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On May 18, 1989, Yasin was arrested along with 250 members of his organization, a move reportedly made at the behest of the United States, which had hoped to encourage PLO-affiliated groups to accept Israeli peace proposals. It was there, in an Israeli prison, that the sheikh became larger than life, as if his very absence from the scene were the source of his transformation from juridical to charismatic authority. His vatic gifts became the means for the survival of his political power. While Arafat was called the “the symbol”, Yasin was touted as “the greatest symbol of the intifada”. That the “miracle sheikh” remained alive against all odds did not, however, ensure his power in a culture in which suicide had become a gift and revelation.

One supposes that the strange humanoid tree is meant as a symbol of Hamas, and in a wider way, Islam. Given the bloody knife, the figure seems also meant to symbolize jihad. In the accompanying texts, the movement claims ownership to two recent armed actions and reiterates its opposition to talks between the PLO and Israel. The idea that armed operations make a “laughingstock of the Jews” and “set terror in their hearts” is an important one in the media of Hamas , where the ability to inspire fear in the enemy is commonly presented as a major measure of success.

The general strike called by the PLO on 16 September was pre-empted by the start of the government offensive at dawn the next morning. The principal objective was to control Amman and hold all government installations. The army command hoped to decide the battle in 36–48 hours, in order to forestall diplomatic intervention by the Arab states. It accepted that achieving complete control throughout the kingdom might take longer, and planned accordingly to conduct offensive operations between Jarash and Irbid in a second stage. To attain its initial objective, the army massed 30,000–35,000 men in the Amman govemate and placing blocking forces around Zarqa to prevent possible Iraqi intervention. Contrary to both Jordanian and Palestinian expectations, it was Syria that intervened. The Jadid faction was making a last-ditch attempt to regain the initiative in the internal power struggle with Asad, and mobilized its remaining supporters in the army.

The spiral of violence in the south in 1974 pushed Lebanon inexorably towards civil war. The mounting strain on relations between the PLO and the Lebanese government became evident in July 1974, when the latter resisted an offer from the council of Arab defence ministers to provide protection against Israeli air raids such as the attack that had obliterated much of the Nabatiyya refugee camp. In August the joint defence command of the League of Arab States gave the PLO a grant of 30 million Lebanese lira to build air raid shelters, but the government again opposed any fortification work in the camps. The authorities compelled the head of the PLO engineering department, Muhammad al-Shacir, to leave the country in September, but finally relented under Syrian pressure and allowed 100 Syrian soldiers equipped with portable SA-7 anti-aircraft missiles to deploy in the camps.

The PLO had an objective to end the siege of the beleaguered pockets in East Beirut and lift the stranglehold on the western half of the capital. Representatives of Tal al-Za'tar lobbied Arafat for help on 4 January, 1975, and the PLO made a last appeal to the Lebanese authorities, warning that it would have to consider all measures to ensure the delivery of vital supplies to the camp. Two food convoys organized by the UNWRA and the army over the next two days were prevented from reaching Tal al-Za'tar by the Maronite militias, but Arafat remained reluctant to use force. This was partly not to give a pretext for escalation to the Maronite leadership. The ultimate aim was to compel it to accept modification of the Cairo agreement and Melkart protocol, restrict its presence and activity generally, and relocate the population of the besieged refugee camps away from Maronite-held areas.

PLO reactions to the latest Syrian deployment were swift. Fateh called for a total Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon and held Damascus responsible for any bloodshed that might ensue, and urged the League of Arab States to convene an emergency meeting of Arab foreign ministers. The Palestinian Left, LNM, and some Lebanese politicians such as defeated presidential candidate Edde described the Syrian intervention as ‘military occupation’ and vowed to resist it ‘with all means’. LNM leader junblat saw an Arab-Israeli plot to partition Lebanon into ‘sectarian statelets’, hinting at an alliance between the dominant Alawi community of Syria, the Lebanese Maronites, and the Jewish state. Seeking an anti-Syrian alliance, he and Fateh security officer Salama met the LF deputy-commander, Bashir Jmayyil, in secret on 2 June, 1975, and was later joined by Khalaf to meet president-elect Sarkis, but was unable to come to a satisfactory agreement with either.

