MARWAN BARGHOUTI

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What is the role of Marwan Barghouti with the Palestinian Arabs?

Marwan Barghouti was born on June 5, 1960, in the West Bank, outside of Ramallah, the son of a farmer. He was one of the founders of the Shabiba, the Fatah youth organization. Fatah is the largest constituent organization in the PLO, and is headed personally by Yasser Arafat. Schooled in Hebrew during his time in Israeli jails, Barghouti was a field Fatah leader during the first intifada of 1987, when he was deported by Israel. Barghouti served in PLO headquarters in Tunisia. He returned to the West Bank in 1994 and was elected to the Palestinian Legislative Council of the Palestinian Authority, created by the 1995 Oslo II Interim Agreement, in 1996.

Barghouti initially came into prominence because of his willingness to speak out against the corruption of the Palestinian Authority leadership. He tried to distinguish himself from "the Tunisians," the PLO exile leadership that accompanied Yasser Arafat to the West Bank and Gaza Strip with the implementation of the Oslo accords.

In 1995, Arafat set up the Tanzim ("organization" in Arabic) as a paramilitary force of the Fatah, separate from the Palestinian Authority. This provided Arafat a certain distance and deniability regarding its attacks on Israelis, instead of his using the Palestinian Authority security services. Nonetheless, Arafat directly arms and finances the Tanzim. Barghouti, who helped found the Tanzim, is regarded as its commander, with Arafat's full backing. When Barghouti lost the election for the position of General Secretary of Fatah, Arafat cancelled the election results.

Barghouti has self-confessed to a central role in the contrived opening moves of the al-Aqsa intifada which has taken thousands of lives, Israeli and Palestinian Arab, since its start in 2001. At the same time he aspires to be successor to Yasser Arafat and needs to portray himself as a moderate to the West.

Barghouti wrote an op-ed piece in the Washington Post on January 16, 2002, presenting himself as a reasonable Palestinian leader with limited political aims, who also renounces terrorism and advocates only the Palestinian Arabs' right to self-defense:

• And while I, and the Fatah movement to which I belong, strongly oppose attacks and the targeting of civilians inside Israel (emphasis added), our future neighbor, I reserve the right to protect myself, to resist the Israeli occupation of my country and to fight for my freedom.

Yet the next day, a member of Fatah's Tanzim militia attacked a Bat Mitzvah party in Hadera, killing six civilians and wounding over thirty. Israeli security sources have firmly established that Marwan Barghouti knew of the Hadera attack in advance, and gave it his blessing. Barghouti is on Israel's wanted list in connection with this Tanzim terrorist operation, and others. He denies accusations that he participates in military operations.

The New Yorker magazine (July 9, 2001) published a "Letter From Gaza," where Barghouti was asked what would Israel have to do to bring an end to the intifada? He replied:

• We need one hundred per cent of Gaza, one hundred per cent of the West Bank, one hundred per cent of East Jerusalem, and the right of return for refugees.

It was then pointed out that former Prime Minister Ehud Barak had, at the Camp David summit in 2000, offered the Palestinians a series of dramatic concessions, close to Barghouti's list of demands: a free Gaza, around ninety per cent of the West Bank, a capital in East Jerusalem, and so on. Barghouti responded:

• No! Nothing less than a hundred per cent is acceptable.

And if you get a hundred per cent? Will that end the conflict? His reply:

• Then we could talk about bigger things. I've always thought that a good idea would be one state for all the peoples.

Moderate? In Barghouti's thinking, there is no room for a Jewish State of Israel.

In March and April of 2002, during Israel's Operation Defensive Shield, documents were discovered in Yasser Arafat's Ramallah compound demonstrating that the "al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade" is directed by Marwan Barghouti, who passes concrete instructions to Al-Aqsa operatives. The al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, a cover name for a reorganization of Fatah, was declared a terrorist organization by the US after a series of deadly attacks against Israel were attributed to them.

On April 15, 2002 Israeli security forces arrested Barghouti in Ramallah, part of Israel's Operation Defensive Shield. He was tried in Israeli courts for a series of murders and other crimes where he was linked by evidence. In May of 2004 he was convicted of the murder of five civilians and of involvement in four terror attacks. On June 6, 2004 he was given five consecutive life sentences plus an additional 40 years in prison (20 years for attempted murder and another 20 for membership in a terror organization).

Sources and additional reading on this topic:

• Marwan Barghouti
• Marwan Barghouti, Fatah-Tanzim, and the Escalation of the Intifada
• Fawning Over Barghouti
• Yasser Arafat's "Mukata'a" Compound in Ramallah - A Center for Controlling and Supporting Terrorism
• Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade
• Documents captured by Israel detail Arafat's terror offensive