Page 28 - Encyclopedia Of Terrorism

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many others began to defect from the PLO leader’s
ABBAS, MUHAMMAD control.
“ABU” (1948– ) Abbas became a member of the PLO executive
committee in 1984, and his close association with
aka Muhammad Zaidan
Arafat and the PLO soon came under international
scrutiny. Four PLF members hijacked the Achille
Muhammad “Abu” Abbas is the leader of the Lauro on October 7, 1985, off Port Said, Egypt, as it
Palestine Liberation Front–Abu Abbas Faction (PLF), sailed toward Israel. Abbas’s men demanded the
a Marxist militant group perhaps best known for release of 50 Palestinians held in Israel and threat-
its hijacking of the Achille Lauro cruise ship in 1985. ened to blow up the ship. They held hundreds of pas-
Abbas was a member of the Palestine Liberation sengers hostage for two days. During the ordeal, the
Organization (PLO) executive committee for many hijackers shot and killed an elderly Jewish man in a
years, remaining loyal to Yasir Arafat during the wheelchair named Leon Klinghoffer and threw his
1980s when many other militant Palestinian leaders body overboard.
split with the PLO. While the Achille Lauro was in the hands of the
Abbas was born in 1948 in Haifa, in what is now hijackers, Abbas negotiated with Egyptian officials
Israel. He has often told interviewers that he was just and secured safe passage to Tunisia for himself, the
13 days old when his family fled to a refugee camp hijackers, and another PLF official in return for the
in Lebanon. He reportedly joined the PLO’s army hostages’release. An EgyptAir plane carrying the PLF
in 1964, and fought with the Vietcong against U.S. members took off for Tunisia, but U.S. Air Force
forces in Vietnam. fighter jets forced the plane to land in Sicily, where
Abbas joined Ahmed Jibril’s Popular Front for the Italian forces arrested three of the hijackers. Abbas
Liberation of Palestine–General Command (PFLP–GC) and other PLF members, however, fled to the former
in the late 1960s. In 1977, he became alienated by the Yugoslavia with the help of Italian authorities,
pro-Syrian leanings of the PFLP-GC and left to form provoking protests by the U.S. government.
the PLF. As a leader of the PLF, Abbas plotted several Abbas has repeatedly claimed that the hijacking
unorthodox attacks on Israel. In 1981, PLF members was a mistake and that he had planned for his men to
attempted to invade Israel by flying over the Lebanese travel undercover on the Achille Lauro until it docked
border in hang gliders and a hot air balloon; both at Ashdod, Israel. The PLF subsequently moved its
attempts were foiled by the Israeli military. base of operations to Iraq.
Abbas was deputy secretary of the PLF when Abbas has never served time in jail, although an
the group split into three factions: pro-Arafat and Italian court tried him in absentia for his leadership
his Palestine Liberation Organization, pro-Syrian, role in the Achille Lauro hijacking and sentenced him
and pro-Libyan. Abbas led the pro-PLO faction to life in prison. The U.S. Department of Justice
and remained loyal to Arafat during the 1980s when dropped its international warrant for Abbas’s arrest

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