The resolution provided by the Riyadh and Cairo summit conferences for the Lebanese conflict provided welcome relief for the PLO, but left its mainstream leadership facing a triangle of interrelated political challenges. PLO ambition to become the key power broker in Lebanon had ultimately been frustrated, effectively ending its direct intervention in the reshaping of Lebanese state and society. This by no means indicated a complete loss of influence or an end to manipulative politics—quite the contrary in fact, as the PLO had undeniably become an integral actor in the new balance of power in the country—but it encouraged continued movement towards a more self-contained and clearly demarcated Palestinian statist framework. For the next year, however, the PLO was principally engaged in a complicated holding action: extending the truce in Lebanon and containing the damage done to relations with Syria, while conducting a discreet diplomatic dialogue with the US.

This chapter discusses the events of the time when Sadat addressed the Israeli Knesset in Jerusalem. His determination to pursue his diplomatic initiative shattered the PLO strategy of balancing relations with Egypt and Syria while cultivating a political dialogue with the US, and threatened to take Palestinian and Arab divisions to breaking point. The characteristic response was to attempt to play all sides and prevaricate in the hope that a change of circumstances would enable the PLO to resume its original strategy. To pursue this course required a greater degree of internal control than ever before, however, the more so if the mainstream leadership was to resist political intervention by Arab states. Consequently, the period following Sadat's visit to Jerusalem was one of political flux and military tension in the Palestinian arena, as it was throughout Lebanon and in the wider region.

The signing of the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty posed a strategic dilemma for the PLO, which had made a sustained effort since 1973 to gain a direct role in the US-sponsored peace process and place Palestinian statehood on the negotiating agenda. The mainstream leadership did not relinquish its core objectives, nor did it abandon its basic assumptions about the means to attain them, but it was obliged to retrench politically. The major consequence was to reinforce the statist transformation of the PLO. The PLO had become more than a state-within-a-state in Lebanon, it was a state-inexile, with an autonomy born out of the combination it enjoyed of territorial control in Lebanon, non-extractive financial resources (Arab aid), and international recognition. This was the age of the ‘Fakhani Republic’, as the PLO headquarters area in the west Beirut neighbourhood of Fakhani was sometimes dubbed by its critics.

The growing importance for the PLO's diplomatic strategy of the extension of its state-in-exile to the occupied territories came clearly into play as it strove to reassert its centrality to the peace process in the late 1970s. This proved a daunting task, as it faced strenuous opposition from a range of actors. Its relative success in mobilizing the population of the occupied territories, and in attracting or co-opting the local leadership, moreover enhanced its diplomatic standing internationally. However, this also triggered a struggle for political predominance between Fateh and the Palestinian Left, which emerged in this period as a serious contender for national leadership. Key to its rise was the convergence of strategic interests among key Arab states, although Arafat was ultimately able to utilize his control of the statist institutions of the PLO and of its sources of ‘rent’ to co-opt the Left and maintain his position internally.

By the end of May 1982, the PLO had a remarkably accurate picture of Israeli war plans. The PLO expected one of two scenarios. The first envisaged armoured attacks through Nabatiyya and Tyre linking up with amphibious landings at Qasmiyya or Zahrani, with heliborne or naval diversions at other points and a possible thrust towards Hasbayya. The IDF might also circle round Sidon to link up with a major troop landing at the Awwali river estuary to the north, and then drive towards a second beachhead at Damur. The PLO apparently viewed the latter option as unlikely. The PLO concluded that in either case the IDF would halt south of Sidon within five days, at which point the superpowers would impose a ceasefire and resume the peace process. This was a major misreading of Israeli and US aims, but otherwise the PLO accurately anticipated the IDF's plans.

