Death Becomes Them
David Lange
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Over the past day or so, the grim reaper visited two very evil people – PLO Arab terrorist Abu Abbas and convicted sniper John Allen Muhammad.
Actually, in Muhammad’s case, the grim reaper only visited to tell him that he will be seeing him soon.
And in the true tradition of evil people, Muhammad expressed no remorse – only denial.
Just like I said at the beginning, I had nothing to do with this, and I’ll say again, I had nothing to do with this,” Muhammad said.
Meanwhile, arch terrorist Abbas, who hijacked the Achille Lauro cruise ship, has now met the grim ferryman. And here is more on his dastardly deeds.
Abbas’ small Palestine Liberation Front commandeered the Italian cruise ship, demanded the release of 50 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and threw an elderly wheelchair-bound Jewish American tourist, Leon Klinghoffer, overboard after shooting him.
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Abbas had been a marginal figure in the PLO of late. He was a member of the PLO’s executive committee, but left in 1991. His tiny faction has very few followers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. According to Israel’s Shin Bet security service, the PLF had sent some members to Iraq for military training.
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In 1998, he returned to attend a session of the Palestine National Council, the Palestinians’ parliament-in-exile, for a crucial vote on abrogating chapters of the PLO founding charter calling for Israel’s destruction. In the end, Abbas did not participate in the vote.
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Abbas disappeared, and international manhunts and a price on his head failed to flush him out. He next turned up in Gaza after granted amnesty by the Israelis.
While out of the limelight for the past decade, Abbas is believed to have continued plying the terror trade from Iraq until his April capture.
Israeli intelligence officials say the PLF faction under Abbas was a conduit for Saddam Hussein’s payments to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers.
Israel reported earlier this year that it captured several Palestinians who trained at a PLF camp in Iraq and were told by Abbas to attack an Israeli airport and other targets.
Abbas was born in 1948 in the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Syria after his family fled from their home in Tira, near Haifa, when the state of Israel was created.
He attended Damascus University and graduated with a degree in Arab literature. He also became involved in student politics and in 1967 joined George Habash’s Marxist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
He fought as a guerrilla, as often against rival Palestinian factions as the Israelis. But Abbas and others felt that group was focusing too much on political philosophy rather than armed struggle.
In 1976, Abbas took his followers to form a new faction, the Palestine Liberation Front.
Of course, there are some who like to gloss over his past (Hat tip: Meryl Yourish).
Abu Abbas, whose name actually was Mohammed Abbas, led a faction of the Palestine Liberation Front, a Palestinian splinter group.
His faction operated out of Tunisia until the October 1985 attack on the Achille Lauro, after which it relocated to Iraq. His group was also responsible for some attacks in Israel. Abbas was a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s executive committee from 1984 but left in 1991.
I am surprised that Al Bawaba did not throw in a couple of “yada yada yadas”.
Update: Predictably, the Palestinian Liberation Front (PLF) has blamed the US for Abbas’ murder, saying that they “failed to give Abbas medication to treat his heart condition.” He had a heart?
Update: Even more predictably, the PLF are also blaming Israel for his murder.
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David Lange
