Middle East Information Resource
Political Entities - Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command is a small splinter group of a few hundred armed men that seceded from the PFLP in April 1968, shortly after its formation. Since then it has been led by Ahmad Jibril, a former Engineering Officer in the Syrian army, who had been active in the pre-1967 guerrilla group "Palestine Liberation Front."
The organization gave dedicated itself to the armed struggle against Israel. It assumed a radical leftist position by opposing "reactionary" Arab regimes. It operates in tightly organized clandestine cells, but its composition and internal processes have remained secret. Its military operations are daring, highy professional, and innovative. They frequently experiment with new devices and military methods. They have staged hijackings and air bombing of foreign aircrafts, and mass killing of hostages.
The PFLP-GC`s does not appear to be ideologically oriented. It has been closely linked politically and militarily to Syria since its establishment, and followed the Syrian line. It has always been based primarily in Syria, with additional bases in Lebanon. It has also had Libyan support. The PFLP-GC has differed with the PLO over tactics of guerrilla attacks against Israeli in 1981 and 1982, but it collaborated in the main with the PLO, until the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. This cooperation came to an end following the rift between the PLO and Syria, after the evacuation of Beirut.
In 1983 it joined the Syrian-backed anti-Ararat coalition and fought his forces in the Tripoli area of northern Lebanon. In 1985 it attained great prestige due to its success in obtaining the release of 1150 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli prisons in returned for three Israeli soldiers captured in Lebanon in 1982. It did not participate in the reconciliation of 1987. Since the Oslo Accords, the PFLP-GC has been part of the alignment of Palestinian Syrian-backed opposition groups, the "Ten Front."