The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) on Monday accused Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas of cutting off its monthly funds, which it receives from the Palestine Liberation Organization’s (PLO) Palestinian National Fund.
PFLP, a Palestinian Communist terror organization, is the second largest faction in the PLO after Abbas’ Fatah. Unlike Fatah and PLO, which both had their status as recognized terrorist organizations removed in the 1994 Oslo Accords, PFLP still is recognized as a terror group.
According to the PFLP, funds for February and March haven’t been delivered due to Abbas’ decision.
While Abbas apparently didn’t give an explicit reason for pulling PFLP’s funding, it is speculated he took the move following PFLP’s harsh criticism of him and his security cooperation with the IDF.
Rabah Muhanna, a senior PFLP official, said his group found out about the move a few days ago and that Abbas did not consult with other PLO factions about his decision.
“This is an individual decision. We will bring it before the PLO Executive Committee for discussion. We will also raise the issue before Abbas himself,” said Muhanna.
Hamas also condemned Abbas on Monday, with its spokesperson Sami Abu Zuhri saying, “Abbas uses money to extort political concessions and pass agendas that are rejected nationally.” Abu Zuhri said Hamas appreciates PFLP’s positions, and called on Abbas to retract the move.
Zulfikar Shiverjo, a member of PFLP’s central committee, told al-Ain that Abbas did not give a reason for pulling the funds, which amount to $70,000 a month.
He speculated Abbas is attacking PFLP for its opposition to some of his policies, without specifying which policies.
The reason?
A possible indication for Abbas’ sudden anger with PFLP may be found on the Communist terror group’s website, where just last Sunday the group condemned him.
The condemnation came after Abbas gave an interview to Channel 2 in which he promised to continue the security cooperation with Israel, and made statements against the wave of Arab terror attacks.
In its statement published on its site last Sunday, PFLP called on the PLO and its institutions to “confront…Abbas’s remarks to Zionist media as well as the PA’s delegation to pay condolences on the death of a so-called ‘Civil Administration’ occupation official in the West Bank.”
The reference is to a delegation Abbas sent to give condolences over the death of Brig. Gen. Munir Amar, head of the Civil Administration in Judea and Samaria, who died in a plane crash in the Galilee last month.
The PFLP said Abbas’ “shameful behavior” exhibits “subservience to the structures of the occupation and its mechanisms of repression. These actions cross all of the lines and traditions of the Palestinian people and undermine the Palestinian national liberation movement and its principles and decisions, the most recent being the Palestinian Central Council’s decisions to end security coordination with the occupation.”
After noting that the security cooperation has met with “popular opposition and outrage,” PFLP called on the PLO and its institutions to “hold the PA president accountable before the Palestinian people.”
It also denounced “the disgraceful statements of Abbas concerning the PA searching and surveilling schoolchildren on the pretext of ‘searching for knives’ while Palestinian children face the Zionist war machine daily at the checkpoints and barriers of death, and in the streets of Palestinian cities in the West Bank and in Jerusalem.”
“This is a direct attack on the Palestinian education system, whether universities or elementary and secondary schools, and the stigmatization of the intifada and resistance as ‘terror,'” added the terror group, opposing the seizure of knives that Abbas mentioned in his interview.
PFLP’s leader Ahmad Sa’adat was sentenced to 30 years in jail in 2008 for heading the terrorist group.
He was accused of planning the 2001 assassination of Tourism Minister Rehavam “Gandhi” Ze’evi, which was committed by four PFLP terrorists in Jerusalem; the PA has lauded Sa’adat on numerous occasions for the murder.