In the immediate wake of its departure from Beirut, the mainstream PLO leadership was less concerned to reassess past performance than to obtain what it saw as the political dues it had earned by dint of sheer survival. The publication of the Reagan plan five days earlier indicated that the US administration had come to the conclusion that lasting stability in the region required resolution of the Palestinian problem, and the PLO and Arab states hoped to seize the opportunity. The cautious PLO response to the Reagan plan equally reflected recognition of the greatly reduced state of its bargaining power. Furthermore, an independent Palestinian state was to be established with Jerusalem as its capital. Arafat explained that this formulation made peace contingent on the establishment of a Palestinian state, but the implicit exchange was PLO willingness to recognize Israel and negotiate on the basis of UNSCR.

The surprise visit by Arafat to Cairo showed that the loss of the territorial base in Lebanon had freed the mainstream Palestinian leadership to undertake controversial steps in pursuit of its diplomatic strategy. The PLO executive committee adjourned four days later without issuing a formal comment on the matter despite the efforts of PFLP and DFLP representatives. Emboldened, Arafat renewed his effort to obtain PLO participation in the peace process. The PLO chairman suggested that Israel and the PLO should exchange mutual recognition, but the Israeli cabinet summarily rejected his proposals. Arafat may not have expected a positive response in fact, and probably made these overtures as a means of buying time, as part of a general political strategy that included bringing the Iran-Iraq war to a close, restoring Egypt to the Arab fold, and involving the Maghrib more actively in the affairs of the Arab Mashriq.

Despite stout denials from the PLO leadership in exile and local activists alike, the intifada reached a stalemate in the Spring of 1989. So, by the same token, did PLO diplomacy. Furthermore, the official dialogue with the US was not progressing well. The first round of talks in December dealt only with procedural matters, while at the second, the US side refused to discuss anything but ending terrorism. President George Bush and secretary of state James Baker raised PLO hopes in following weeks by calling for an end to Israeli occupation and the achievement of Palestinian political rights, but then dismayed it by limiting the dialogue to discussion of a proposal for peace talks. Further discussion of the Soviet Jewish ‘menace’ took place amidst the sharp escalation of tensions between the US, Israel, and Iraq, and The PLO had drawn steadily closer to Iraq.

The start of pinprick raids against Israel by Fateh at the beginning of 1965 provoked strong reactions. The PLO immediately denied any connection with al-Asifa, and insisted that Palestinian operations should be conducted solely by the PLA. It insisted on taking direct charge of PLA finance, equipment, armament, and the appointment, promotion, or dismissal of officers. Shuqayris protest that the PLO had no desire to exercise sovereign rule over Gaza had little impact. The PLO may have entertained unrealistic expectations of the military capability and administrative autonomy it could acquire. With the establishment of the 421 Battalion, the PLA reached its full strength. The PLO was caught in a paradox. The diplomatic recognition and military capability it received from the Arab states enhanced its stature among the Palestinians, but also raised expectations it could not meet. The contrast with Fateh further eroded its political credibility.

The failure of their enterprise in the occupied territories left the guerrilla groups in flux, much as the June 1967 war had brought the legitimacy of the PLO leadership into question. Yet, as in 1948, defeat gave a new impetus to Palestinian nationalism. The debacle of the Arab states and armies, the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza by a despised Israel, and the exodus of another 300,000 refugees demolished many social and political certainties to which Palestinians clung. The challenge now was to embody their distinct national identity in an autonomous political institution. Armed struggle was the means for the emerging guerrilla movement both to assert its legitimacy and to carve out the sanctuary it needed in the Arab confrontation states. For a nationalist movement that lacked economic or social control over its constituency, it was also a means of political outbidding and manipulative mobilization.

A rich history of civic organizing in El Salvador and the Palestinian territories undergirded the mass mobilization of the 1970s and 1980s. These mobilization efforts and much of the associational life that grew out of them were responses to conflicts with long historical roots. This chapter explains the historical roles of the political-military organizations of the FLMN and PLO in mass mobilization in the two cases. It then traces the evolution of mass mobilization and associational life leading to the beginning of the conflicttopeace transition in each case, including the development of mass based women’s organizing in both cases.