Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

36 • ARAFAT, YASIRgovernment created it in 1969 mainly to extend its influence withinthe Palestinian movement and within Lebanon. This has brought thegroup into conflict with other groups in Lebanon enjoying Syrian statesponsorship, such as Amal. Apart from its role in Lebanon, the Fronthas conducted some armed raids into Israeli territory. This group helpedform part of the Rejection Front in 1974 opposed to the peace overturesof Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Chairman YasirArafat and was originally led by Abdul Rahim Ahmad, one of Arafat’scritics. Currently the ALF is led by Rakad Salam, imprisoned by Israel,while it gained a seat (now held by Mahmud Ismail) in the PLO Executive.This group, which used to be supported by the Iraqi regime underSaddam Hussein, has been largely inactive since the 1990s and is notcurrently listed as a Foreign Terrorist Organization by the U.S. Departmentof State, nor is it listed as a proscribed terrorist group by either theEuropean Union or the United Nations.ARAFAT, YASIR (1929–2004). Given name, Abdul-Rahman Abdul-Rauf Arafat al Qudwa al Hussayni, aka Abu Ammar, Yasir Arafatwas the head of the al Fatah group from the early 1960s and wasconcurrently chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization(PLO) from February 1969. Although his official biography statedhis birthplace as Jerusalem, Arafat was actually born in Cairo, Egypt,into a Palestinian family reputedly related to the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem,Mohammed Amin al Husseini, who played a key role in organizingand leading Palestinians against the Israelis during the firstArab-Israeli war. Arafat studied engineering at Cairo University inthe 1940s and 1950s, where he met other Palestinians such as Khalilal Wazir and Salah Khalaf, who become cofounders of al Fatah withArafat in 1957, originally a secret group that surfaced in 1959.Following the defeat of the Arab states in the 1967 war, al Fatahundertook guerrilla warfare with Israel, and its popularity, togetherwith that of Arafat, grew among the Palestinians, allowing Arafat andother guerrilla leaders to take over control of the PLO in 1969.Arafat survived a number of challenges to his preeminence in theleadership of the PLO. In 1974 leftist and pro-Syrian groups, whichcoexisted with al Fatah within the framework of the PLO, formed aRejection Front in protest to Arafat’s willingness after the October1973 war to adopt diplomatic initiatives on behalf of the Palestiniansrather than relying on armed struggle. Although al Fatah was respon-