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New PLO leaders visit Pali refugees; promise guns, butter
[I]n a stark testimony to the difficulties ahead for the new Palestinian leadership, Mahmoud Abbas and Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia stayed away from the largest refugee camp, Ein el-Hilweh, home to rival Palestinian factions. Under heavy guard, the leaders instead laid a wreath at a martyrs' monument in the southern city of Sidon before going to Rashidiyeh, a camp of 17,000 people dominated by their Fatah loyalists. Hundreds of uniformed and armed guerrillas were deployed in the narrow streets of Rashidiyeh, near the port city of Tyre, to protect the leaders. It was the first visit to Lebanon by senior Palestinian officials since PLO guerrillas were driven from the country in 1982. Crowds of men, women and children, estimated at about 5,000, carried Palestinian flags or pictures of Abbas and Yasser Arafat. Children fresh from classes joined the elderly at a playground for the Fatah-arranged rally, applauding repeatedly on hearing Arafat's name. Both Abbas and Qureia reassured the crowd the new Palestinian leadership will not compromise their rights. "We cannot fill the vacuum left behind by Yasser Arafat," said Abbas. "We will try through the institutions to fill this vacuum and continue the mission and fulfill the trust." He said all Arafat's principles — including establishment of an independent Palestinian state and the right of return — "amounted to a will that must be complied with by every Palestinian." Qureia said: "We will not compromise over this (return) right. We will cling to it and we will struggle for it." He reiterated that east Jerusalem should be the capital of any future Palestinian state. Although the refugees cannot vote, their sheer numbers — 350,000 in Lebanon alone — and the fact that their cause has been at the center of the political dispute makes them a crucial constituency. "We support the good man," said 88-year-old Saeed Ghrayel, who fled his home near Lake Tiberias in 1948. "We are with Fatah and the PLO. We put our trust in them. They are responsible for us," he said. Posted by: Seafarious 2004-12-09 |
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