Whither Fatah?
Daoud Kuttab speculates on the future of Fatah, which, despite its victory at the UN, is experiencing a crisis of leadership among Palestinians.
When Palestinian student activists in Kuwait decided that they needed to take matters into their own hands to liberate Palestine, they chose Lebanon as the country that they wanted to launch the first armed attack against the “Zionists” on the first day of 1965.
Those planning for and supporting the attack issued their first press release in Kuwait. They weren’t sure how to sign it. They called their movement Harakat al-Taharur al-Watania al-Falastinia — the Palestinian National Liberation Movement. They wanted a shorter name and tried to figure out the movement’s acronym as a guide. The Arabic acronym, spelled HATF (doom), was unappealing. So the young leaders reversed the letters to come up with Fatah.
That first day in 1965, when the press release bearing Fatah’s name was distributed to the world, has since become the anniversary of the leading Palestinian national movement. Within a few years, the founders of Fatah, including Yasser Arafat, Khalil Wazir (abu Jihad), Salah Khalaf (Abu Iyad) and Mahmoud Abbas, were able to take charge of an Arab League creation: the Palestine Liberation Organization.
At the time of the launch of Fatah, only half of Palestine was under Israeli control and the big talking point was the right of return for the Palestinian refugees who were being kicked around the region like a political football.
