejectionists and it fears its rich and poWerful neighbour, Saudi Arabia.
Despite the campaign by Iraq and Libyti . to rally the Arab radicals against Sadat, both Syria and the PLO remain committed to a political settlement to be worked out at a reconvened Geneva Conference. It is clear that President Sadat, who has repeatedly stated that the United States hold 99% of the cards in the. Middle East conflict, has placed his complete and total reliance on President Carter despite the fact that the American President has not shown himself to be decisive on this .issue. The hope and the expectation is that the US administration will lean not only on Israel but also on Saudi Arabia — a country that can exert considerable influence on the PLO as well as Damascus and Amman to save Sadat. The Egyptian leader, moreover, holds another card, which is the spectre of a separate peace treaty with Israel, if the other Arabs refuse to back him. The question is, however, whether Sadat has the depth of support at home and in the Arab world to sustain him in power until these crucial moves arc made by people over whom he has little control. He may have paved the -way for his exit by threatening resignation if his peace initiative does not succeed. If he is forced to take up that option, the NI"tionists will be the real victors.
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