Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

540 • POPULAR FRONT FOR THE LIBERATION OF PALESTINEon 1 July 1976. Likewise, terrorists of the PFLP and RAF hijacked aLufthansa plane to Mogadishu, Somalia, on 13 October 1977 to forcethe German government to release several imprisoned RAF terroristsheld in Germany, but commandos of West Germany’s counterterrorismstrike force Grenzschutzgruppe-9 (GSG-9) foiled these hijackersin the 18 October 1977 Mogadishu hijacking rescue.The brutality of these operations, which were directed very deliberatelyat innocent civilians, drew forth so much international condemnationand caused such embarrassment to the backers of the PFLP that,by the end of the 1970s, the PFLP came around to the al Fatah positionthat terrorist actions should be confined to Israeli targets withinthe boundaries of Israel and those territories under Israeli occupation.Dr. George Habash was highly esteemed throughout the Palestiniancommunity and was considered a figure of integrity as well as the outstandingrepresentative of the more radical Pan-Arabist position withinthe PLO. Therefore, his decision to acquiesce in, or else to resist, thePLO’s renunciation of terrorism outside Israel and Israeli-occupied territoriescarried great weight and had far-reaching consequences.Habash resigned as PFLP chair in 2000 in favor of Abu Ali MustafaZubari, whom Israel allowed to return to the West Bank after 32years’ exile in Damascus, but Zubari was killed by an Israeli helicoptergunship attack on the PFLP office in Ramallah on 27 August 2001in retaliation for the PFLP assassination of Meir Lixenberg, a leaderof four Israeli settlements in the West Bank. In retaliation for the killingof Zubari, the PFLP assassinated the Israeli minister of tourism,Rehavam Zeevi, on 17 October 2001. Zubari was succeeded as leaderof the PFLP by Ahmad Saadat, who was arrested by the PalestinianAuthority in January 2002 in response to U.S., Israeli, and Britishdemands that the perpetrators of the Zeevi assassination be broughtto justice. When Palestinian officials refused to extradite Saadat,Israeli Defense Forces raided the Jericho Prison, seizing Saadat andfive other inmates, whom they removed to Israel for trial.The Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades of the PFLP carried out two suicidebombings in the West Bank during 2002, one at Karnei Shomronon 16 February, killing three Israelis, and the other at Ariel on 7March, which left several wounded. It also carried out a suicidebombing in Netanya, Israel, on 19 May 2002, killing six Israelis. On25 December 2003 it carried out a suicide bombing in a bus stationin Petah Tikvah, Israel. Another suicide attack on 1 November 2004